Eleven home players contested first-round matches in SW19 and all but one experienced defeat, with six of the losses coming in straight sets.
The number could have been worse, but Jack Pinnington Jones' match against Brandon Nakashima was halted due to bad light while he was two sets down.
It is the worst return for British players in the men's and women's singles draws at Wimbledon this century.
Britain's hopes were immediately soured after the withdrawals of top stars Emma Raducanu and then Jack Draper through injury.
British men's number one Cameron Norrie was tasked with flying the flag, but the 26th seed lost a five-setter 6-7(7), 6-2, 6-7(2), 6-3, 7-6(4) to qualifier Michael Zheng.
Harriet Dart pushed former French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko in a 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 loss and Oliver Tarvet was beaten in four hours by France's Arthur Rinderknech.
Fran Jones was the final loser, 6-4, 6-4 against Diane Parry and pointed to the difficulty of the draws as one factor behind the nation's struggles.
"It will create bad headlines probably slightly unfairly, I think with some of the draws that people are handed. It was always going to be difficult," Jones said.
Jones' claim holds some weight, however, with Norrie the only British player to face an opponent ranked lower than him.
Teenagers Mimi Xu, Hannah Klugman and Mika Stojsavljevic also fell as they were dealt tough draws against Daria Kasatkina, Barbora Krejcikova and Belinda Bencic respectively.
Felix Gill was seen off by rising Spanish star Rafael Jodar and debutants Max Basing and Alicia Dudeney were also sent packing.