- | –1700
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- | 1940s
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February The Pavilion Cinema at Telscombe Cliffs burns down before the fire engines from Brighton and Newhaven can reach it.
April 9 The Imperial Theatre in North Street opens.
April 18 G C Tryon MP is created 1st Baron Tryon, causing a by-election for his Brighton seat.
April Surrenden Field is taken over by Brighton Coproration to be used for food production.
May 9 Parliamentary by-election, Lord John Francis Ashley Erskine (Conservative), just ended his term as Governor of the Madras Presidency, is returned unopposed.
May 28 Land at the western end of Peacock Lane is bout by Brighton Borough Council from Braybons Ltd.
June 2 Brighton beaches are closed and defensive barricades begin to be installed.
June 29 The Court Cinema in New Road closes.
June Whittinghame College in Surrenden Road becomes a military hospital.
July 15 A curfew is imposed on the area south of Western Road and North Street one hour after sunset. This affects opening hours of places of entertainment.
July 15 The first air raid on Brighton.
August 30 A Hawker Hurricane aircraft, shot down by a German Messerschmidt aircraft, crashes in Woodhouse Road.
September 14 Four children and two adults in the Odeon Kemp Town and 20 more injured in an air raid when a bomb hits the cinema. In the surrounding area 46 more people die and 85 are injured. This occasion accounts for more than a quarter of all deaths in air raids on Brighton during the whole war.
September 18 Houses at the south-eastern end of White Street are destroyed by bombing, killing 11 people.
September 27 The Grand Cinema in North Road closes.
October 26 Bombing destroys houses in Egremont Place.
December 26 Odeon Kemp Town re-opens after rapid re-building.
• Bishop Hannington Memorial Church in Holmes Avenue opens.
• Hans Nathan Felsbusch paints a mural in the north chapel of St Wilfrid’s Church in Elm Grove.
February 14 Sir Herbert Carden dies.
February 19 Sir Hamilton Harty dies at 33 Brunswick Square.
March 9 Eleven bombs fall in Preston Road and Lauriston Road, damaging St John’s Church.
March The number of allotments is doubled to 6,000.
May 3 Roedean School, already requisitioned by the army, is commissioned by the Royal Navy as HMS Vernon (R).
July The former Grand Theatre/Cinema in North Road re-opens as a twice-nightly variety theatre.
September 1-20 Brighton Museums and Art Gallery shows the first exhibition by war artists, circulated by the Museums Association.
November 15 Parliamentary by-election cased by the resignation of Lord Erskine. Anthony A H Marlowe is returned unopposed.
• The Canadian Army occupies Ovingdean Hall.
March 25 Fire breaks out during the morning in the screen area at the Cinema-de-Luxe in North Street. The cinema never re-opens and remains derelict until demolished in 1962.
March Hove’s Warship Week raises £521,000 to adopt HMS Unbeaten, a Royal Navy submarine.
May 16 A civic restaurant is opened by Lord Woolton, the minister for food.
June An ARP cooking depot and school meals kitchens are established in Valley Drive.
June A Salute the Nations parade is held in Preston Park.
October 12 A bomb falls on the rear gardens of Elder Place, killing an elderly resident.
November 15 Civil Defence services are inspected by the Brighton mayor.
December 24-26 Curfew restrictions are relaxed to all time out of the home until 1:00am.
• Belgrave Street Congregational Chapel closes.
March 9 A bomb destroys 9-10 Walsingham Terrace.
March 13 Houses in Lowther Road are damaged by bombing.
March 29 An attack by eight Focke-Wulf FW 190s causes damage to the municipal clinic in Sussex Street, Circus Street and Preston Circus.
May 25 12:25 Up to 30 German Focke-Wulfe aircraft drop 22 500kg bombs on Brighton and machine-gun the streets for five minutes, killing 10 men, 12 women and two children. Kemptown gasworks is set on fire. Railway workshops are struck, including the Pullman Car repairs works in Highcroft Villas, and part of the London Road viaduct is demolished, as are 24-26 Park Crescent. The raid renders 150 houses uninhabitable and makes over 500 people homeless.
June 26-July 24 Brighton Art Gallery shows the second exhibition by war artists, circulated by the British Institute for Adult Education.
August 16 St Cuthman’s Church in Whitehawk Way is destroyed by bombing.
February 3 Parliamentary by-election caused by the resignation of Sir A C Rawson on grounds of ill health. William Teeling (Conservative) is returned. His opponent, Bruce Briant, not wanting another uncontested by-election, was nominated as an independent with only seven minutes to go and achieved over 46 per cent of the vote.
April 19 A Messerschmidt 410A-1 aircraft crashes into the wall of StNicholas Rest Garden, killing Oberleutnant Richard Pahl.
June 5-7 Rex Whistler paints Allegory: HRH Price Regency Awakening the Spirit of Brighton on the wall of 39 Preston Park Avenue, where he is billeted.
July 10 Two Royal Engineers sappers are killed while clearing mines on Brighton beach.
July 30 The Lido Cinema in Denmark Villas is renamed the Odeon Hove.
August The barricades, barbed wire and mines are removed from beaches as the threat of invasion is reduced after the D-Day landings.
October 11 Nos 1 and 5 Shelley Road are damaged by enemy action.
October 26 Nos 3 and 7 Shelley Road are damaged by enemy action.
May 8 VE-Day celebrations, including street parties, are extensive in Brighton and Hove.
July 5 Parliamentary election, the last for the two-seat Brighton constituency. No change in representation but Labour closes the gap significantly as a Labour government is elected.
• A compulsory purchase order is made to acquire land in Withdean Estate East to build a council housing estate.
• Cosy Nook cinema opens on the corner of East Street and King’s Road.
December 4 Princes Elizabeth visits the Royal Alexandra Children’s Hospital and takes tea at Preston Manor.
December 11 The Regency Society of Brighton and Hove is inaugurated at a public meeting in the Royal Pavilion.
• Ovingdean Hall is bought by the Brighton Institute for the Deaf and Dumb.
July 12 Cosy Nook cinema in East Street is taken over by photographic and film dealer John King and renamed King’s Minicine News Cinema.
July 27-August 10 A Regency Festival is held, including an exhibition in the Royal Pavilion, six concerts in the Dome and the Royal Pavilion Music Room, and an opera at the Theatre Royal, plus lectures, boxing, dances and a play reading.
August 7 A Regency cricket match is held on Brunswick Lawns.
August 21-23 The News Chronicle Professional Golf Tournament is held at Hollingbury Golf Course.
August The HMS King Alfred naval training establishment opens as a leisure centre.
October Brighton Speed Trials are resumed.
November The London to Brighton Veteran Car Run resumes in time for its 50th anniversary with 137 starters.
• The Old Bridge for the Portslade House Estate is demolished.
• The cost of clearing snow after a blizzard early in the year was £4,940 to pay men clearing the show, £2,982 for haulage and £1,308 for salt, grit and tools. The cost of repairing damage to road surfaces is estimated at a further £7,000, making a total of more than £16,000 (over £545,000 in 2025).
May 22 Brighton Olympic Stadium opens in Tongdean Lane.
May 24 The Court Cinema in New Road re-opens as the Dolphin Theatre.
August 19-21 The News Chronicle Professional Golf Tournament is held at Hollingbury Golf Course; it is won by Dai Rees.
September 27 An anti-aircraft gun features in an army exhibition on The Level.
November [3?] Playhouse repertory theatre opens in former King’s Cliff Cinema, Sudeley Street, seating 280 with ticket prices from 2s to 4s 10d. Managing director of Playhouse Productions Ltd is Bray Wyndham, the manager is W McLure Gibson and the repertory company includes Moya Fenwick, Marie Hopps, Mona Harding and Gordon Court.
November 4 Brighton Borough Council acquires land at Newtimber.
• Almhouses in Spa Street, founded in 1852, are demolished.
• Brighton Corporation acquires the Stanmer estate.
• Elim Clarence Baptist Chapel in Clarence Gardens closes for worship.
• Prince’s Cinema in North Street becomes Prince’s News Theatre.
January 8 midnight Premiere of the Boulting Brothers’ production of Brighton Rock at the Savoy ABC cinema in West Street.
January 22 St Dunstan’s Children’s Home is opened in Bazehill Road.
April 24 midnight Premiere of Alberto Cavalcanti’s film The First Gentleman, partly filmed in Brighton, is held in Brighton.
June 5 Brighton & Hove Motor Club holds the Brighton Hill Climb in Stanmer Park, starting where Stony Mere Way divides and ending where One Garden is now. Stirling Moss, then aged 18, wins in his class.
June The fascist Union Movement is confronted by Jewish ex-servicemen and the 43 Group on The Level. It becomes known as the Battle of The Level.
July Easthill Park in Portslade opens on a six-acre site bought by Portslade Council in 1947.
October 11 Brighton Borough Council buys 267 Preston Road (Tivoli).
October Brighton Speed Trials are held on Madeira Drive; Tony Crook in an Alfa-Romeo breaks records.
• Brighton Zoo opens adjacent to the Olympic Stadium in Tongdean Lane.
• St James’s Church in St James’s Street closes.
• The Dispensary in Queen’s Road closes after 99 years.
• The country’s first post-war self-build housing project in Plymouth Avenue, Lower Bevendean.
• Carden Primary School opens in County Oak Avenue, the first new school in Britain after WW2.
• Southern Electricity Board (Seeboard) acquires the former hotel at 1 Grand Avenue.
• St Nicholas Church Hall in Centurion Road becomes Brighton Film Studios.
• Church of St Mary the Virgin and St Mary Magdalene closes for worship.
April 2 Cinemas and other places of entertainment are allowed to turn on their neon lights again after an extended wartime blackout to conserve energy.
May 23-27 A Health Congress is held in Brighton by the Royal Sanitary Institute.
June 15 The Brighton Stanley Excelsior 550 yard White Hope Scratch Cycle Race is held in Preston Park.
August 16-18 The News Chronicle Professional Golf Tournament is held at Hollingbury Golf Course.
September 3 Brighton Speed Trials are held on Madeira Drive.
• Gravestones in the Hanover Chapel burial ground are moved to the side of the site.
• Romano-British pottery and tiles are found during excavation to create tennis courts in Hove Park.
• The churchyard of All Saints’ Church, Patcham is extended.
• The Sassoon Mausoleum becomes The Bombay Bar.
Page created 30 March 2026