1786 in Great Britain

Events from the year 1786 in the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Incumbents

6 January – The outward bound East Indiaman Halsewell is wrecked on the Isle of Portland in a storm with only 74 of more than 240 on board surviving.^[1]
14 July – Convention of London between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Spain: British settlements on the Mosquito Coast of Central America are to be evacuated; Spain expands the territory available to the British in Belize on the Yucatán Peninsula for cutting mahogany.
August – British Cabinet approves the establishment of a penal colony at Botany Bay to serve as "a remedy for the evils likely to result from the late alarming and numerous increase of felons in this country and more particularly in the metropolis" (London).
11 August – Captain Francis Light acquires the island of Penang from the Sultan of Kedah on behalf of the British East India Company, renaming it Prince of Wales Island in honour of the heir to the British throne,^[2] the first colony of the British Empire in Southeast Asia.
1 September to 30 November – At 7.50 °C or 45.50 °F, this is the equal coolest autumn in the CET series with that of 1676, and the coolest since monthly data are accurate to a tenth of a degree.^[3]
26 September – Commercial treaty with France (the Eden Agreement) signed.^[4]

Sinking fund of £1M per annum established to reduce the national debt.
New Lanark established in South Lanarkshire, Scotland, by David Dale, as a model cotton milling community.
Scottish millwright Andrew Meikle invents a practical threshing machine.
Wall's begins in business as a butchery.
Wills, Watkins & Co. open a tobacconists’ shop in Bristol which will become W.D. & H.O. Wills.

1 January - Dixon Denham, explorer (died 1828)
26 January - Benjamin Haydon, painter and writer (suicide 1846)
17 April - William King, physician and philanthropist (died 1865)
5 July - Charles Stothard, draughtsman (died 1821)
24 September - Granville Waldegrave, naval officer (died 1857)
26 September - James Bremer, rear admiral (died 1850)
2 November - Anne Knight, social reformer (died 1862)
Unknown dates
- James Foster, ironmaster (died 1853)
- William Horner, mathematician (died 1837)
- John Shuttleworth, industrialist and political campaigner (died 1864)
Approximate date - Fairfax Moresby, Calcutta-born Admiral (died 1877)

19 January - John Duncombe, writer (born 1729)
25 February - Thomas Wright, astronomer, mathematician, instrument maker, architect, garden designer, antiquary and genealogist (born 1711)
10 April - John Byron, Vice Admiral (born 1723)
21 June - George Hepplewhite, furniture maker (born 1727)
July - Josiah Martin, colonial governor (born 1737)
18 October - Alexander Wilson, mathematician (born 1714)

↑ "Loss of the Halsewell East-Indiaman". Remarkable Shipwrecks; Or, A Collection of Interesting Accounts of Naval Disasters: With Many Particulars of the Extraordinary Adventures and Sufferings of the Crews of Vessels Wrecked at Sea, and of Their Treatment on Distant Shores. Together with an Account of the Deliverance of Survivors. Hartford: Andrus and Starr. 1813. pp. 214–25. Retrieved 2013-02-02.
1 2 Williams, Hywel (2005). Cassell's Chronology of World History. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. p. 339. ISBN 0-304-35730-8.
↑ Met Office, Hadley Center ranked seasonal CET
1 2 Palmer, Alan; Palmer, Veronica (1992). The Chronology of British History. London: Century Ltd. pp. 230–231. ISBN 0-7126-5616-2.

1786 in Europe

Sovereign states	Andorra Austria Denmark–Norway Denmark Norway France Great Britain Holy Roman Empire Hungary Ireland Malta Monaco Netherlands Ottoman Empire Papal States Portugal Prussia Russia San Marino Spain Sweden Switzerland

Dependencies, colonies and other territories	Guernsey Isle of Man Jersey