Events from the year 1841 in the United Kingdom.
Incumbents
Monarch – Victoria
Prime Minister – William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne (Whig) (until 30 August); Robert Peel (Conservative) (starting 30 August) Foreign Secretary – Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (until 2 September) George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen (starting 2 September) Parliament – 13th (until 23 June), 14th (starting 19 August)
Events
4 January – City of Dublin Steam Packet Company is wrecked on the Western Rocks, Isles of Scilly, with the loss of 61 of the 65 on board; at least 20 other ships run aground round the British Isles today. 20 January – Convention of Chuenpi agreed between Charles Elliot and Qishan of the Qing dynasty. 26 January – the United Kingdom formally occupies Hong Kong. 27 January – the active volcano Mount Erebus in Antarctica is discovered and named by James Clark Ross. 28 January – Ross discovers the "Victoria Barrier", later known as the Ross Ice Shelf. February – H. Fox Talbot obtains a patent for the calotype process in photography. 10 February – Penny Red postage stamp replaces the Penny Black. 20 February – the Governor Fenner, carrying emigrants to America, sinks off Holyhead with the loss of 123 lives. 1 March – opening throughout of the Manchester and Leeds Railway, the first to cross the Pennines. 4 March – first performance of Dion Boucicault's comedy London Assurance, presented by Charles Mathews at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. March – Richard Beard opens England's first commercial photographic studio in London, producing daguerreotype portraits. by April – Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew first opens to the public and William Hooker appointed director. 3 May New Zealand becomes a separate British colony, having previously been administered as part of the Colony of New South Wales. London Library opens in Pall Mall. 6 June (Sunday) United Kingdom Census held, the first to record names and approximate ages of every household member and to be administered nationally. Marian Hughes becomes the first woman to take religious vows in communion with the Anglican Province of Canterbury since the Reformation, making them privately to E. B. Pusey in Oxford. 7 June – Lord Melbourne loses a vote of no confidence against his government. 21 June – St. Chad's Cathedral, Birmingham, dedicated as a Roman Catholic church. 29 June–22 July – general election – Sir Robert Peel's Conservatives take control of the House of Commons. 30 June – Great Western Railway completed throughout between London and Bristol. 5 July – Thomas Cook arranges his first excursion, taking 570 temperance campaigners on the Midland Counties Railway from Leicester to a rally in Loughborough. 17 July – first edition of the humorous magazine Punch published. 26 July – the proprietors of The Skerries Lighthouse off Anglesey, the last privately owned light in the British Isles, are awarded £444,984 in compensation for its sale to Trinity House. 28 August – Melbourne resigns as Prime Minister; replaced by Robert Peel. 2 September – reconsecration of Leeds Parish Church after reconstruction. 21 September – the London and Brighton Railway is opened throughout. 24 September – United Kingdom annexes Sarawak from Brunei; James Brooke is appointed rajah. 10 October – First Opium War: Battle of Chinhai – British capture a Chinese garrison. 13 October – First Opium War: British occupy Ningbo. 27 October – Anglican clergyman Richard Sibthorp becomes the first Tractarian to be received into the Roman Catholic Church, by Nicholas Wiseman at St Mary's College, Oscott (he reconverts two years later). 30 October – a fire at the Tower of London destroys its Grand Armoury and causes a quarter of a million pounds worth of damage. 13 November – surgeon James Braid attends his first demonstration of animal magnetism, which leads to his study of the subject he eventually calls hypnotism. 23 December – First Anglo-Afghan War: at a meeting with the Afghan general Akbar Khan, the diplomat Sir William Hay Macnaghten is shot dead at close quarters.
Undated
Antarctic explorer James Clark Ross additionally discovers the Ross Sea, Victoria Land and Mount Terror. Chemical Society of London founded by Thomas Graham. Ulster Canal completed.
Ongoing events
First Opium War (1839–1842) First Anglo-Afghan War (1839–1842)