page_title: 1945 in the United Kingdom
section_title: Events
hierarchical_section_title: 1945 in the United Kingdom / Events
caption_attribution_description: English: Winston Churchill waves to crowds in Whitehall in London as they celebrate VE Day, 8 May 1945. From the the balcony of the Ministry of Health, Prime Minister Winston Churchill gives his famous 'V for Victory' sign to crowds in Whitehall on the day he broadcast to the nation that the war with Germany had been won, 8 May 1945 (VE Day). To Churchill's left is Sir John Anderson, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. To Churchill's right is Ernest Bevin, the Minister of Labour.
context_page_description: Events from the year 1945 in the United Kingdom. This year sees the end of World War II and a landslide general election victory for the Labour Party.
context_section_description: 2 January – General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference at Zonhoven describing his contribution to the Battle of the Bulge.
  23 January – announcement of the establishment of the Industrial and Commercial Finance Corporation (ICFC; predecessor of 3i) by the Bank of England and the major commercial banks to provide long term investment funding for small and medium-sized enterprises.
  4 February – Prime Minister Winston Churchill attends the Yalta Conference (ends 11 February).
  13 February – the RAF Bomber Command begins the strategic bombing of Dresden in Saxony, Germany, resulting in a lethal firestorm which kills tens of thousands of civilians.
  10 March – sixty-seven German prisoners of war tunnel their way out of Island Farm Camp 198 at Bridgend, the biggest escape attempt by German POWs in the UK during the War.
  14 March – the RAF uses the Grand Slam bomb for the first time on the Bielefeld railway viaduct.
  17 March – 13 people are killed and 22 injured when a lone Heinkel 111 bomber opens fire and drops bombs on people leaving a cinema in Kingston upon Hull.
  27 March – last day of V-2 rocket attacks aimed at the UK. One hits Hughes Mansions, Stepney in East London, killing 134 and the last falls in Orpington with one fatality.
  29 March – the last V-1 flying bomb attack on the UK takes place. The last enemy action of any kind on British soil occurs when one strikes Datchworth in Hertfordshire without any fatalities or injuries.
  13 April – the first Scottish National Party Member of Parliament, Robert McIntyre, is elected to the Parliament of the United Kingdom after his victory at the Motherwell by-election.
  15 April – British troops liberate the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp; Richard Dimbleby reports on it for the BBC.
  19 April – Geoffrey Fisher enthroned as Archbishop of Canterbury.
  April – Sybil Campbell is appointed a stipendiary magistrate in London, the first woman to become a professional judge in the UK.
  7 May – at 23:00 the SS Avondale Park is torpedoed and sunk by German submarine U-2336 off the Firth of Forth with two killed, the last British-flagged merchant ship lost to German action.
  8 May – eight days after the suicide of Adolf Hitler and the collapse of the Nazi rule in Berlin, V-E Day is celebrated throughout the UK. Prime Minister Winston Churchill makes a victory speech and appears on the balcony of Buckingham Palace with George VI, Queen Elizabeth and Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. Street parties take place throughout the country.
  9 May – German forces in the Channel Islands, the only occupied part of the British Isles, surrender.
  23 May – Churchill forms a "caretaker" Conservative Party administration, pending an election, officially ending the wartime Coalition government.
  28 May – William Joyce, known as "Lord Haw-Haw" is captured on the German border. He is later charged with high treason in London for his English-language wartime broadcasts on German radio. He is hanged in January 1946.
  1 June – the UK takes over administration of Lebanon and Syria.
  4 June – Churchill, in a broadcast election speech, claims that a future socialist government "would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo".
  7 June – the Benjamin Britten opera Peter Grimes first performed at the Sadler's Wells Theatre in London.
  13 June – Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts renamed Arts Council of Great Britain.
  15 June – Parliament passes the Family Allowances Act to provide payments to families with children.
  18 June – the demobilisation of the wartime armed forces begins.
  5 July – polling day for the first general election to be held since 1935; the vote count is not made for another three weeks (see below) so that votes from the servicemen overseas can be added to the total.
  17 July – Potsdam Conference – the three main Allied leaders begin their final summit of the war. The meeting will end on 2 August.
  26 July – general election results are announced; Winston Churchill resigns as prime minister after his Conservative Party is soundly defeated by the Labour Party, who have a majority of 146 se
caption: Churchill waves to the crowds on VE Day
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