1909 in the United Kingdom

Events from the year 1909 in the United Kingdom.

Incumbents

 * Monarch – Edward VII
 * Prime Minister – H. H. Asquith (Liberal)

Events

 * 1 January – national old age pension scheme comes into force.
 * 9 January – Ernest Shackleton's Nimrod Expedition to the South Pole forced to turn back 112 miles from the pole.
 * 23 January – the Tottenham Outrage, an armed robbery and the murder of a ten-year-old boy and a police constable in Tottenham, North London, carried out by two Latvian anarchists.
 * 16 February – West Stanley Pit Disaster, a coal mining disaster in Stanley, County Durham, in which more than 160 miners are killed in an explosion.
 * 22 February – Thomas Beecham conducts the first concert with his newly established Beecham Symphony Orchestra.
 * 26 February – first film shown in colour using Kinemacolor at the Palace Theatre, London.
 * March – construction of the Rosyth Dockyard for the Royal Navy on the east coast of Scotland begins.
 * 6 March – Birkenhead dock disaster: a temporary cofferdam collapses during construction of Vittoria Dock, killing 14 navvies.
 * 10 March – Anglo-Siamese Treaty signed in Bangkok.
 * 15 March – Selfridges department store opens in London.
 * 16 March – Port of London Authority established.
 * 11 April – coming into effect of Children Act 1908 (8 Edw. 7. c. 67), establishing separate juvenile courts for ten–sixteen-year-olds; abolishing the use of custody for under-fourteens and hanging for under-sixteens; introducing the registration of foster parents; and restricting access for under-16s to cigarettes and alcohol.
 * 24 April – the FA Cup final is won by Manchester United for the first time, as they beat Bristol City 1–0 at Crystal Palace.
 * 29 April – People's Budget introduced in the British Parliament by David Lloyd George.
 * 2 May – John Moore-Brabazon becomes the first resident British citizen to make a recognised powered heavier-than-air flight in the UK, flying from The Aero Club's ground at Leysdown on the Isle of Sheppey in his Voisin biplane Bird of Passage.
 * 13 May – Lonmin is incorporated in the UK as the London and Rhodesian Mining and Land Company Limited.
 * 26 May – the King's horse, Minoru, wins the Epsom Derby.
 * 15 June – representatives from England, Australia and South Africa meet at Lord's and form the Imperial Cricket Conference.
 * 25 June – Herbert Samuel, is appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, making him the first practising Jew to serve as a member of the Cabinet.
 * 26 June
 * Edward VII and Queen Alexandra open the Victoria and Albert Museum, designed by Aston Webb.
 * The Science Museum in London comes into existence as an independent entity.
 * 27 June – Eric Gordon England flies a Weiss glider at Amberley, West Sussex, in the first recorded soaring flight, origin of sport gliding.
 * July – Ivy Evelyn Woodward is admitted as the first woman Member of the Royal College of Physicians.
 * 1 July – The British Indian army officer and politician Curzon Wyllie is shot dead at the Imperial Institute in South Kensington, London, and a bystander fatally wounded; the assassin, Madan Lal Dhingra, an Indian nationalist student, is subsequently sentenced to death and hanged at Pentonville Prison on 17 August.
 * 25 July – Louis Blériot flies a Blériot XI monoplane across the English Channel from Calais to Dover, winning a prize of £1 000 from the Daily Mail.
 * 23 August – the Secret Service Bureau counter-espionage unit (later known as MI5) is secretly established.
 * 3 September – the first Boy Scout rally held at The Crystal Palace in London.
 * 17 September – militant suffragette Mabel Capper is among the first to suffer force-feeding while on hunger strike, at Winson Green Prison in Birmingham.
 * 20 September – Labour Exchanges Act leads to setting up of labour exchanges as a source of information on employment.
 * 2 October – the first match is played at the Rugby Football Union's Twickenham Stadium in Middlesex, Harlequins v. Richmond.
 * 15–23 October – "Aviation week" of demonstration flying held at Doncaster; this is followed by a similar event at Blackpool.
 * 20 October – the Trade Boards Act, a form of minimum wage legislation, is passed.
 * 5 November – the first Woolworth's branch in the UK opens in Liverpool.
 * 8 November – first contest for a Lonsdale Belt in boxing, won by Welsh lightweight Freddie Welsh in London.
 * 30 November – the House of Lords rejects the People's Budget proposed by David Lloyd George, forcing a general election.
 * 3 December – the SS Ellan Vannin sinks in Liverpool Bay resulting in the loss of all 15 passengers and 21 crew.
 * 4 December – the University of Bristol is founded and receives its Royal Charter.
 * 7 December – South Africa granted dominion status.

Undated

 * First British bird ringing programme initiated by Arthur Landsborough Thomson at Aberdeen.

Publications

 * Florence Barclay's novel The Rosary.
 * Angela Brazil's schoolgirl story The Nicest Girl in the School.
 * Daniel Jones' introductory The Pronunciation of English.
 * H. G. Wells' novels Ann Veronica and Tono-Bungay.

Births

 * 24 January – Martin Lings, Islamic scholar (died 2005)
 * 28 January – Geoff Charles, photojournalist (died 2002)
 * 29 January – Phoebe Hesketh, poet (died 2005)
 * 9 February – Marjorie Ogilvie Anderson, historian (died 2002)
 * 14 March – William Montgomery Watt, Anglican priest and professor (died 2006)
 * 26 March – Martin Hodgson, rugby league footballer (died 1991)
 * 6 April - Katherine Russell, social worker and university teacher (died 1998)
 * 7 April – Robert Raglan, actor (died 1985)
 * 30 April – F. E. McWilliam, sculptor (died 1992)
 * 11 May – Herbert Murrill, organist and composer (died 1952)
 * 15 May – James Mason, actor (died 1984)
 * 16 May – Charles Wilson, political scientist (died 2002)
 * 18 May – Fred Perry, tennis player (died 1995)
 * 19 May – Nicholas Winton, humanitarian (died 2015)
 * 26 May – Matt Busby, football manager (Manchester United) (died 1994)
 * 7 June – Jessica Tandy, actress (died 1994)
 * 18 June – Christabel Bielenberg, writer (died 2003)
 * 28 June – Eric Ambler, novelist and playwright (died 1998)
 * 3 July – Sylvia Gray, businessperson (died 1991)
 * 4 July – Robert Manuel Cook, classical scholar (died 2000)
 * 5 July – Douglas Dodds-Parker, soldier and politician (died 2006)
 * 19 July – Percy Stallard, cyclist (died 2001)
 * 28 July – Malcolm Lowry, novelist (died 1957)
 * 30 July – C. Northcote Parkinson, historian and author (died 1993)
 * 21 August – Ethel Caterham, Supercentenarian the last surviving person in the UK born in the 1900s decade.
 * 25 August – Michael Rennie, actor (died 1971)
 * 28 August – Ralph Kilner Brown, athlete, politician and judge (died 2003)
 * 14 September – Peter Scott, ornithologist and painter (died 1989)
 * 23 September
 * Molly Harrison, museum curator (died 2002)
 * Susan Travers, World War II nurse (died 2003)
 * 6 October – Robert Potter, architect (died 2010)
 * 28 October – Francis Bacon, painter (died 1992)
 * 8 November – Eric Bedford, architect (died 2001)
 * 17 November – E. S. Turner, author and journalist (died 2006)
 * 19 November – Griffith Jones, actor (died 2007)
 * 23 November – Nigel Tranter, historian and writer (died 2000)
 * 30 November – Nancy Carline, artist (died 2004)
 * 1 December – Frank Gillard, radio broadcaster (died 1998)
 * 4 December
 * Edward Britton, trade unionist (died 2005)
 * Jimmy Jewel, comedian and actor (died 1995)
 * 8 December – Lesslie Newbigin, bishop and theologian (died 1998)
 * 10 December – F. W. Walbank, scholar of Greek history (died 2008)
 * 15 December – Jack Gwillim, actor (died 2001)
 * 23 December
 * Donald Coggan, Archbishop of Canterbury (died 2000)
 * Maurice Denham, actor (died 2002)

Deaths

 * 8 January – Harry Seeley, palaeontologist (born 1839)
 * 14 January – Arthur William à Beckett, journalist (born 1844)
 * 24 February – Fanny Cornforth, artists' model (born 1835)
 * 1 April – Sir Marshal Clarke, Anglo-Irish colonial administrator (born 1841)
 * 10 April – Algernon Charles Swinburne, poet (born 1837)
 * 13 April – Sir Donald Currie, Scottish shipping magnate (born 1825)
 * 12 May – Sir Hugh Gough, general, Victoria Cross recipient (born 1833 in British India)
 * 18 May – George Meredith, novelist and poet (born 1828)
 * 31 May – Thomas Price, Welsh-born Prime Minister of South Australia (born 1852)
 * 10 June – Aylmer Spicer Cameron, Scottish army officer, VC recipient (born 1833)
 * 22 June – Edward John Gregory, painter (born 1850)
 * 1 July – Curzon Wyllie, soldier and politician (murdered) (born 1848)
 * 9 July
 * George Robinson, 1st Marquess of Ripon, politician (born 1827)
 * Rosa Nouchette Carey, children's writer (born 1840)
 * 1 August – Sir Hugh Rowlands, Welsh general, first Welsh Victoria Cross recipient (born 1828)
 * 14 August – William Stanley, inventor, precision engineer (born 1829)
 * 22 August – Henry Radcliffe Crocker, dermatologist (born 1846)
 * 25 October – Arthur Bromley, British Royal Navy officer, Admiral Superintendent of Malta Dockyard (born 1847)
 * 9 November – William Powell Frith, painter (born 1819)
 * 10 November – George Essex Evans, Welsh-Australian poet (born 1863)
 * 11 December – Ludwig Mond, industrialist (born 1839)
 * 13 December – Sir Alfred Lewis Jones, shipping magnate (born 1845)