1783

Year 1783 (MDCCLXXXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Sunday of the 11-day slower Julian calendar).

Events of 1783

January–June

The first manned hot-air balloon, designed by the Montgolfier brothers, takes off from the Bois de Boulogne, Paris, on November 21, 1783

• February 3 – American Revolutionary War: Britain acknowledges the United States independence.
• February 4
  • American Revolutionary War: Great Britain formally declares that it will cease hostilities with the United States of America.
  • A sequence of earthquakes begins in Calabria, Italy, leaves 50,000 dead.
• February 26 – Continental Army Corps of Engineers disbanded.
• March 5 – Last celebration of Massacre Day.
• April 15 – Preliminary articles of peace ending the American Revolutionary War are ratified.
• May 18 – Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada – The first United Empire Loyalists reach Parrtown.
• May 26 – A Great Jubilee Day is held in Trumbull, Connecticut to celebrate the end of the American Revolution.
• June 4 or June 5 – The Montgolfier brothers publicly demonstrate their montgolfière (hot air balloon) in Annonay, France.
• June 8 – The volcano Laki, in Iceland, begins an 8-month eruption which kills tens of thousands throughout Europe, including 1/5 of Iceland's population, and causes widespread famine. It has been described as one of "the greatest environmental catastrophes in European History".

July–December

The first manned hydrogen balloon La Charlière' on its first flight -December 1, 1783. Piloted by Prof. Jacques Charles with Nicolas-Louis Robert.

• July 16 – Grants of land in Canada to American loyalists are announced.
• July 24 – The Treaty of Georgievsk is signed between the Imperial Russia and the Kingdom of Kartli and Kakheti (Georgia).
• August 5 – Mount Asama erupts, causing turmoil in Edo period Japan.
• August 27 – Le Globe - Jacques Charles and Les Frères Robert launched the world's first hydrogen-filled balloon in Paris.
• September 3 – American Revolutionary War – Treaty of Paris: A treaty between the United States and the Kingdom of Great Britain is signed in Paris, formally ending the war.
• September 9 – Dickinson College was chartered in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
• October 3 – The Waterford Glassware Factory begins production in Waterford City, Ireland.
• November 2 – In Rocky Hill, New Jersey, US General George Washington gives his Farewell Address to the Army.
• November 21 – In Paris, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent, marquis d'Arlandes, make the first untethered hot air balloon flight (flight time: 25 minutes, Maximum height: 900 m).
• November 24 – In Spain, the Cedula of Population is signed, stating that anyone who will swear fealty to Spain and is of the Roman Catholic faith is welcome to populate Trinidad and Tobago.
• November 25 – American Revolutionary War: The last British troops leave New York City 3 months after the signing of the Treaty of Paris.
• November 30 – A 5.3 magnitude earthquake struck New Jersey.
• December 1 – La Charlière - Jacques Charles and Nicolas-Louis Robert made the first manned flight in a hydrogen-filled balloon in Paris.
• December 4 – At Fraunces Tavern in New York City, U.S. General George Washington formally bids his officers farewell.

Undated

• The city of Sevastopol is founded on the Crimean peninsula of the Russian Empire.
• United Empire Loyalists flee to Canada from the new United States.
• The Treaty of Versailles is signed, ending hostilities between the Franco-Spanish Alliance and England.
• Loyalists from New York settle Great Abaco in the Bahamas.
• Ireland's last grey wolf is killed.
• Spanish government refuses to grant diplomatic recognition to the USA.
• Evan William's distillery was founded in Bardstown Kentucky.

Births

• January 20 – Justus Johann Friedrich Dotzauer, German cellist and composer (d. 1860)
• January 23 – Stendhal, French writer (d. 1842)
• March 8 – Hannah Van Buren (d. 1819)
• April 3 – Washington Irving, American author (d. 1859)
• July 24 – Simón Bolívar, Venezuelan patriot, revolutionary leader and statesman (d. 1830)
• September 17 – Samuel Prout, English painter (d. 1852)
• September 17 – Nadezhda Durova, First female Russian army officer (d. 1866)
• October 31 – Karl Wilhelm Gottlob Kastner, German chemist (d. 1857)

Deaths

• January 7 – William Tans'ur, English hymnist (b. 1700)
• February 6 – Capability Brown, English landscape gardener (b. 1716)
• March 23 – Charles Carroll, American lawyer and delegate to the Continental Congress (b. 1723)
• March 30 – William Hunter, Scottish anatomist (b. 1718)
• March 31 – Nikita Ivanovich Panin, Russian statesman (b. 1718)
• April 16
  • Benedict Joseph Labre, French saint (b. 1745)
  • Christian Mayer, Czech astronomer (b. 1719)
• May 23 – James Otis, American lawyer and patriot (b. 1725)
• September 18
  • Leonhard Euler, Swiss mathematician and physicist (b. 1707)
  • Benjamin Kennicott, English churchman and Hebrew scholar (b. 1718)
• October 29 – Jean le Rond d'Alembert, French mathematician (b. 1717)
• November – Carolus Linnaeus the Younger, Swedish naturalist (b. 1741 )
• November 22 – John Hanson, American delegate to the Continental Congress (b. 1715)
• November 23 – Yoriyuki Arima, Japanese mathematician (b. 1714)
• December 13 – Pehr Wilhelm Wargentin, Swedish astronomer (b. 1717)
• December 16 – William James, British naval commander (b. 1720)