1922 in the United Kingdom

1922 in the United Kingdom:

Other years

1920 | 1921 | 1922 (1922) | 1923 | 1924

Individual countries of the United Kingdom

England | Ireland | Scotland | Wales

Sport

1922 English cricket season Football: England | Scotland

King George V, 1923

The social and political problems of most prominence in the United Kingdom in 1922 showed a further departure from those that chiefly occupied public attention during World War I, and the country had by then almost returned to its normal condition. Prices continued to fall during the early part of the year, but very slowly as compared with the previous decline, and in the latter half of the year the fall ceased almost entirely, prices becoming comparatively stabilized at about 80% above the level of July 1914. Labour problems, which occupied so much attention during and after the war, were less constantly in the public eye. The principle of inevitable reductions in wages had been accepted by the working classes as a whole, and there were few strikes on a large scale, the worst being that in the engineering trade. Unemployment continued to be very great, but it was recognized that little more could be done by government measures for its alleviation, and the subject was much less prominent in the political world than it had been in the previous year. A further indication of the return to normal conditions was in the gradual decay of the coalition government. The combination of parties brought about in the presence of a common danger no longer worked in peacetime. Very early in the year signs of disintegration became manifest in the coalition. On several occasions the two wings threatened to fall apart, but the government was successfully held together by the personality of Prime Minister David Lloyd George until the last quarter of the year, when the internal dissensions of many months reached a bursting-point, and the coalition collapsed.

Irish affairs occupied an important place in politics throughout the year. 1922 saw the establishment of the Irish Free State in the south and west of the island.

Incumbents

• Monarch - George V
• Prime Minister - David Lloyd George, coalition (until 22 October), Andrew Bonar Law (Conservative) (starting 23 October)

Events

• January - The year begins with the British Empire at its largest extent, covering a quarter of the world and ruling over one in four people on earth.
• 1 January - Transport and General Workers' Union formed by merger of fourteen smaller unions under its first general secretary Ernest Bevin, forming by far the largest trade union.
• 7 January - In Ireland, Dáil Éireann ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty.
• 12 January
  • British government releases remaining Irish prisoners captured in the War of Independence.
  • HMS Victory permanently dry docked at Portsmouth.
• 13 January - Flu epidemic has claimed 804 victims in Britain.
• 24 January - Façade – An Entertainment, poems by Edith Sitwell recited over an instrumental accompaniment by William Walton, first performed, privately in London.
• 1 February - Formal handing over of Beggars Bush Barracks takes place in Dublin, marking the first act of British military withdrawal from Ireland.
• 6 February - Washington Naval Treaty signed between the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, France and Italy.
• 28 February - Unilateral Declaration of Egyptian Independence by the United Kingdom ends its protectorate over Egypt and grants the country nominal independence, reserving control of military and diplomatic matters.
• 29 April - Huddersfield Town win the FA Cup with a 1-0 win over Preston North End in the final at Stamford Bridge, London. From next year, the final will be played at the new stadium being built at Wembley, North London.
• 1 March - The Civil Aviation Authority is established.
• 16 May - The final group of British troops leave the Curragh Camp in Ireland.
• 29 May - British Liberal MP Horatio Bottomley jailed for seven years for fraud.
• 1 June - Official founding of the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
• 22 June - Irish Republican Army agents assassinate Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson in Belgravia; the assassins are sentenced to death on 18 July.
• July - Launch of the Austin 7 car, produced at Longbridge.
• 17 July - County Hall, London opened, as the new headquarters of the London County Council.
• 20 July - Infanticide Act effectively abolishes the death penalty for a woman who deliberately kills her newborn child while the balance of her mind is disturbed as a result of giving birth, by providing a partial defence to murder.
• 17 August - Dublin Castle is formally handed over to the Irish Republican Army as the last British Army troops leave.
• 5 September - An underground explosion at Haig Pit, Whitehaven, in the Cumberland Coalfield, kills 39.
• 8–9 September - Captain Frank L. Barnard wins the first King's Cup Race for aeroplanes, flying from Croydon Aerodrome (London) to Glasgow and back in 6 hours 32 minutes in an Airco DH.4A.
• 7 October - Speaking on the radio station 2LO, the Prince of Wales becomes the first Royal to make a public broadcast.
• 17 October - First Hunger March sets out, from Glasgow to London.
• 18 October - The British Broadcasting Company (BBC) is formed.
• 19 October - David Lloyd George's Coalition Ministry resigns over the Chanak Crisis.
• 23 October - Bonar Law's Conservative government takes office.
• 1 November - A broadcasting licence fee of ten shillings is introduced.
• 2 November - Archaeologist Leonard Woolley begins excavations at the Sumerian city of Ur.
• 4 November - In Egypt, English archaeologist Howard Carter and his men find the entrance to King Tutankhamen's tomb in the Valley of the Kings.
• 14 November - The British Broadcasting Company begins radio service in the United Kingdom, broadcasting from station 2LO in London.
• 15 November
  • General election, the first following the partition of Ireland, won by the Conservative Party under Bonar Law. The Labour Party overtakes the Liberal Party as Britain's second largest political party.
  • First BBC broadcasts from Birmingham (station 5IT) and Manchester (station 2ZY).
• 5 December - UK Parliament enacts the Irish Free State Constitution Act, by which it legally sanctions the new Constitution of the Irish Free State.
• 6 December - The Irish Free State officially comes into existence. George V becomes the Free State's monarch.
• 7 December - The Parliament of Northern Ireland votes to remain part of the United Kingdom.
• 10 December - Francis William Aston wins the Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his discovery, by means of his mass spectrograph, of isotopes, in a large number of non-radioactive elements, and for his enunciation of the whole-number rule".
• 11 December - End of the trial of Edith Thompson and Frederick Bywaters at the Old Bailey in London for the murder of Thompson's husband. Both found guilty and sentenced to death.
• 18 December - Carrie Morrison becomes the first woman solicitor admitted to practice in England.
• 24 December - First BBC broadcast from Newcastle upon Tyne (station 5NO).

BP Motor Spirit advert, 1922

Undated

• Meteorologist Lewis Fry Richardson proposes a scheme for weather forecasting by solution of differential equations, the method used today, in his work Weather Prediction by Numerical Process.
• Archibald Hill wins the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for his discovery relating to the production of heat in the muscle". This award is announced on 25 October 1923.
• Urdd Gobaith Cymru founded in Wales by Ifan ab Owen Edwards.
• Production of Branston Pickle by Crosse & Blackwell begins at Branston, Staffordshire.

Publications

• Edmund Blunden's collection The Shepherd, and Other Poems of Peace and War.
• Barbara Cartland's first novel Jigsaw.
• Agatha Christie's novel The Secret Adversary.
• Richmal Crompton's children's stories Just William (first collected in book form).
• John Drinkwater's poems Preludes 1921–1922.
• T. S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land, in the first issue of The Criterion (15 October).
• Thomas Hardy's collection Late Lyrics and Earlier, with Many Other Verses.
• James Joyce's novel Ulysses (first published complete in book form by Sylvia Beach in Paris, 2 February).
• Isaac Rosenberg's Poems (posthumous).
• Sacheverell Sitwell's collection The Hundred and One Harlequins, and Other Poems.
• Virginia Woolf's novel Jacob's Room.

Births

• 20 January - Elizabeth Diana Percy, Duchess of Northumberland (died 2012)
• 21 January - Paul Scofield, actor (died 2008)
• 26 January - Michael Bentine, actor (died 1996)
• 6 February
  • Patrick Macnee, actor (died 2015)
  • Denis Norden, television and radio scriptwriter
• 7 February - Hattie Jacques, actress (died 1980)
• 9 February - Jim Laker, cricketer (died 1986)
• 26 February - Margaret Leighton, actress (died 1976)
• 9 March - Tommy Cooper, comedian and magician (died 1984)
• 5 April
  • Tom Finney, footballer (died 2014)
  • Christopher Hewett, actor (died 2001)
• 13 April - John Braine, novelist (died 1986)
• 16 April - Kingsley Amis, novelist (died 1995)
• 28 April - Alistair MacLean, writer (died 1987)
• 27 May - Christopher Lee, film actor (died 2015)
• 31 May - Denholm Elliott, film actor (died 1992)
• 26 June - Alan T. Peacock, economist (died 2014)
• 21 July - Mollie Sugden, actress (died 2009)
• 6 August - Freddie Laker, airline entrepreneur (died 2006)
• 9 August - Philip Larkin, poet (died 1985)
• 22 August - Dave Freeman, scriptwriter (Benny Hill, Carry On films, etc.) (died 2005)
• 5 October - Jock Stein, footballer and manager of Scotland (died 1985)
• 16 October - Max Bygraves, singer and entertainer (died 2012)
• 26 December - Richard Mayes, actor (died 2006)

Deaths

• 5 January - Sir Ernest Shackleton, explorer (born 1874)
• 3 February - John Butler Yeats, Irish-born portrait artist (born 1839)
• 24 March - Walter Parr, preacher (born 1871)
• 10 April - John Benn, politician (born 1850)
• 14 May - Mary Victoria Hamilton, Scottish-German-French great-grandmother of Prince Rainier III of Monaco (born 1850)
• 4 June - W. H. R. Rivers, anthropologist, neurologist, ethnologist and psychiatrist (born 1864)
• 2 August - Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born inventor (born 1847)
• 14 August - Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe newspaper and publishing magnate (born 1865)
• 7 October - Marie Lloyd, music-hall singer (born 1870)
• 24 October - George Cadbury, businessman (born 1839)