1866 in Wales

This article is about the particular significance of the year 1866 to Wales and its people.

Incumbents

5 February — Railway contractor Thomas Savin goes bankrupt, resulting in a temporary halt in the construction of the Aberystwith and Welsh Coast Railway.
31 March — The last public execution in Wales takes place as Robert Coe is hanged in Swansea.
1 May — Wrexham, Mold and Connah's Quay Railway opens to passengers.
July — Launch of Yr Australydd, a Welsh language Calvinistic Methodist newspaper, in Victoria (Australia), edited by William Meirion Evans and Theophilus Williams.
5 September — The Pembroke and Tenby Railway is extended for passengers to Whitland.
6 September — Six people are killed in a railway derailment near Criccieth.
September — The song Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau — later to become the official national anthem of Wales — is sung for the first time at the National Eisteddfod held at Chester.
17 October — First confirmed death from a cholera epidemic in Carnarvon.
December — The Talyllyn Railway officially opens.
Sir George Gilbert Scott begins work on the renovation of Bangor Cathedral.
The Baptist Union of Wales is established.
Whiteford Lighthouse on Gower, the only remaining large wave-swept cast-iron lighthouse built in the UK, is first lit.
Edward Gordon Douglas is created Baron Penrhyn.
Morris Brothers department store established at Tenby; it will still be trading 150 years later.

Cricket — Hawarden Park Cricket Club is founded, reputedly by William Ewart Gladstone.
Rugby football — First competitive game played in Wales, between college teams at Lampeter.

13 January — Frank Hill, Wales international rugby captain
21 January — Sir Owen Cox, politician and businessman in Australia
22 March — Willie Thomas, Wales international rugby captain
1 April — Sir William Henry Hoare Vincent, diplomat
18 April — Frederick Llewellyn-Jones, lawyer and politician
20 April — Sir John Milsom Rees, laryngologist
30 May — John Gruffydd Moelwyn Hughes, minister and poet
5 August — Sir Edward Anwyl, Celtic scholar
7 August — Charles Granville Bruce, mountaineer
13 August - William Finney, cricketer
24 August — Caesar Jenkyns, footballer
4 October — Robert Jones (Trebor Aled), poet
12 October — James Ramsay MacDonald, politician
4 November — Sir David William Evans, lawyer, public servant and Wales international rugby player,
5 November — Daniel Protheroe, conductor and choirmaster
14 November — Tom Morgan Wales international rugby player
24 November — Alexander Bland, Wales international rugby player
4 December — Dai Lewis, rugby union forward who played international rugby for Wales
10 December — Stanley L. Wood, illustrator
date unknown — David Delta Evans, journalist, author, and Unitarian minister