Events from the year 1941 in the United Kingdom. The year was dominated by the Second World War.
Incumbents Monarch – George VI Prime Minister – Winston Churchill (Coalition)
Events 9 January – Avro Manchester Mark III BT308, prototype of the Avro Lancaster heavy bomber, first flies, from RAF Ringway. 19 January – British troops attack Italian-held Eritrea. 20 January – Firewatching mandatory for business premises, to limit incendiary damage. 21 January – the Daily Worker, newspaper of the Communist Party of Great Britain, is suppressed by the (Labour) Home Secretary in the Churchill war ministry, Herbert Morrison (until September 1942) in view of its continuing pro-Soviet stance. 21–22 January – Battle of Tobruk: Australian and British forces attack and capture Tobruk (Libya) from the Italians. 31 January – German spy Josef Jakobs parachutes into the village of Ramsey, Cambridgeshire; he breaks his ankle on landing and is immediately arrested. 5 February – Air Training Corps formed. 11 February – begins her first voyage as a troopship, from Singapore. 12 February – Reserve Constable Albert Alexander, a patient at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, becomes the first person treated with penicillin intravenously, by Howard Florey’s team. He reacts positively but there is insufficient supply of the drug to reverse his terminal infection. A successful treatment is achieved during May. 19 February – "Three nights' Blitz" over Swansea, South Wales, begins. 230 are killed and 409 injured. February – white flour is replaced by "National flour", a wholemeal flour. 2 March – John Gilbert Winant takes up post as United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom in succession to Joseph P. Kennedy; he will serve for 5 years. 11 March President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease Act into United States law, allowing the country to supply military equipment to Britain. Luftwaffe air raids on Manchester cause extensive damage to the city, a notable casualty being Old Trafford football stadium, home of Manchester United, which is severely damaged. 13 March – Clydebank Blitz: bombing of Clydebank. 528 people die, 617 more are seriously injured, and hundreds more are injured by blast debris. Another 35,000 people are made homeless. 15 March – Plymouth Blitz: bombing of Plymouth. 336 people lose their lives. 27–29 March – Battle of Cape Matapan: Off the Peloponnesus coast in the Mediterranean, British naval forces defeat those of Italy sinking five warships. 15 April – Belfast Blitz: Belfast is heavily bombed, killing 900 and injuring 1,500. 7 April – Budget Day: Chancellor of the Exchequer Kingsley Wood presents a Keynesian budget that increases taxes; for the first time in British history, a majority of the population is liable to income tax. 18 April – heaviest air-raid of the year on London. 21 April – Greece capitulates. British troops withdraw to Crete. May The Ministry of Information issues more than 14 million copies of a leaflet Beating the Invader, with a preface from Churchill, giving advice on what to do "if invasion comes". Meatless Woolton pie introduced. 2–8 May – 'May Week Raids', sustained heavy bombing on Merseyside, result in over 1,700 deaths and well over 1,000 injuries. 6–7 May – Greenock Blitz: Greenock in Scotland is intensively bombed. 280 people are killed, and 1,200 more injured. 9 May – is captured by the Royal Navy in the North Atlantic with its Enigma cryptography machine and codebooks intact. 10 May The House of Commons is damaged by the Luftwaffe in an air raid. Rudolf Hess parachutes into Scotland claiming to be on a peace mission. 15 May – first British jet aircraft, the Gloster E.28/39, is flown at RAF Cranwell in Lincolnshire.
17 May – Tipton, near Dudley in the midlands, is bombed by the Luftwaffe for the second time in six months, with a further six civilian deaths. 24 May – in the North Atlantic, the German battleship Bismarck sinks killing all but three crewmen on what was the pride of the Royal Navy. 26 May – in the North Atlantic, Fairey Swordfish biplanes from the carrier HMS Ark Royal fatally cripple the German battleship Bismarck in a torpedo attack. May – Emergency Work (Merchant Navy) Order requires merchant seamen to serve for the duration, establishes a Merchant Navy Reserve Pool of labour, and guarantees a wage (which will continue in the event of shipwreck). 1 June – clothes rationing introduced. 4 June – Britain invades Iraq; the pro-Axis government there is overthrown. June – Noël Coward's comedy Blithe Spirit is premiered at Manchester Opera House. Opening in London on 2 July, its run of 1,997 consecutive performances sets a record for non-musical plays in the West End theatre which will not be surpassed for more than twenty years. 12 July – Anglo-Soviet Agreement signed for mutual co-operation following the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. August – Political Warfare Executive is formed to disseminate information to Germany and its Occupied countries. 9 August Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill meet on board ship at Naval Station Argentia, Newfoundland. The Atlantic Charter (released 14 August), setting goals for postwar international cooperation, is agreed as a result. RAF pilot Douglas Bader taken prisoner by the Germans after a mid-air collision over France. 12 August – Dudley, which suffered 10 fatalities in a landmine attack in November last year, suffers five more fatalities when a second landmine is dropped in the town. 15 August – Josef Jakobs becomes the last person executed at the Tower of London when he faces execution by firing squad following conviction for an offence under the Treachery Act 1940. 16 August – HMS Mercury Royal Navy Signals School and Combined Signals School opens at Leydene, near Petersfield, Hampshire. 18 August – National Fire Service established. 30 August – first official 'Shetland bus' clandestine mission using Norwegian fishing boats between Shetland and German-occupied Norway. September Air Raid Precautions is renamed the Civil Defence Service. Local authorities are ordered to survey iron railings with the intention of their removal as scrap for munitions. The Royal Scots Greys, stationed in the Middle East, receive their first tanks, being the last of the cavalry regiments of the British Army to have abandoned horses for combat operations. October – the first Ronald Searle cartoon to feature St Trinian's School is published, in the magazine Lilliput. 30 October – J. Arthur Rank purchases the Gaumont-British Picture Corporation, with its 251 cinemas and its subsidiary operations, Gainsborough Pictures and Lime Grove Studios. 31 October – a Huddersfield factory fire kills 49, many of them young women. End October – President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt approves US$1bn in Lend-Lease aid to Britain. 1 November – announcement that radical politician Sir Charles Trevelyan is donating his family home, Wallington Hall, Northumberland, to the National Trust, its first such stately home acquisition. 13 November – the aircraft carrier is hit by the off Gibraltar; she capsizes and sinks under tow the next day. 27 November – Tobruk is relieved by the Eighth Army (which has controlled British and other Allied ground forces in the Western Desert from September) in Operation Crusader. 5 December – Britain declares war on Finland, Hungary and Romania. 8 December – the Battle of Hong Kong begins less than eight hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor when Imperial Japanese forces invade British Hong Kong. British Malaya is also attacked and there follows the declaration of war on Japan. 10 December – sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse in the South China Sea: two Royal Navy capital ships, HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse, are sunk by Japanese aircraft. 13 December Battle of Cape Bon off Tunisia: two Italian cruisers are sunk without Allied losses. Britain declares war on Bulgaria. 15 December – Crofter Hand Woven Harris Tweed Co Ltd v Veitch decided in the House of Lords upholds the right of trade unionists to strike as part of collective bargaining. 18 December – National Service (No. 2) Act comes into effect: All men and women aged 18–60 are now liable to some form of national service, including military service for men under 51 and unmarried women between 20 and 30. The first military registration of 18½-year-olds takes place. The schedule of reserved occupations is abandoned. 25 December The Battle of Hong Kong ends after 17 days with surrender of the Crown colony of Hong Kong to the Japanese. Sir Alan Brooke succeeds John Dill as Chief of the Imperial General Staff, an office he will hold until 1946. 27 December Winston Churchill becomes the first British Prime Minister to address a Joint session of the U.S. Congress. British Commandos raid the Norwegian port of Måløy on the island of Vågsøy, causing the Germans to reinforce the garrison and defenses.
Undated Spring – Noël Coward composes the song London Pride. The circular silver-alloy threepence coin is last minted for general circulation in the UK. Factory Canteen, predecessor of multinational foodservice company Compass Group, is founded in England by Jack Bateman.
Publications Joyce Carey's memoir A House of Children, novel Herself Surprised and pamphlet The Case for African Freedom. Lord David Cecil's The English Poets, first of the 'Britain in Pictures' series. Agatha Christie's novels Evil Under the Sun (featuring Hercule Poirot) and N or M? (featuring Tommy and Tuppence working undercover in the war). A. J. Cronin's novel The Keys of the Kingdom. T. S. Eliot's poem The Dry Salvages, third of the Four Quartets (in February New English Weekly). Patrick Hamilton’s eve-of-war blackly comic novel Hangover Square. James Hilton's wartime novel Random Harvest. John Gillespie Magee, Jr.'s wartime sonnet "High Flight". The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. John Pudney's wartime poem "For Johnny". Hilary St George Saunders' official booklet The Battle of Britain, August–October 1940. Rebecca West's Balkan travelogue Black Lamb and Grey Falcon.
Births 1 January – Martin Evans, biologist 2 January – Celia Birtwell, textile and fashion designer 5 January – Kevin Keelan, English footballer 7 January Iona Brown, British violinist and conductor (died 2004) John E. Walker, English chemist, Nobel Prize laureate 8 January – Graham Chapman, English comedy writer-performer (died 1989) 9 January – Terry Hands, English theatre director (died 2020) 10 January – Tom Clarke, Scottish politician 12 January – Long John Baldry, blues singer (died 2005) 19 January Tony Anholt, actor (died 2002) Colin Gunton, theologian (died 2003) 20 January – Allan Young, English footballer (died 2009) 27 January – Beatrice Tinsley, English-born astronomer (died 1981) 28 January – Ann Leslie, English journalist, born in British India (died 2023) 5 February – Gareth Williams, Baron Williams of Mostyn, Labour politician, Leader of the House of Lords, Lord President of the Council (died 2003) 7 February – Kevin Crossley-Holland, English author and poet 10 February – Michael Apted, English film director (died 2021) 17 February – Julia McKenzie, actress 20 February – Richard Mabey, English writer and broadcaster 25 February – David Puttnam, English film producer and life peer 26 February – Tony Ray-Jones, British photographer (died 1972) 27 February – Paddy Ashdown, Liberal Democrat politician, born in the British Raj (died 2018) 28 February – Tristan Garel-Jones, Welsh-born Conservative politician (died 2020) 4 March – Adrian Lyne, English film director 5 March – Errol Le Cain, children's book illustrator and animator (died 1989) 25 March Lindy Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, Marchioness of Dufferin and Ava, artist, conservationist and businesswoman (died 2020) Rose Dugdale. heiress and IRA militant (died 2024)