Directory

1853 CE

Saint Paul Fire and Marine, as predecessor of The Travelers Companies, a worldwide insurance service, founded in Minnesota, United States. Indian Railways: The first passenger railway in India opens from Bombay to Thana, Maharashtra, 22 mi km. Compagnie Générale des Eaux, predecessor of Vivendi and Veolia, a global media conglomerate, is founded in Paris, France.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 20 – The United Kingdom proclaims its annexation of Lower Burma, ending the Second Anglo-Burmese War.source
  • March 29 – Manchester is granted city status in the United Kingdom.source
  • July 14 – Japan allows Commodore Perry to come ashore and begin negotiations.source
  • August 12 – New Zealand acquires self-government.source
  • November 3 – Troops of William Walker capture La Paz in Baja California Territory and declare the (short-lived) Republic of Sonora.source
  • November 15 – Maria II of Portugal is succeeded by her son Pedro V as King of Portugal.source

Conflict & Security

  • January 8 – Taiping Rebellion: Zeng Guofan is ordered to assist the governor of Hunan in organizing a militia force to search for local bandits.source
  • January 12 – Taiping Rebellion: The Taiping army occupies Wuchang.source
  • February 10 – Taiping Rebellion: Taiping forces assemble at Hanyang, Hankou and Wuchang for the march on Nanjing.source
  • March 20 – Taiping Rebellion: A rebel army of around 750,000 seizes Nanjing, killing 30,000 Imperial troops.source
  • May 5 – Perpetual Maritime Truce comes into force between the United Kingdom and the rulers of the Sheikhdoms of the Lower Gulf, later known as the Trucial States.source
  • June 27 – Taiping Rebellion: The Northern Expeditionary Force crosses the Yellow River.source
  • July 27 – Iesada succeeds his father Ieyoshi as Japanese shōgun. The Late Tokugawa shogunate (the last part of the Edo period in Japan) begins.source
  • October 4–5 – Crimean War: The Ottoman Empire begins war with Russia.source
  • October 28 – Crimean War: The Ottoman army crosses the Danube into Vidin/Calafat, Wallachia.source
  • October 30 – Taiping Rebellion: The Taiping Northern Expeditionary Force comes within 3 mi km of Tianjin.source
  • November 4 – Crimean War: Battle of Oltenitza – Turkish forces defeat the Russians.source
  • November 30 (November 18 O.S.) – Crimean War: Battle of Sinop – The Russian fleet destroys the Turkish fleet.source
  • December 6 – Taiping Rebellion: French minister de Bourboulon arrives at the Heavenly Capital, aboard the Cassini.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • July 8 – U.S. Commodore Matthew C. Perry arrives in Edo Bay, Japan, with a request for a trade treaty.source

Economy & Finance

  • March – The clothing company Levi Strauss & Co. is founded in San Francisco (US).source
  • September 20 – Otis Elevator, as predecessor of Otis Worldwide, is founded in the United States.source
  • December 14 – Compagnie Générale des Eaux, predecessor of Vivendi and Veolia, a global media conglomerate, is founded in Paris, France.source
  • The Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China is incorporated in London by Scotsman James Wilson, under a Royal Charter from Queen Victoria.source
  • 1853–1873 – More than 130,000 Chinese laborers come to Cuba.source

Technology & Infrastructure

  • February 12 – The city of Puerto Montt is founded in the Reloncaví Sound, Chile.source
  • April 16 – Indian Railways: The first passenger railway in India opens from Bombay to Thana, Maharashtra, 22 mi km.source
  • May 12–October 31 – The Great Industrial Exhibition is held in Dublin, Ireland.source
  • May 23 – The first plat for Seattle, Washington, is laid out.source
  • June 30 – Georges-Eugène Haussmann is selected as préfect of the Seine (department) to begin the re-planning of Paris.source
  • July 1 – The Swiss watch company Tissot is founded.source
  • August 24 – Potato chips are first prepared, by George Crum at Saratoga Springs, New York, according to popular accounts.source
  • October 1 – C. Bechstein's piano factory is founded, one of three established in a "golden year" in the history of the piano (Julius Blüthner and Steinway & Sons being the others).source
  • December 30 – Gadsden Purchase: The United States buys approximately 77,000 km2 sqmi of land from Mexico to facilitate railroad building in the Southwest.source
  • Isambard Kingdom Brunel accepts John Scott Russell's tender for construction of the passenger steamer.source
  • Melbourne Cricket Ground, the largest sports stadium in the Southern Hemisphere, officially opens.source
  • The world's first public aquarium opens, as a feature of the London Zoo.source

Science & Discovery

  • September 19 – English missionary Hudson Taylor first leaves for China.source
  • October 4 – On the east coast of the United States, Donald McKay launches the Great Republic, the world's biggest sailing ship, which at 4,500 tons is too large to be successful.source
  • French diplomat Arthur de Gobineau begins publication of his An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (Essai sur l'inégalité des races humaines), an early example of scientific racism.source

Health & Medicine

  • April 7 – Prince Leopold, the youngest son and the eighth child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, is born in Buckingham Palace; he has inherited haemophilia. During the labour, Victoria chooses to use chloroform, thereby encouraging the use of anesthesia in childbirth.source
  • Charles Pravaz and Alexander Wood independently invent a practical hypodermic syringe.source
  • An outbreak of yellow fever kills 7,790 people in New Orleans.source

Crime & Justice

  • July 25 – Outlaw and bandit Joaquin Murrieta is killed in California.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • January 6 – U.S. President-elect Franklin Pierce's only living child, Benjamin "Benny" Pierce, is killed in a train accident.source
  • March 5 – Saint Paul Fire and Marine, as predecessor of The Travelers Companies, a worldwide insurance service, founded in Minnesota, United States.source

Culture & Society

  • January 6 – Florida Governor Thomas Brown signs legislation that provides public support for the new East Florida Seminary, leading to the establishment of the University of Florida.source
  • January 19 – Giuseppe Verdi's opera Il Trovatore premieres at Teatro Apollo in Rome.source
  • February 22 – Washington University in St. Louis is founded as Eliot Seminary.source
  • March 6 – Giuseppe Verdi's opera La traviata premieres at La Fenice in Venice, but is poorly received at this time.source
  • June 22 – Guimarães is elevated to city status by Queen Maria II of Portugal.source
  • August 23 – The first true International Meteorological Organization is established in Brussels, Belgium.source
  • August 24 – The Royal Norwegian Navy Museum is founded at Karljohansvern in Horten, perhaps the world's first naval museum.source
  • October 25 – In Munich, the art museum Neue Pinakothek opens.source
  • Wheaton Academy is founded as an evangelical high school in West Chicago, Illinois.source

Births

  • January 28 – José Martí, Cuban revolutionary (d. 1895)source
  • February 22 – Annie Le Porte Diggs, Canadian-born state librarian of Kansas (d. 1916)source
  • April 7 – Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, member of the British royal family (d. 1884)source
  • July 18 – Hendrik Lorentz, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1928)source
  • July 24 – William Gillette, American actor, playwright and stage-manager (d. 1937)source
  • July 29 – Ioan Culcer, Romanian general and politician (d. 1928)source
  • September 2 – Wilhelm Ostwald, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1932)source
  • September 16 – Albrecht Kossel, German physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1927)source
  • September 21 – Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1926)source
  • October 13 – Lillie Langtry, Jersey-born stage actress and royal mistress (d. 1929)source
  • October 17 – Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia, wife of Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh (d. 1920)source
  • October 26 – Tokugawa Akitake, Japanese daimyō, the last lord of Mito Domain, younger brother of the last shōgun Tokugawa Yoshinobu (d. 1910)source
  • December 22 – Teresa Carreño, Venezuelan pianist, singer, composer and conductor (d. 1917)source
  • December 23 – William Henry Moody, 35th United States Secretary of the Navy, 45th United States Attorney General and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (d. 1917)source

Deaths

  • January 8 – Mihály Bertalanits, Slovene (Prekmurje Slovene) poet in the Kingdom of Hungary (b. 1788)source
  • February 4 – Princess Maria Amélia of Brazil, daughter of Emperor Pedro I of Brazil (b. 1831)source
  • February 6 – Anastasio Bustamante, 4th President of Mexico (b. 1780)source
  • March 30 – Abigail Fillmore, First Lady of the United States (b. 1798)source
  • April 18 – William R. King, 13th Vice President of the United States (b. 1786)source
  • June 2 – Lucas Alamán, Mexican statesman, historian (b. 1792)source
  • July 27 – Tokugawa Ieyoshi, 12th shōgun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan (b. 1793)source
  • August 9 – Józef Maria Hoene-Wroński, Polish philosopher (b. 1776)source
  • August 19 – George Cockburn, British naval commander (b. 1772)source
  • August 23 – Alexander Calder, first mayor of Beaumont, Texas (b. 1806)source
  • August 29 – Charles James Napier, British army general and colonial administrator (b. 1782)source
  • October 2 – François Arago, French Catalan mathematician, physicist, astronomer and politician (b. 1786)source
  • October 13 – Jan Cock Blomhoff, Dutch director of Dejima, Japan (b. 1779)source
  • December 15 – Georg Friedrich Grotefend, German epigraphist, philologist (b. 1775)source