1781 in Great Britain

Incumbents

• Monarch – George III
• Prime Minister – Frederick North, Lord North

Events

• 1 January – Industrial Revolution: The Iron Bridge opens across the River Severn.
• 3 February – Fourth Anglo-Dutch War: Capture of Sint Eustatius – British forces led by General John Vaughan and Admiral George Rodney take the Dutch Caribbean island of Sint Eustatius, with only a few shots fired. On 26 November it is retaken by Dutch-allied French forces.
• 5 January – American Revolutionary War: Richmond, Virginia, is burned by British naval forces led by Benedict Arnold.
• 6 January – Battle of Jersey: British troops prevent the French from occupying Jersey in the Channel Islands.
• 17 January – American Revolutionary War: the American Continental Army under Daniel Morgan decisively defeats British forces at the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina.
• January – William Pitt the Younger, later Prime Minister, enters Parliament, aged 21.
• 3 February – American Revolutionary War and Fourth Anglo-Dutch War: The Dutch Caribbean island of Sint Eustatius surrenders to Admiral Rodney.
• 28 February – foundation of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester.
• 13 March – Sir William Herschel discovers the planet Uranus. Originally he calls it Georgium Sidus in honour of King George III.
• 15 March – American Revolutionary War: American General Nathanael Greene loses the Battle of Guilford Court House to British.
• 1 July – Second Anglo-Mysore War: at the Battle of Porto Novo, the British defeat the Mysore ruler Hyder Ali.
• 6 July – American Revolutionary War: At the Battle of Green Spring, the British led by Lord Cornwallis defeat the French led by the Marquis de Lafayette.
• 27 July – French spy François Henri de la Motte executed at Tyburn for high treason.
• 30 August – American Revolutionary War: French fleet under the Comte de Grasse enters Chesapeake Bay, cutting British General Charles Cornwallis off from escape by sea.
• 5 September – American Revolutionary War: in the Battle of the Chesapeake, a British fleet under Thomas Graves arrives and fights de Grasse, but is unable to break through to relieve the Siege of Yorktown.
• 6 September – American Revolutionary War: Battle of Groton Heights – a British force under Benedict Arnold attacks a fort in Groton, Connecticut, achieving a strategic victory.
• 19 October – American Revolutionary War: following the Siege of Yorktown, General Charles Cornwallis surrenders to General George Washington at Yorktown, Virginia, ending the armed struggle of the American Revolutionary War.
• 29 November
• * Zong massacre: English slave traders begin to throw approximately 142 slaves taken on in Accra overboard alive from the slave ship Zong in the Caribbean Sea to conserve supplies for the remainder; the Liverpool owners subsequently attempt to reclaim part of their value from insurers.
• * Henry Hurle officially founds the Ancient Order of Druids in London.
• 3 December – first known building society established, in Birmingham.
• 12 December – American Revolutionary War: Second Battle of Ushant – the Royal Navy, commanded by Rear Admiral Richard Kempenfelt in, decisively defeats the French fleet in the Bay of Biscay.
• Last year in which the monarch participates in a regular peacetime meeting of the Cabinet.

Publications

• Peter Beckford's Thoughts on Hunting.
• Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volumes 2 and 3.
• John Wood, the Younger's pattern book A Series of Plans for Cottages or Habitations of the Labourer.
• The collection of children's poetry Mother Goose's Melody.

Births

• 21 February – Bulkeley Bandinel, scholar-librarian
• 29 May – John Walker, inventor
• 9 June – George Stephenson, locomotive engineer
• 6 July – Stamford Raffles, founder of Singapore
• 8 July – Tom Cribb, bare-knuckle boxer
• 14 September – James Walker, Scottish civil engineer
• 3 November – Sarah Elizabeth Utterson, translator and author
• 6 November – Lucy Aikin, English writer
• 30 November – Alexander Berry, adventurer and Australian pioneer
• 11 December – Sir David Brewster, physicist

Deaths

• 12 January – Richard Challoner, Catholic prelate
• 21 February – Matchem, racehorse
• 24 February – Edward Capell, critic
• 19 April – Elizabeth Raffald, cookery writer and entrepreneur
• 23 April – James Abercrombie, general
• 8 May – Richard Jago, poet
• 17 May – William Aislabie, politician
• 28 September – William Henry Nassau de Zuylestein, 4th Earl of Rochford, diplomat and statesman
• 16 October – Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke, naval officer