Directory

1769 CE

Charles III of Spain sends Spanish missionaries, who found California missions in San Diego, Santa Barbara, San Francisco and Monterey, and begin the settlement of California. The party of Gaspar de Portolà becomes the first white group to set foot in the area now known as Santa Monica, California. Dartmouth College is established in Hanover, New Hampshire, as John Wentworth, the Royal Governor, conveys a charter from King George III of Great Britain.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • February 17 – The British House of Commons votes not to allow MP John Wilkes to take his seat after he wins a by-election, on the grounds that he was an outlaw when standing.source
  • May 9 – France conquers Corsica, ending the Corsican War of Independence.source
  • November 21 – Ireland's House of Commons rejects a spending bill passed by Great Britain's parliament, by a 94–71 margin.source

Conflict & Security

  • September 10 – Russo-Turkish War (1768–1774): Russian forces take the Ottoman fortress of Chocim in Bukovina.source
  • November 12 –The Gorkhali Army conquer the last standing Malla Kingdom of Bhaktapur marking the end of The Malla dynasty in Nepal.source
  • December 22 – The Sino-Burmese War (1765–69) is ended by a truce.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • March 16 – Louis Antoine de Bougainville returns to Saint-Malo, following a three-year circumnavigation of the world with the ships Boudeuse and Étoile, with the loss of only seven out of 330 men; among the members of the expedition is Jeanne Baré, the first woman known to have circumnavigated the globe. She returns to France some time after Bougainville and his ships.source
  • April 13 – James Cook arrives in Tahiti, on the ship HM Bark Endeavour, preparing for the 1769 Transit of Venus observed from Tahiti on June 3. After the voyage, the data is found to be inaccurate in determining the distance between the Sun and Earth.source
  • May 14 – Charles III of Spain sends Spanish missionaries, who found California missions in San Diego, Santa Barbara, San Francisco and Monterey, and begin the settlement of California.source
  • June 7 – Frontiersman Daniel Boone first begins to explore modern-day Kentucky.source
  • July 20 – Recently appointed as the Governor of Spanish Louisiana, Irish-born soldier of fortune Alejandro O'Reilly sails into the French fort of La Balize with 21 Spanish ships, along with 2,056 soldiers, cannons and ammunition, and informs French Louisiana Governor Charles Philippe Aubry of his royal commission to take Louisiana on behalf of the King of Spain.source
  • October 1 – James Cook names White Island, off the coast of New Zealand.source
  • October 7 – James Cook lands in New Zealand, at Poverty Bay.source
  • October 9 – In the first encounter between the Māori people and Europeans (at the future site of Gisborne, New Zealand), one Maori is shot and killed after he steals a sword from one of the officers of the Cook expedition. Several more Māori are killed in fighting the next day.source
  • November 1 – A party of the expedition of Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portola becomes the first Europeans to reach San Francisco Bay. Sergeant Jose Francisco de Ortega and his group accidentally discover the area while searching for Drakes Bay in Alta California.source

Religion & Belief

  • March 4 – Mozart departs Italy, after the last of his three tours there.source
  • May 19 – Cardinal Giovanni Vincenzo Antonio Ganganelli is elected as the 249th pope, succeeding the late Clement XIII and choosing to take the regnal name of Pope Clement XIV.source
  • July 16 – Father Junípero Serra founds Mission San Diego de Alcalá, the first of the 21 California missions.source

Technology & Infrastructure

  • April 29 – Scottish inventor James Watt is granted a British patent for "A method of lessening the consumption of steam in steam engines" – the separate condenser, a key improvement (first devised by Watt in 1765) and the basis for the Watt steam engine which stimulates the Industrial Revolution.source
  • July 3 – Richard Arkwright patents a spinning frame in England, able to spin threads mechanically.source
  • October 23 – Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot demonstrates a steam-powered artillery tractor (see drawing) in France.source

Science & Discovery

  • June 3 – A transit of Venus is followed five hours later by a total solar eclipse, the shortest such interval in historical times. The transit is viewed by King George III of Great Britain, at the Kew Observatory.source
  • First recorded use of 'literally' as a metaphorical intensifier.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • August 18 – Brescia Explosion: The city of Brescia, Italy is devastated when the Church of San Nazaro is struck by lightning. The resulting fire ignites 200,000 lb (90,000 kg) of gunpowder being stored there, causing a massive explosion, which destroys 1/6 of the city and kills 3,000 people.source

Climate & Environment

  • September – Massive droughts in Bengal lead to the Bengal famine of 1770, in which ten million people, a third of the population, will die, the worst natural disaster in human history (in terms of lives lost).source

Culture & Society

  • August 3 – The party of Gaspar de Portolà becomes the first white group to set foot in the area now known as Santa Monica, California.source
  • September 6–9 – David Garrick holds a Shakespeare Jubilee festival at Stratford-upon-Avon in England.source
  • December 13 – Dartmouth College is established in Hanover, New Hampshire, as John Wentworth, the Royal Governor, conveys a charter from King George III of Great Britain.source
  • The Authorized King James Version of the Bible is published in England in the Oxford standard text, edited by Benjamin Blayney.source

Births

  • January 1 – Jane Marcet, British science writer (d. 1858)source
  • January 2 – Nannette Streicher, German piano maker, composer, music educator and writer (d. 1833)source
  • February 23 – Princess Pauline of Anhalt-Bernburg; German regent and social reformer (d. 1820)source
  • March 1 – François Séverin Marceau-Desgraviers, French general (d. 1796)source
  • March 2 – DeWitt Clinton, American politician and naturalist, 6th Governor of New York (d. 1828)source
  • March 10 – Joseph Williamson, English philanthropist, builder of the Williamson Tunnels (d. 1840)source
  • March 23 – William Smith, English geologist, cartographer (d. 1839)source
  • April 13 – Thomas Lawrence, English painter (d. 1830)source
  • June 18 – Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, British statesman, diplomat, and soldier (suicide 1822)source
  • July 28 – Hudson Lowe, Irish-born soldier and future jailer of Napoleon on Saint Helena (d. 1831)source
  • August 23 – Georges Cuvier, French naturalist and zoologist; known as the Father of Paleontology (d. 1832)source
  • August 31 – David Hosack American physician and botanist, a Hamilton family doctor (d. 1835)source
  • September 14 – Alexander von Humboldt, German explorer, scientist (d. 1859)source
  • October 6 – Isaac Brock, British general, administrator (d. 1812)source

Deaths

  • January 5 – Charles Sackville, 2nd Duke of Dorset, English cricketer (b. 1711)source
  • February 2 – Pope Clement XIII (b. 1693)source
  • February 2 – Pope Clement XIII dies, the night before preparing an order to dissolve the Jesuits.source
  • April 5 – Marc-Antoine Laugier, French Jesuit priest, architectural theorist (b. 1713)source
  • April 13 – Anna Canalis di Cumiana, morganatic spouse of Victor Amadeus II of Savoy (b. 1680)source
  • April 20 – Chief Pontiac, Ottawa chief (murdered) (b. c. 1719)source
  • June 1 – Edward Holyoke, American President of Harvard University (b. 1689)source
  • August 1 – Jean-Baptiste Chappe d'Auteroche, French astronomer (b. 1722)source
  • August 2 – Daniel Finch, 8th Earl of Winchilsea, English politician (b. 1689)source
  • August 29 – Edmond Hoyle, English game expert (b. 1672)source
  • September 23 – Michel Ferdinand d'Albert d'Ailly, French astronomer (b. 1714)source
  • November 3 – Diane Adélaïde de Mailly, third of the five famous French de Nesle sisters (b. 1713)source
  • November 23 – Constantine Mavrocordatos, Prince of Wallachia and Prince of Moldavia (b. 1711)source
  • December 8 – Joseph Friedrich Ernst, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (b. 1702)source