Among many other events, August saw the first night of the Blitz as German planes bombed the city of London (pictured to the left).
| 1 August | 1740 | ‘Rule Britannia‘ sung for the first time in public, in Thomas Arne’s ‘Masque Alfred’. | |
| 2 August | 1100 | King William II (Rufus) killed by a crossbow bolt in mysterious circumstances while hunting in the New Forest, his ghost is still said to haunt the woods. | |
| 3 August | 1926 | Britain’s first set of electric traffic lights appear on the streets of London. | |
| 4 August | 1914 | Britain declared war on Germany in support of Belgium and France, and on Turkey because of her alliance with Germany. Find out more in our article concerning the Causes of World War One. | |
| 5 August | 1962 | Nelson Mandela imprisoned for attempting to overthrow South Africa’s apartheid rule. | |
| 6 August | 1881 | Birth of Sir Alexander Fleming, Scottish discoverer of penicillin. | |
| 7 August | 1840 | Britain bans the employment of climbing boys as chimney sweeps. | |
| 8 August | 1963 | Britain’s Great Train Robbery – £2.6 M stolen from Royal Mail. | |
| 9 August | 1757 | Birth of Thomas Telford, Scottish civil engineer credited with opening up northern Scotland by building roads, bridges and waterways. | |
| 10 August | 1675 | King Charles II lays the foundation stone of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. | |
| 11 August | 1897 | Birth of best-selling children’s writer Enid Blyton, whose books have been among the world’s best-sellers since the 1930s, with more than 600 million sold. | |
| 12 August | 1822 | Lord Castlereagh, British Foreign Secretary, commits suicide. In his role as Foreign Secretary he managed the coalition that defeated Napoleon. | |
| 13 August | 1964 | Peter Allen and John Walby become the last people to be hanged in Britain. | |
| 14 August | 1040 | Duncan I of Scotland is killed in battle by his own men, led by Macbeth. | |
| 15 August | 1945 | Japan surrenders to the Allies, ending the Second World War. | |
| 16 August | 1819 | The Peterloo Massacre took place in Manchester at St. Peter’s Fields. | |
| 17 August | 1896 | Mrs. Bridget Driscoll of Croydon, Surrey, became the first pedestrian in Britain to die after being hit by a car. | |
| 18 August | 1587 | Birth of Virginia Dare, the first child of English parents to be born in the Roanoke Colony in what is now North Carolina, USA. What became of Virginia and the other early colonists remains a mystery to this day. | |
| 19 August | 1646 | Birth of John Flamsteed, Britain’s first Astronomer Royal. He would go on to publish a catalogue that identified 2,935 stars. | |
| 20 August | 1940 | Winston Churchill referring to the RAF pilots, says ” Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”. | |
| 21 August | 1765 | King William IV born. William would go on to serve in the Royal Navy, earning him the nickname the “Sailor King”. | |
| 22 August | 1485 | Richard III becomes the last English king to die in battle, killed at Bosworth Field in Leicestershire. | |
| 23 August | 1940 | The first night of the Blitz as German planes bomb the city of London. | |
| 24 August | 1875 | Matthew Webb (Captain Webb) started his attempt from Dover in Kent, to become the first person to swim the English Channel. He reached Calais, France at 10.40 am the following morning, having been in the water for 22 hours. | |
| 25 August | 1919 | World’s first international daily air service begins between London and Paris. | |
| 26 August | 1346 | With the help of the longbow the English army of Edward III defeats the French at the Battle of Crecy. | |
| 27 August | 1900 | Britain’s first long distance bus service begins between London and Leeds. The journey time being 2 days! | |
| 28 August | 1207 | Liverpool is created a Borough by King John. | |
| 29 August | 1842 | Great Britain and China sign the Treaty of Nanking, ending the First Opium War. As part of the treaty China gave the territory of Hong Kong to the British. | |
| 30 August | 1860 | Britain’s first tramway opens in Birkenhead, near Liverpool. | |
| 31 August | 1900 | Coca Cola is sold for the first time in Britain. | |
