1847

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1847 (MDCCCXLVII) was a common year starting on Friday (dominical letter C) of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Wednesday (dominical letter E) of the Julian calendar, the 1847th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 847th year of the 2nd millennium, the 47th year of the 19th century, and the 8th year of the 1840s decade. Note that the Julian day for 1847 is 12 calendar days difference, which continued to be used from 1582 until the complete conversion of the Gregorian calendar was entirely done in 1929.

Events

January–March

• January 4 – Samuel Colt sells his first revolver pistol to the U.S government.
• January 13 – The Treaty of Cahuenga ends the fighting in the Mexican–American War in California.
• January 16 – John C. Frémont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.
• January 17 – St. Anthony Hall is founded at Columbia University, New York City, New York.
• January 30 – Yerba Buena, California is renamed San Francisco.
• February 5 – A rescue effort, called the First Relief, leaves Johnson's Ranch to save the ill-fated Donner Party. These California bound emigrants became snowbound in the Sierra Nevada in the winter of 1846–47, and some had resorted to cannibalism to survive.
• February 11 – Thomas Edison was born in Milan, Ohio
• February 22 – Mexican–American War – The Battle of Buena Vista: 5,000 American troops under General Zachary Taylor use their superiority in artillery to drive off 15,000 Mexican troops under Antonio López de Santa Anna, defeating the Mexicans the next day.
• March 1
  • The state of Michigan formally abolishes the death penalty.
  • Faustin Soulouque is elected the President of Haiti.
• March 4 – The 30th United States Congress is sworn into office.
• March 9 – Mexican–American War: United States forces under General Winfield Scott invade Mexico near Veracruz.
• March 14 – Verdi's opera Macbeth premieres at Teatro della Pergola in Florence, Italy.
• March 29 – Mexican–American War: United States forces led by General Winfield Scott take Veracruz after a siege.

April–June

• April 5 – The world's first municipally-funded civic public park, Birkenhead Park in Birkenhead on Merseyside in England, is opened.^[1]
• April 15 – The Lawrence School, Sanawar is established.
• April 16 – New Zealand Wars: A minor Māori chief is accidentally shot by a junior British Army officer in Whanganui on New Zealand's North Island, triggering the Wanganui Campaign which continues until July 23.
• April 25 – The brig Exmouth carrying Irish emigrants from Derry bound for Quebec is wrecked off Islay with only three survivors from more than 250 on board.^[2][3]
• May – The Architectural Association School of Architecture is founded in London.
• May 7 – In Philadelphia, the American Medical Association (AMA) is founded.
• May 31 – Second Treaty of Erzurum: the Ottoman Empire cedes Abadan Island to the Persian Empire.
• June – E.H. Booth & Co. Ltd, which becomes the northern England supermarket chain Booths, is founded when 19-year-old tea dealer Edwin Henry Booth opens a shop called "The China House" in Blackpool.
• June 1
  • The first congress of the Communist League is held in London.
• June 26 – Opening of the first passenger railway wholly within modern-day Denmark, from Copenhagen to Roskilde.^[4]

The first U.S. postage stamps have portraits of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington. Though highly collectable, they are far from being the most valuable.

July–September

• July 1 – The United States issues its first postage stamps (pictured).
• July 24 – After 17 months of travel, Brigham Young leads 148 Mormon pioneers into Salt Lake Valley, resulting in the establishment of Salt Lake City.
• July 26 – Liberia gains independence.
• July 29 – The Cumberland School of Law is founded at Cumberland University in Lebanon, Tennessee. At the end of this year only 15 law schools exist in the United States.
• August 12 – U.S. troops of General Winfield Scott begin to advance along the aqueduct around Chalco and Xochimilco lakes in Mexico
• August 20 – U.S. troops defeat Mexican troops in the Battle of Churubusco
• August – Yale Corporation establishes the first graduate school in USA as "Department of Philosophy and the Arts" renamed as "Graduate School of Arts and Sciences" in 1892.
• September 14 – U.S. general Winfield Scott enters Mexico City, marking the end of organized Mexican resistance in the Mexican–American War.
• September 30 – The Vegetarian Society was formed in the United Kingdom. It remains the oldest in the world.

October–December

• October 12 – German inventor and industrialist Werner von Siemens founds Siemens AG & Halske.
• October 19 – Charlotte Brontë publishes Jane Eyre under the pen name of Currer Bell.
• October 31 – Theta Delta Chi is founded at Union College.
• November 3–29 – Sonderbund War, a civil war in Switzerland in which General Guillaume-Henri Dufour's federal army defeats the Sonderbund (an alliance of seven Catholic cantons) with a total of only 86 deaths.
• November 4–8 – James Young Simpson discovers the anesthetic properties of chloroform and first uses it, successfully, on a patient, in an obstetric case in Edinburgh.^[5][6]
• November 10 – The first brew of Carlsberg Beer was finished.
• December 14 – Emily Brontë and Anne Brontë publish Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey, respectively, in a 3-volume set under the pen names of Ellis Bell and Acton Bell.
• December 21 – Abdelkader surrenders and is imprisoned by the French.

Date unknown

• Great Famine continues in Ireland.
• The North Carolina General Assembly incorporates the railroad town of Goldsborough, and the Wayne county seat is moved to the new town.
• Radley College, an English public school, is founded near Oxford.

Births

January–June

Thomas Alva Edison

Otto Wallach

• January 5 – Oku Yasukata, Japanese field marshal and a leading figure in the early Imperial Japanese Army (d. 1930)
• January 7 – Caspar F. Goodrich, American admiral (d. 1925)
• January 24 – Radomir Putnik, Serbian field marshal (d. 1917)
• January 28 – Dorus Rijkers, Dutch naval hero (d. 1928)
• February 8 – Hugh Price Hughes, Methodist social reformer, first Superintendent of the West London Mission (d. 1902)
• February 11 – Thomas Alva Edison, American inventor (d. 1931)
• February 15 – Robert Fuchs, Austrian composer (d. 1927)
• February 16 – Philipp Scharwenka, Polish-German composer (d. 1917)
• March 3 – Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born inventor (d. 1922)
• March 4 – Carl Josef Bayer, Austrian chemist (d. 1904)
• March 8 – John Lister, English politician (d. 1933)
• March 14 – Castro Alves, Brazilian poet (d. 1871)
• March 23 – Edmund Gurney, British psychologist (d. 1888)
• March 27 – Otto Wallach, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1931)
• April 2 – Flora Annie Steel, English writer (d. 1929)
• April 10 – Joseph Pulitzer, Hungarian-born journalist and newspaper publisher (d. 1911)
• May 7 – Archibald Primrose, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1929)
• May 14 – Frederick William Borden, Canadian politician (d. 1917)
• June 8 – Ida Saxton McKinley, U.S. First Lady (d. 1907)
• June 11 – Millicent Fawcett, British suffragist and feminist (d. 1929)

July–December

Paul von Hindenburg

Bram Stoker

• July 9 – Wong Fei-hung, Chinese healer and revolutionary (d. 1924)
• July 20 – Max Liebermann, German painter and printmaker (d. 1935)
• July 25 – Paul Langerhans, German pathologist and biologist (d. 1888)
• August 14 – Karl Oskar Medin, Swedish scientist and pediatrician (1927)
  • Robert Comtesse, member of the Swiss Federal Council (d. 1922)
• August 21 – Hale Johnson, American temperance movement leader (d. 1902)
• September 3 – Charles Stillman Sperry, American admiral (d. 1911)
• September 5 – Jesse James, American outlaw (d. 1882)
• October 1 – Annie Besant, English women's rights activist, writer and orator (d. 1933)
• October 2 – Paul von Hindenburg, German field marshal, President of Germany (d. 1934)
• October 13 – Maurice Bailloud, French general (d. 1921)
• October 14 – Wilgelm Vitgeft, Russian admiral (d. 1904)
• October 17 – Chiquinha Gonzaga, Brazilian composer (d. 1935)
• October 22 – Koos de la Rey, Boer general (d. 1914)
• November 2 – Georges Sorel, French socialist (d. 1922)
• November 7 – Lotta Crabtree, American stage actress (d. 1924)
• November 8 – Bram Stoker, creator of the Gothic novel Dracula (d. 1912)
• November 26 – Dagmar of Denmark, empress of Tsar Alexander III of Russia (d. 1928)
• November 30 – Afonso Pena, Brazilian president (d. 1909)
• December 7 – George Grossmith, English actor and comic writer (d. 1912)
• December 18 – Augusta Holmès, French composer (d. 1903)
• December 17
  • Émile Faguet, French writer and critic (d. 1916)
  • Michel-Joseph Maunoury, French general during World War I (d. 1923)
• December 28 – Giuseppe Maria Giulietti, Italian explorer (d. 1881)

Date unknown

• Bandō Kakitsu I, Japanese kabuki actor (d. 1893)

Deaths

January–June

• January 19 – Charles Bent, first Governor of New Mexico Territory (assassinated)
• March 9 – Mary Anning, British paleontologist (b. 1799)
• April 21 – Barbara Spooner Wilberforce, wife of British Abolitionist William Wilberforce (b. 1777)
• April 30 – Archduke Charles of Austria, Austrian general (b. 1771)
• May 14 – Fanny Mendelssohn, German composer and pianist (b. 1805)
• May 15 – Daniel O'Connell, Irish politician, who promoted the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829 (b. 1775)
• May 29 – Emmanuel de Grouchy, Marquis de Grouchy, French marshal (b. 1766)
• May 31 – Abbasgulu Bakikhanov, Azerbaijani writer (b. 1794)

July–December

Felix Mendelssohn

• July 16 – Karl Friedrich Burdach, German physiologist (b. 1776)
• September 4 – František Vladislav Hek, Czech patriot (b. 1769)
• September 13 – Nicolas Oudinot, French marshal (b. 1767)
• October 3 – Charles Hatchett, English chemist (b. 1765)
• October 22 – Negus Sahle Selassie of Shewa
• November 4 – Felix Mendelssohn, German composer (b. 1809)
• December 14 – Manuel José Arce, Central American politician (b. 1787)

References

• Historic Letters of 1847