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The following events took place during his lifetime.
1696 Window Tax introduced to raise extra money for the war against France which was supporting the exiled James II.
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Eighteenth Century
England at the start of the century was still mainly a land of hamlets and villages with the majority of the population living in the south. The population probably numbered about five and a half million.
In the towns, houses, including the cellars, were desperately overcrowded; there were no sanitary systems, and streets were unpaved and filthy. In the early part of the century) only about one child in four, born in London, survived.
During the century transport between towns improved, mills and factories were built; and, as towns developed, dispensaries, general hospitals, hospitals for special groups of patients, and charity schools were founded in London and in provincial towns. By the end of the century ideas of state intervention in public health matters were emerging, and concern was expressed about the conduct of asylums (madhouses) and the treatment of prisoners.
1707 Act for the Union of England and Scotland; the first Parliament of Great Britain met on October 23rd.
1714 John Bellers (1654-1725, philanthropist) in his “Essay Towards the Improvement of ‘hysic” proposed that government should establish hospitals for teaching and research and should provide medical care to the sick poor.
1716 “The Art of Midwifery Improved” published
c 1718 Inoculation for smallpox introduced by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1679-1762, wife of he British ambassador to Turkey).
1719 Westminster Hospital, London, founded.
1733 Bastardy Act ordered that fathers of bastard children shall be committed to gaol until they gave security to indemnify the parish from expense.
1735 Conjuration and Witchcraft Act repealed previous witchcraft acts and made persons (“Pretenders”) claiming to have arts or powers whereby ‘ignorant persons are frequently deluded or defrauded” such as by witchcraft, sorcery, inchantment, conjuration, fortune telling or other occult or crafty science liable to punishment on conviction.
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