1918 in the United Kingdom

Incumbents

• Monarch – George V
• Prime Minister – David Lloyd George
• Parliament – 30th

  Events

• 12 January
• * Minnie Pit disaster, a mining accident at Halmer End in the North Staffordshire Coalfield, kills 155 as the result of an explosion caused by firedamp.
• * Admiralty M-class destroyers and run aground and are wrecked off Orkney in a severe storm with only one survivor.
• 15 January – the keel of is laid on Tyneside, the first purpose-designed aircraft carrier to be laid down.
• 28 January – night of unusually heavy bombing in London and south-east England.
• 31 January – "Battle of May Island": in a confused series of collisions as a large Royal Navy fleet steams down the Firth of Forth this evening, submarines and are sunk, three other submarines and a light cruiser are damaged and 104 men are killed.
• 6 February – Representation of the People Act gives women the vote provided they are over 30 and are a local government elector. It also removes most property qualifications, giving all adult male resident householders the vote, and requires elections to be restricted to a single day. Many conscientious objectors are barred from voting until 5 years after the end of the war.
• 1 March – armed merchant cruiser is torpedoed and sunk off Rathlin Island, Ireland, by Imperial German Navy U-boat SM U-19 with the loss of 49 lives.
• 23 March – in London at the Wood Green Empire, Chung Ling Soo dies during his trick where he was supposed to "catch" two separate bullets – one of them perforates his lung. He dies the following morning in hospital.

• 1 April – the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service are merged to form the Royal Air Force; the Royal Air Force; the Women's Royal Air Force is also founded to provide mechanics.
• 23 April
• * Conscription Crisis of 1918 in Ireland: a general strike is held here against conscription.
• * Zeebrugge Raid, an attempt by the Royal Navy to seal off the German U-Boat base here.
• June – standard clothing introduced.
• 3 June – GPO raises postage rates: the ordinary letter rate is now 1½d., bringing an end to the Uniform Penny Post which has existed since 1840; and the rate for postcards doubles from ½d. to 1d.
• 1 July – explosion of 8 tons of TNT at the National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell kills 134; only 32 bodies can be positively identified.
• 15 July – ration books introduced for butter, margarine, lard, meat and sugar.
• 17 July – is torpedoed and sunk off the east coast of Ireland by Imperial German Navy U-boat SM U-55; 218 of the 223 on board are rescued.
• August – Education Act raises the school leaving age in England and Wales to fourteen.
• 1 August – British anti-Bolshevik forces occupy Archangel, Russia. On 10 August their commander is told to help White Russians.
• 30 August – strike of 20,000 London policemen with demands of increased pay and union recognition.
• 29 September – first performance of Gustav Holst's orchestral suite The Planets, before an invited audience at the Queen's Hall in London, conducted by Adrian Boult.
• 26 October – Cecil Chubb donates Stonehenge to the nation.
• 27 October–2 November – 2,200 deaths in London over this period due to Spanish flu. Barnsley is the town with the highest mortality rate from the pandemic.
• 3 November – armistice with Austria-Hungary signed in Padua.
• 5 November – former Cunarder HMS Campania sinks in an accident in the Firth of Forth with no loss of life.
• 9 November – British battleship HMS Britannia is sunk by a German submarine off Trafalgar with the loss of around fifty lives, the last major naval engagement of World War I.
• 11 November – World War I ends: Germany signs an armistice agreement with the Allies in the "Compiègne Wagon" in France with Admiral Sir Rosslyn Wemyss as British representative. George Edwin Ellison becomes the last British soldier to be killed in the War, near Mons in Belgium.
• 14 November – Labour Party leaves the wartime coalition government.
• 15 November – first released British prisoners of war reach Calais.
• 20 November – U-boats start to rendezvous off Harwich to begin the surrender of the High Seas Fleet to the Royal Navy; in the following week the German warships are escorted to internment in Scapa Flow.
• 21 November – the Parliament Act 1918 receives Royal Assent, giving women over 21 the right to stand as a Member of Parliament.
• 23 November – British military government of Palestine begins.
• 5 December – light cruiser HMS Cassandra sunk by mine in the Gulf of Finland while assisting Estonia against the Bolsheviks, with eleven crew lost.
• 14 December – general election polling held. It is the first national election in the United Kingdom at which women are entitled to vote or stand, and the male franchise is extended. This is known as the "Coupon election" from the letter of endorsement given to candidates of the official Coalition by Bonar Law and Lloyd George.
• 24 December – first Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King's College, Cambridge, held.
• 28 December – Countess Constance Markievicz, while detained in Holloway Prison, becomes the first woman MP elected to the British House of Commons. Sinn Féin has won 73 out of 105 Irish seats in the British Parliament. In accordance with their manifesto, Sinn Féin members refuse to take their seats in the Palace of Westminster and instead form the First Dáil in Ireland in 1919.
• 29 December – the Sunday Express newspaper published for the first time.

  Undated

• United Newspapers Ltd. founded in London.
• The Scottish county of Elginshire is officially renamed as the County of Moray.
• Gainsborough wins the English Triple Crown by finishing first in the Derby, 2,000 Guineas and St Leger.

  Publications

• Gerard Manley Hopkins' Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins.
• Daniel Jones's textbook An Outline of English Phonetics.
• Wyndham Lewis's novel Tarr.
• André Maurois' novel Les Silences du Colonel Bramble.
• Siegfried Sassoon's Counter-Attack and Other Poems
• Dr Marie Stopes' books Married Love and Wise Parenthood.
• Lytton Strachey's historical biography Eminent Victorians.
• Rebecca West's novel The Return of the Soldier.

  Births

• 1 January – Patrick Anthony Porteous, Scottish soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross
• 15 January
• * Diana Barnato Walker, aviator
• * David George Kendall, mathematician
• 28 January
• *Harry Corbett, English puppeteer, actor and screenwriter
• *Trevor Skeet, lawyer and politician
• 1 February – Muriel Spark, Scottish author
• 2 February – Stuart Blanch, Anglican prelate and Archbishop of York
• 1 March – Roger Delgado, actor
• 15 March – George Haig, 2nd Earl Haig, soldier, artist and peer
• 18 March – Terry Spencer, World War II RAF fighter pilot and war photographer
• 10 April – Betty Tebbs, campaigner for women's rights and peace
• 16 April – Spike Milligan, comedian, writer, musician, poet and playwright
• 18 April – Avril Angers, actress
• 23 April – James Kirkup, poet, translator and travel writer
• 2 May – John Barraclough, air marshal
• 21 May – Ralph Russell, scholar
• 24 May – Jack Edwards, World War II soldier
• 15 May – James Baddiley, microbiologist
• 16 May – Wilf Mannion, footballer
• 31 May – Sadie Corré, actress and tap dancer
• 6 June
• * Kenneth Connor, actor
• * Susan Williams-Ellis, pottery designer
• 22 June – Cicely Saunders, nurse, physician and writer
• 23 June – Paul Ashbee, archaeologist
• 25 June – P. H. Newby, novelist
• 27 June – Douglas John Foskett, librarian
• 8 July – Julia Pirie, spy
• 9 July – John Heath-Stubbs, poet and translator
• 11 July – Venetia Burney, teacher who named the planet Pluto
• 15 July – Arthur Dimmock, author and historian
• 16 July – Samuel Victor Perry, biochemist
• 17 July
• * Geoffrey Lane, judge
• * Edgar O'Ballance, military journalist
• 20 July – Eric Longworth, actor
• 21 July – David Piper, curator and novelist
• 25 July – Alexander McKee, journalist, military historian and diver, discoverer of the Mary Rose
• 8 August – Brian Stonehouse, painter and World War II spy
• 13 August – Frederick Sanger, biochemist, double Nobel Prize laureate
• 15 August – Derrick Bailey, cricketer
• 19 August – Patrick Dowling, television producer
• 8 September – Derek Barton, organic chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 16 September
• *Mervyn Pike, politician
• *Carole Lynne, actress
• 17 September – Chaim Herzog, sixth president of the State of Israel
• 27 September – Martin Ryle, radio astronomer, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics
• 16 October – Tony Rolt, racing driver and soldier
• 18 November – Tasker Watkins, major-general, jurist and businessman
• 27 November – Peter Tuddenham, voice actor
• 19 December – John Adams, naval officer
• 21 December – Frank Hampson, illustrator

  Deaths

• 5 February – Leonard Monteagle Barlow, fighter pilot
• 14 February – Sir Cecil Spring Rice, diplomat
• 23 February – Thomas Brassey, 1st Earl Brassey, politician and colonial administrator
• 24 February – Sir Eric Barrington, civil servant
• 23 March – T. P. Cameron Wilson, poet and novelist
• 25 March – Walter Tull, footballer and first Black infantry officer to serve in the British Army
• 1 April – Isaac Rosenberg, painter and poet
• 9 July – James McCudden, fighter pilot
• 26 July
• * Henry Macintosh, Scottish Olympic sprinter
• * Mick Mannock, fighter pilot
• 31 July – George McElroy, fighter pilot
• 1 October – Evelyn Boscawen, 7th Viscount Falmouth, artistocrat and army officer
• 5 October – Robbie Ross, writer
• 7 October – Sir Hubert Parry, composer
• 24 October – Daniel Burley Woolfall, football administrator, 2nd President of FIFA
• 4 November – Wilfred Owen, poet
• 5 or 20 November – Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers, occultist
• 9 November – Sir Peter Lumsden, Scottish Indian Army general
• 15 November – Sir Robert Anderson, police official
• 29 November – Thomas Allinson, physician and dietetic reformer
• 27 December – Birt Acres, American-born pioneer of cinematography