Victorian Era

Alex along with the other Season 2 guests being brought to the Victorian Mansion

### Main Antagonist

The Sorceress

The **Victorian Era** is the time period in which Season 2 takes place. The main antagonist is the Sorceress, who trapped the second mansion in time.

## History

The Victorian Era took place in England from June 20, 1837-January 22, 1901. This was the time that Queen Victoria reigned. Before this was the Georgian Era and after was the Edwardian Era. The later half of the Victorian Era overlaps with the first part of the *Belle Époque* era of Continental Europe.

### **Note Worthy Events**

**June 20, 1837** - At age 18, Victoria takes the throne.

**July 25, 1837** - The first electrical telegraph was sent from English inventor, William Fothergill Cooke, and scientist, Charles Wheatstone, who went on to found The Electric Telegraph Company.

**Aug. 1, 1838** - The British empire abolishes slavery.

**Sept. 17, 1838** - The first modern railroad line, the London-Birmingham Railway, opens.

**Feb. 10, 1840** - Queen Victoria marries Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, her first cousin. As queen, she was the one to propose.

**Dec. 19, 1843** - Charles Dickens, one of the era’s greatest writers, publishes *A Christmas Carol*. Other works from the author during this period: *Oliver Twist*, *Great Expectations*, *David Copperfield* and *Nicholas Nickleby*, among others.

**September 1845** - Ireland’s potato crop begins to rot, causing the four-year Irish Potato Famine, also known as the Great Hunger, that lead to 1 million deaths and caused 1 million people to emigrate from the country.

**May 1, 1851** - The brainchild of Prince Albert, the Great Exhibition opens in London’s Crystal Palace, with 10,000-plus exhibitors displaying the world’s technological wonders.

**Dec. 24, 1853** - The Vaccination Act makes it mandatory for children born after Aug. 1, 1853, to be vaccinated against smallpox.

**March 28, 1854** - France and Britain declare war on Russia, launching the Crimean War, which largely surrounds the protection of the rights of minority Christians in the Ottoman Empire. History’s most famous nurse, Florence Nightingale, helps reduce the death count by two-thirds by improving unsanitary conditions.

**Nov. 24, 1859** - The controversial *On the Origin of Species* by Charles Darwin, is published.

**1861** - Prince Albert dies of typhoid, leaving behind Queen Victoria and nine children.

**Nov 26, 1865** - The fantasy novel *Alice's Adventures in Wonderland* is published, written by Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll.

**March 7, 1876** - Scotsman, Alexander Graham Bell, is awarded a patent on his invention of the telephone, and, three days later, famously makes the first phone call to Thomas Watson, his assistant.

**May 1, 1876** - India, which has been under British rule since 1858, declares Queen Victoria empress, under direction of Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli.

**Aug.-Nov. 1888**: An unknown killer, named Jack the Ripper, murders and mutilates five prostitutes in London.

**Jan. 22, 1901**: Queen Victoria dies on the Isle of Wight at age 81, ending the Victorian Era. She is succeeded by Edward VI, her eldest son.