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This article is about the particular significance of the year 1840 to Wales and its people.
[edit] Incumbents
[edit] Events
- January 1 - Trial of John Frost, Zephaniah Williams and William Jones opens at Monmouth before Lord Chief Justice Tindal. This was the first trial where proceedings were recorded in shorthand.
- January 16 - Frost, Williams and Jones are all found guilty of high treason for their part in the Chartist riots, and are sentenced to death - the last time the sentence of hanging, drawing and quartering was passed in the UK. (The sentence was commuted to transportation.)
- October 8 - Opening of Crockherbtown station, now Cardiff Queen Street railway station
- October 9 - Taff Vale Railway is opened, the first major railway in Wales, running from Cardiff to Abercynon.
- November 18 - A paddle steamer, City of Bristol, is wrecked at Llangennith, Gower, drowning about 22 people.
- Thomas Joseph Brown is consecrated "Vicar Apostolic" of the Roman Catholic District of Wales.
[edit] Arts and literature
[edit] New books
- Evan Davies (Eta Delta) - Y Weinidogaeth a'r Eglwysi
- Sir John Hanmer, 3rd Baronet - Memorials of the Parish and Family of Hanmer
- William Lloyd - The Narrative of a Journey from Cawnpoor to the Boorendo Pass
- David Price (Dewi Dinorwig) - Y Catechism Cyntaf
- Taliesin Williams - Hynafiaeth ac Awdurdodaeth Coelbren y Beirdd
[edit] Births
- February 26 - John Cynddylan Jones, theologian (died 1930)
- April 14 - Evan Jones (Gurnos), poet and musician (died 1903)
- June 21 - Sir John Rhŷs, educationist (died 1915)
- September 16 - Alfred Thomas, 1st Baron Pontypridd (died 1927)
- November 29 - Rhoda Broughton, novelist (died 1920)
- December 3 - Francis Kilvert, diarist (died 1879)
- December 5 - John E. Jones, governor of Nevada (died 1896)
- December 17 - Matthew Vaughan-Davies, 1st Baron Ystwyth, politician (died 1935)
- December 24 - Jabez Edmund Jenkins, poet (died 1903)
[edit] Deaths
