The Chartists.
Despite the Reform Act of 1832, the vast majority of people still had no vote – and because of this no say in the running of the country. Chartism was a movement calling for political reform. Its name was based on the people’s Charter of 1838. The six points of the Charter were: votes for all adult males; voting by secret ballot; elections for Parliament every year; Mps should be paid a salary and should not have to own property; all constituencies should be the same size. There were many Chartist demonstrations, however, even despite the petition having two million signatures of support, the movement faded because of weak leadership. But most Chartist demands were eventually met and these helped to form the parliamentary system in place today.
Growth of the Empire.
By the end of Queen Victoria’s reign, Britain had gained more overseas lands and taken over more peoples than any other nation in history. Britain’s empire included countries in every continent and islands in every ocean including colonies in the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, Australia and the Pacific. Because the empire covered both hemispheres, it was known as “the empire on which the sun never sets”. Though Britain had lost the American colonies in 1783, a number of overseas territories became part of the empire after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815 – India, Australia (as a penal colony), Canada among them. Strategic harbors such as Gibraltar, Hong Kong, Singapore and Aden came into British hands, and vital trading routes, such as the Cape Route (via the tip of South Africa) to India, or the Suez Canal (via Egypt) to the spice and rubber plantations of southeast Asia were also controlled by Britain. British boats constantly patrolled countries belonging to the British Empire.
Queen Victoria, herself Empress of India since 1876, was a keen supporter of a foreign policy that pursued colonial expansion and upheld the empire, but not at any cost. As more and more British and Irish people immigrated to countries within the Empire, so these lands were gradually given more freedom to govern themselves. Many colonies, notably Canada, Australia and South Africa, became known as domination rather than colonies and allowed to govern themselves, but they still remained closely linked to Britain.
An Age of Science.
In the 19th century medical practice finally began to change. At this same time, scientists and physicians made the discoveries that truly revolutionized medicine.
The cholera epidemic of 1854 that killed more than 50 000 people spurred people to fight the disease by improving sanitation. Methods of sanitation and cleanliness in military hospitals were developed by Florence Nightingale during the Crimean War. In London the work improving sanitation was entrusted to the engineer Joseph Bazalgette who was to provide a system of sewers which would not only drain off surface rainwater, but also take household sewage.
At the beginning of the Victorian era the State took no interest in the public health: water supplies were bad, dust-heaps lay in the streets, there were no public baths, and the death-rate was very high. The establishment of a Board of Health enforced a better state or things, and a higher degree of human cleanliness had a grand effect on the health of the community. Perhaps such a revolution in thought was only equaled by the changes that took place in the world of medicine and surgery.
A Board of Health organized street cleaning, the building of pavement and the development of proper sewers. Modern hospitals were built. In 1899 the School of Tropical Medicine was started. Medical pioneers Manson and Rose identified the mosquito had created malaria, which was of significant benefit to people in the British colonies.
The other discovery which prolonged life and alleviated suffering was made by Edward Jenner an English doctor who invented the world's first vaccine of the prevention of small-pox (free vaccination was made available in 1840).
Another modern step for modern medicine was the use of painkillers. Up to this time very few operations could be attempted; the wretched patient had to see all the preparations, and to feel all the pain. Many died merely from shock, others from surgical fever; only the strongest survived. Under chloroform it was found that operations could be performed slowly and painlessly, and many hundreds of lives were saved by this means. In the 1840s, a Scottish doctor Sir James Simpson put patients under chloroform vapor to ease childbirth pains. Queen Victoria was given it during the birth of her eight children.
Towards the end of the 19th century, surgery was further helped by the wonderful discovery of the X or Röntgen rays, by which means the exact location of a bullet or foreign substance imbedded in the flesh could be detected.
Sir Joseph Lister - a name famous in the annals of Victorian medicine - found a means whereby greater care and cleanliness in surgery saved many a case that had hitherto succumbed to blood-poisoning after operation. In the 1860s Lister developed chemical disinfectants to make everything that came into contact with a wound antiseptic. He began to practice antiseptic surgery in Glasgow in 1865.
The name of Herschel calls up the vision of a man who, during the nineteenth century, devoted his life to the study of the heavens. The very year of the Queen's accession, Sir John Herschel, with his great telescope at the Cape, was sweeping the heavens for stars and planets; and his Handbook, published in 1838, told the grand story of a solar system travelling through endless space. Among his other achievements he had named some 250 minor planets, and classified 5,000 clusters of little stars.
While developments were taking place in the telescope and spectroscope, the discovery of photography brought these observations into the realm of fact. By means of this new art the heavens could be photographed, and true pictures of the relative sizes of sun, moon, and stars were presented to the world at large.
The discoveries of Professor Tyndall on the subject of radiant heat became known in 1863, when one of the foremost men of science, Sir William Thomson (afterwards Lord Kelvin), was using his experiments in electricity for practical ends.
One December night in 1858 the first electric light flashed over the troubled waters from the South Foreland lighthouse, though private houses were not lit with it till 1878. By this time the great work of Lord Kelvin's life was done, and he had been the means of laying the deep submarine cable, first from Dover to Calais in 1851, then from Ireland to Newfoundland in 1866, until every foreign country and every colony were in communication one with another.
New discoveries in plant life by Sir William Hooker and other botanists led to the re-establishment of the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew: they were the very first gardens of their kind in the whole world.
A closer study of plant and animal life led Charles Darwin to the new theories which he gave to the world in 1859 on The Origin of Species. His book gave rise to much discussion, but when in 1871 it was followed by The Descent of Man, which suggested that human beings and apes were descended from a common origin, a very storm of abuse burst forth. But though so fiercely attacked, the book had an extraordinary influence on literature, science, art, and religion during the latter half of the century.
The Industrial revolution of the 18th century gathered pace in Victorian era and led to the developing of engineering. To carry heavy loads of goods canals (which were known as “navigations”) were started to be built. Roads and railroads had also become more efficient. During the 1840-s trains became the chief form of transport for passengers, freight, post and newspapers – which helped to speed up a revolution in communications.
London’s underground system - Metropolitan District Railway - was the world’s first. The line was opened to passengers in 1863. The trains were steam locomotives that burned coke as fuel, and getting rid of the smoke form under the ground proved to be a major problem. The first electric underground railway opened in 1890.
Sea transport was revolutionized by steamships made of steel rather than iron which were stronger and lighter.
The telephone, wireless telegraphy, and motors were all in their infancy when Queen Victoria died, so they will not be touched on here.
Throughout the reign of Victoria the field of science was full of eager workers - all toiling in the great cause of humanity. The work was slow and laborious: it needed patience, knowledge, and love. Some died without seeing the result of their toil; others lived to understand the unspoken gratitude of thousands of their fellows. Britain has given to the world some of the greatest discoveries of the century.