The Victorian era

When was the Victorian age?

The time when Queen Victoria reigned is called the Victorian era or Victorian age. She was queen from 1837 to 1901, and a lot of things happened in Britain during that time.

During the 64 years that Queen Victoria was on the throne, Britain was also going through the Industrial Revolution. Machines for factories were invented that could make things quickly, like textiles – so, there were more textiles around to sell, and more people who wanted to buy them. With the invention of the steam train, the textiles could get to places further away than before.

Life in the Victorian era changed very quickly for a lot of people, and cities became busier and more crowded.

Top 10 facts

1. The Victorian era is what we call the time that Queen Victoria reigned: 1837-1901.
2. During the Victorian era, the Industrial Revolution was happening – this is when scientific inventions meant that it was easier to make things to sell, and that those things could be sent to places further away than before.
3. One big reason why the Industrial Revolution happened was because of steam power – this lead to the invention of steam trains, which made it faster to travel and to send goods.
4. A way to make steel from iron was also discovered, which made it easier to make machines for factories and to even build the factories themselves.
5. All of these things during the Industrial Revolution meant that lots of products could be made in the same place at the same time – this is called mass production. Before this, it would have been just one tradesman making one thing at a time.
6. Also during the Victorian Era, Great Britain became the British Empire. Britain governed many countries, kingdoms and colonies all over the world. Many of these places are part of the British Commonwealth today.
7. Before the Victorian era, it took days – sometimes weeks – to travel places. Inventions such as the steam train and the iron steam ship meant that travel took a lot less time, so people started going to places where they wouldn’t have thought to before, like the (modern day) United States of America and India.
8. It was also faster to get in touch with other people, even if you were all the way across the Atlantic Ocean. The telegraph and telephone were both invented in the Victorian era, so people didn’t always have to write letters if they had something important to say.
9. People started using electricity for the first time in the Victorian Era. The first electrically-lit streetlights, public building and even village were in the UK.
10. By 1901, half of all the people who lived in Britain (not including the Empire) lived in cities. This was a huge change because most people had lived in the country around the start of the Victorian era.

Timeline

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Did you know?

• The Victorian era is named after Queen Victoria, who was queen from 1837-1901. People who lived during the Victorian era are called Victorians.
• Before the 19th century it used to take people 12 hours to travel between Birmingham and London if they were riding in a horse-drawn coach. Steam trains meant they could make the journey in under six hours!
• The police force was set up during the Victorian era by a man called Robert Peele (which is why we sometimes call the police "bobbies"!).
• So many things were invented during the Victorian era – can you pick out which ones we still use today?
  • Telephone
  • Telegraph
  • Phonograph
  • Typewriter
  • Motor cars
  • Bicycles
  • Toilets
  • Electric light bulb
  • Steam and electric trains
  • Rubber pneumatic tyres
  • Sewing machines
  • Postage stamps
  • Radio
  • Chocolate Easter eggs
  • Christmas cards
• In 1851 the Great Exhibition was a huge collection of all kinds of inventions and art from Britain as well as places like America and Russia. The money that was made from people paying to see the Great Exhibition was used later to build museums in London, like the Science Museum.
• We use electricity all the time, but it was a brand new thing to the Victorians. A lot of world firsts happened in the UK:
  • the first electric street lights were in London
  • the first building lit with electric lights was a theatre in London
  • the first village to have its own access to electricity was Godalming in Surrey.
• At the beginning of the Victorian era in 1837, more people lived in the country than in cities. By the end of the Victorian era in 1901, half of the British population lived in cities. Find out more about life under Queen Victoria.

See if you can spot all the following in the gallery below:

• Queen Victoria
• Alexander Graham Bell
• Joseph Wilson Swan
• Volks Electric Railway in Brighton
• A steam engine used in a factory
• A map of the British Empire in 1897 (all the red areas)
• People riding a penny-farthing bicycle
• The SS Great Britain ship (Photo Credit: mattbuck via Wikimedia Commons)

Gallery

About

When the Victorian era began, Britain was going through the Industrial Revolution. Scientists had learned how to use steam to create power, and from that came a whole list of other inventions that used steam power to make machines operate.

One of these machines was the steam train, in the early 1800s. It meant that travelling was a lot faster than using a horse and carriage, and that goods could be transported much more quickly than using the canal system.

This was good because more and more goods were being made! For instance, the textile industry was growing thanks to the invention of machines that could do the spinning and weaving instead of people, meaning it took much less time to produce. This is called mass production, and it was a key factor in the Industrial Revolution. It wasn’t a case anymore of just one person making one item – machines could do the same job in a fraction of the time.

While all this was going on, Britain was becoming bigger. The British Empire was the term used to describe all of the places that were under British rule, and during the Victorian era, this got so big that one poet said ‘the sun never sets on the British Empire’ (meaning that wherever the sun was shining at the time, it would be shining on something that belonged to Britain). Many countries that were part of the British Empire are now part of the Commonwealth.

The Great Exhibition in 1851 celebrated not just great accomplishments from around the world, but also within Britain and the British Empire.

Names to know:

Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1806-1859) – a famous engineer who build steam ships, bridges, tunnels and even helped with the Crystal Palace used to house the Great Exhibition
James Watt (1736-1819) – a Scottish engineer who invented an improved steam engine used in factories and mines
Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922) – most famous for inventing the telephone
Thomas Edison (1847-1931) – an American inventor who made the phonograph and helped Joseph Wilson Swan (1828-1914) in Britain create the first electric light bulbs.
Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) – Prime Minister in 1868 and again from 1874-1880
William Gladstone (1809-1898) – Prime Minister four different times between 1868 and 1894, which is more than any other prime minister; he supported laws that allowed more people to vote
W. H. Fox-Talbot – an inventor who found ways to take photographs using negatives
Robert Peel (1788-1850) – Prime Minister from 1834-1835 and 1841-1846, who set up the Metropolitan Police Force in 1829.

Related Videos

Just for fun...

• Quiz yourself on the Victorians!
• Watch a Horrible Histories video about the Victorian age: Queen Victoria - British Things Song
• Read English Heritage's Kids Rule! guide to Victorian England magazine to learn all about the Victorians
• Travel back in time to a Victorian house
• Print out some Victorian scenes to colour in
• Did life really improve in Victorian times?
• Follow along with loads of Victorian recipes 
• Listen to a radio play about Prisoner 4099, 12-year-old William Towers who was caught stealing two rabbits (possibly for food for his family) in 1872 and sent to Wandsworth prison

Best children's books about the Victorians

Find out more:

• A children's guide to Victoria's reign, with information about the Queen Victoria's family, the British Empire, Victorian architecture and Victorian cities
• Watch a BBC Bitesize clip about the history of the steam engine
• A guide to some great Victorians and their lives
• See a BBC Bitesize introduction to the British Empire
• Read fiction books set in Victorian times
• Victorian Britain information and links from the National Archives
• A BBC bitesize introduction to The Victorian Era
• Understand the impact of the steam engine on Victorian life
• Life in the workhouse, including a guided tour
• Read about workhouses in Victorian times
• Find out about crime and punishment in Victorian times
• Information about Victorian prisons
• Watch a BBC Bitesize video about the Industrial Revolution and what life was like in Britain before, during and after industrialisation
• Find out about famous Victorian author, Charles Dickens
• Read about the Great Exhibition, which embodied Prince Albert's desire to showcase the wonders of industry from around the world
• Look closely at William Powell Frith's painting Ramsgate Sands (Life at the Seaside), 1852-4, to see an image of Victorian life
• Consult a Victorian inventions timeline (1837 to 1901)
• Read about Victorian transport in Preston, including trams and stem engines
• Explore posters, newspapers, illustrations and more that showcase Victorian Britain

See for yourself

• Look at an online collection of Victorian objects, including carbolic soap, candle snuffers, clothes wringers and oil lamps
• See posters, British Exhibition tickets and other items from the height of the British Empire at the Museum of London
• Learn more about the amazing inventions around the Victorian Era at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester
• Walk around Buckingham Palace in London to see evidence of Victorian life: a route map highlights all the places of interest
• At York Castle Museum, Kirkgate is a recreated Victorian cobbled street with a schoolroom, police cell and Hansom cab
• At Blists recreated Victorian Town you can meet some "real" Victorians in their authentic shops and cottages, buy Victorian goods and watch tradespeople in action
   

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