1784 CE

Henry Cavendish's paper to the Royal Society of London, Experiments on Air, reveals the molecular composition of water. John Wesley ordains ministers for the Methodist Church in the United States. The Congress of the Confederation passes the Ordinance of Governance to set guidelines for adding to the original 13 states in the United States of America.

In the 1780s, the 18th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 6 – Treaty of Constantinople: The Ottoman Empire agrees to Russia's annexation of the Crimea.source
  • January 14 – The Congress of the United States ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain to end the American Revolution, with the signature of President of Congress Thomas Mifflin.source
  • January 14 – The Confederation Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain to end the American Revolutionary War.United Statessource
  • March 1 – The Confederation Congress accepts Virginia's cession of all rights to the Northwest Territory and to Kentucky (Illinois County).source
  • 11 March - Treaty of Mangalore signed between a jubilant Tipu Sultan and East India Company bringing a closure to Second Anglo-Mysore War.Indiasource
  • April 23 – The Congress of the Confederation passes the Ordinance of Governance to set guidelines for adding to the original 13 states in the United States of America.source
  • May 12 – The Treaty of Paris (signed on September 3 the previous year, officially ending the War of American Independence) comes into effect.source
  • May 20 – A treaty is signed in Paris between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Dutch Republic, formally ending the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War.source
  • 20 May – a treaty is signed in Paris with the Dutch Republic formally ending the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War.United Kingdomsource
  • June 15 – Meshech Weare is sworn in as the first governor of New Hampshire.United Statessource
  • 1 July - Alliance treaty between Sweden and France: Sweden are given Saint-Barthélemy as a colony.Swedensource
  • July 29 – The United States and the Kingdom of France sign a convention for establishing diplomatic relations and "determining the functions and prerogatives of their respective consuls, vice consuls, agents, and commissaries".source
  • August 13 – Parliament of Great Britain passes Pitt's India Act (An Act for the better Regulation and Management of the Affairs of the East India Company and of the British Possessions in India). It requires the governor-general to be chosen from outside the Company and makes company directors subject to parliamentary supervision.source
  • August 16 – Britain creates the colony of New Brunswick.source
  • August 16 – In response to Loyalist demands, the Crown creates New Brunswick out of Nova Scotia. New Brunswick was then divided into eight counties.Canadasource
  • 17 September – The Barony of Guldborgland is established by Poul Abraham Lehn from the manors of Orebygård and Berritzgaard.Denmarksource
  • September 22 – Russia establishes a colony at Kodiak, Alaska.source
  • October 22 – North Carolina rescinds its resolution ceding its western territory (Washington District, modern-day Tennessee) to the United States, after earlier giving Congress two years to accept the terms.source
  • November 26 – The Roman Catholic Apostolic Prefecture of the United States is established.source
  • 26 November – The County of Muckadell is established by Albrecht Christopher Schaffalitzky de Muckadell (1720-1797) from the manors of Arreskov, Brobygård (including Olstedgård) and Gelskov.Denmarksource
  • November 30 – Richard Henry Lee of Virginia is selected as the new President of the Confederation Congress.source
  • King Charles III of Spain authorizes land grants in Alta California.source
  • The North Carolina General Assembly changes the name of Kingston, North Carolina, originally named for King George III of Great Britain, to Kinston.source
  • Britain receives its first bales of imported American cotton.source

Conflict & Security

  • February 24 – The Captivity of Mangalorean Catholics at Seringapatam begins.source
  • March 2 – Governor George Clinton of New York writes to Congress asking them to declare war against Vermont, which at this time is an unrecognized de facto independent state claimed by New York. Congress declined to do this.United Statessource
  • 30 March – 18 June – The Sagbadre War, in present-day Ghana.Norwaysource
  • August - Gustav III returns to Sweden.Swedensource
  • October 8 – "Kettle War", a 1-day action on the Scheldt in which a ship of the Dutch Republic repels forces of the Holy Roman Empire.source
  • October 31–December 14 – The Revolt of Horea, Cloșca and Crișan in Transylvania causes Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor to suspend the Hungarian Constitution.source
  • Benjamin Franklin tries in vain to persuade the French to alter their clocks in winter to take advantage of the daylight.source
  • Butler's Rangers were disbanded in June 1784, and its veterans were given land grants in the Nassau District, now the Niagara region of Ontario, as a reward for their services to the British Crown.Canadasource

Exploration & Expansion

  • 2 August – the first mail coach runs between Bristol and London.United Kingdomsource
  • September 22 – Russia establishes their first colony in Kodiak, Alaska.United Statessource
  • North West Company built up Grand portage as a general summer rendezvous for all companies and free traders, drawing furs from as far as Oregon and the Arctic Circle.Canadasource
  • David Thompson began his apprenticeship on Hudson Bay.Canadasource
  • The Buchanites are expelled from Irvine, going on to establish a celibate community at New Cample near Closeburn, Dumfriesshire.Scotlandsource

Religion & Belief

  • February 28 – John Wesley ordains ministers for the Methodist Church in the United States.source
  • 28 February – John Wesley charters the Methodist Church.United Kingdomsource
  • March 22 – The Emerald Buddha is installed at the Wat Phra Kaew, on the grounds of the Grand Palace in Bangkok (or in 1785).source
  • 14 November – Samuel Seabury is consecrated at the house of John Skinner, coadjutor bishop of Aberdeen, as first Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut (his native state), the first bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States.Scotlandsource
  • December 25 – The Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States is officially formed at the "Christmas Conference", led by Thomas Coke and Francis Asbury.source
  • December 25 – The Methodist Episcopal Church is officially formed at the so-called "Christmas Conference" led by Thomas Coke and Francis Asbury.United Statessource
  • New Church of Ireland St. John's Cathedral, Cashel, completedIrelandsource
  • St Andrew's Church in New Town, Edinburgh, opened.Scotlandsource

Economy & Finance

  • February – The Massachusetts Bank, a predecessor of BankBoston, is established as the first federally chartered joint-stock bank in the U.S. The bank's charter is signed by John Hancock and its early account holders include Paul Revere, Samuel Adams, John Hancock and Henry Knox.United Statessource
  • 21 June – Commutation Act reduces duties on spirits and tea, and implements window tax.United Kingdomsource
  • July 9 – The Bank of New York opens as the first in New York state and continues to operate under that name for almost 223 years until being acquired by Mellon Financial and becoming BNY Mellon.source
  • The Old Bushmills Distillery becomes an officially registered companyIrelandsource
  • The Mutual Assurance Company for Insuring Houses from Loss by Fire is established in Philadelphia.United Statessource

Technology & Infrastructure

  • 15 April – the first ascent of a manned balloon in the British Isles takes place with a hot air balloon at NavanIrelandsource
  • June 9 – The Bank of New York, a predecessor of BNY Mellon, opens.United Statessource
  • 21 August – Joseph Bramah receives his first lock patent.United Kingdomsource
  • William Conyngham begins installation of a planned settlement on Rutland Island, County DonegalIrelandsource
  • Georgernes Verft, a shipyard in Bergen, was established.Norwaysource
  • Orlov Trotter - birth of Bars I, considered first of breedRussiasource
  • Highland estates whose revenues were forfeited to the government by their proprietors following the Jacobite rising of 1745 are restored to their legal heirs on discharge of debts. The accrued funds are primarily applied to completion of the Forth and Clyde Canal.Scotlandsource
  • Industrial Revolution: Henry Cort of Funtley, Hampshire, applies the coal-fired reverbatory furnace to the puddling process for conversion of cast to wrought iron and Edmund Cartwright designs his first power loom.United Kingdomsource

Science & Discovery

  • January 15 – Henry Cavendish's paper to the Royal Society of London, Experiments on Air, reveals the molecular composition of water.source
  • 15 January – Henry Cavendish's paper Experiments on Air reveals the composition of water.United Kingdomsource
  • 15 September – the Italian Vincenzo Lunardi makes the first hydrogen balloon flight in Britain, from Moorfields in London to South Mimms.United Kingdomsource
  • September 19 – In France, the Robert brothers (Anne-Jean Robert and Nicolas-Louis Robert) and a Mr. Collin-Hullin (whose first name is lost to history) become the first people to fly more than 100 km or 100 miles in the air, lifting off from Paris and landing 6 hours and 40 minutes later near Bethune after a journey of 186 km.source
  • 4 October – the Englishman James Sadler makes the first hot air balloon flight in England, from Oxford to Woodeaton.United Kingdomsource
  • November 27 – The phenomenon of black holes is first posited in a paper by John Michell, in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London.source
  • Antoine Lavoisier pioneers quantitative chemistry.source
  • Carl Friedrich Gauss pioneers the field of summation with the formula summing at the age of 7.source
  • Benjamin Franklin invents bifocal spectacles.source
  • James Cook's journal of his last voyage published in London.Canadasource
  • Royal Commission on Animal Magnetism appointed in Paris.Francesource
  • 25 & 27 August – apothecary James Tytler makes the first balloon ascents in Great Britain, in a hot air balloon from Edinburgh.Scotlandsource
  • "Wash Act" reduces excise duty on Scotch whisky and provides a definition of the Highland Line.Scotlandsource
  • 25 & 27 August – Scottish apothecary James Tytler makes the first balloon ascents in Britain, in a hot air balloon from Edinburgh.United Kingdomsource

Health & Medicine

  • Madame du Coudray, pioneer of modern midwifery, retires.source
  • A huge locust swarm hits South Africa.source
  • A dispute arising at the University of Glasgow between Professor John Anderson, the Principal William Leechman and others leads to the self-expulsion of Thomas Muir.Scotlandsource

Crime & Justice

  • 8 March – Mary Bailey, a mariticide, becomes one of the last persons in Britain, convicted of murder, to be sentenced to be hanged, and their body burned. She and John Quin, accused of murdering Cornelius Bailey at Portsmouth, are both convicted and hanged at Winchester; Bailey claims her innocence to the end. After execution, Quin's body is handed to the surgeons for dissection, and Mary Bailey's body burned.United Kingdomsource
  • 30 March - Lloyd Kenyon becomes Master of the Rolls.Walessource
  • Ward Chipman the Elder, a Massachusetts lawyer, settled in New Brunswick, where he served as solicitor general until 1808.Canadasource
  • The satirist John Williams is prosecuted for an attack on the Duke of Rutland's administration in the Volunteers' Journal and flees the countryIrelandsource
  • Jacob Juel escapes imprisonment at Akershus Castle, and flees to Sweden.Norwaysource
  • unknown date – Samuel Homfray and his brother quarrel with Anthony Bacon and take out a lease of one of the richest iron-ore deposits in the district (which develops into the Penydarren ironworks).Walessource

Climate & Environment

  • 1 August – the beginning of the driest twelve months in England and Wales for which reliable records exist – the England and Wales Precipitation totalled just 522.0 mm – with a second successive extended, cold and dry winter from October to MarchUnited Kingdomsource
  • Great Tenmei famine in Edo period Japan continues, as 300,000 die of starvation.source
  • The Laki eruption that began the year prior, continues until 7 February.Icelandsource
  • Two long, severe winters following the eruption of the Laki volcano in Iceland produce the coldest weather since 1740 and eighth-coldest calendar year (mean Central England temperature 7.82 °C) for which reliable records exist – this despite May 1784 being among the ten hottest in that record.United Kingdomsource

Culture & Society

  • January 7 – D. Landreth Seed Company established in Philadelphia; it will continue to exist into the 21st century.United Statessource
  • 15 January - The Asiatic Society was established.Indiasource
  • 29 January – Joachim Geelmuyden and his family were ennobled under the name Gyldenkrantz.Norwaysource
  • April 27 – The Marriage of Figaro, written by playwright Pierre Beaumarchais as a sequel to The Barber of Seville, premieres at the Comédie-Française in Paris.source
  • 14 May - Thomas James Bulkeley, 7th Viscount Bulkeley, is created Baron Bulkeley.Walessource
  • 22 May – English actress Sarah Siddons makes her Scottish debut in Edinburgh.Scotlandsource
  • June 4 – Élisabeth Thible is the first woman to ascend in a hot-air balloon, at Lyon, France.source
  • 18 September – Dardanus, opera by Antonio Sacchini, was first performed at VersaillesFrancesource
  • December – Immanuel Kant's essay "Answering the Question: What Is Enlightenment?" is published.source
  • The North Carolina General Assembly incorporates the town of Morgansborough, named for Daniel Morgan. The town is designated as the county seat for Burke County, North Carolina and is subsequently renamed Morgan, later shortened to Morganton.source
  • Princess Yekaterina Vorontsova-Dashkova is named first president of the newly created Russian Academy.source
  • Foundation of the first theater in Estonia, the Tallinna saksa teater.source
  • The post of Postmasters General of Ireland establishedIrelandsource
  • God - completed by poet Gavrila DerzhavinRussiasource

Births

  • January 28 – George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (died 1860)source
  • February 5 – Nancy Hanks, mother of Abraham Lincoln (died 1818)source
  • February 20 – John E. Wool, general officer in the United States Army, who served during the War of 1812, Mexican–American War, and the American Civil War (died 1869)source
  • March 12 – William Buckland, English geologist, paleontologist (died 1856)source
  • March 23 – Tom Molineaux, African-American boxer (died 1818)source
  • March 27 – Jonathan Jennings, American politician and the first governor of Indiana (died 1834)source
  • April 5 – Louis Spohr, German violinist, composer (died 1859)source
  • July 22 – Friedrich Bessel, German mathematician, astronomer (died 1846)source
  • 26 September – Christopher Hansteen, astronomer and physicist (d.1873)Norwaysource
  • October 13 – King Ferdinand VII of Spain (died 1833)source
  • October 15 – Thomas Robert Bugeaud, Marshal of France and duke of Isly (died 1849)source
  • October 19 – Leigh Hunt, British critic, essayist (died 1859)source
  • October 19 – John McLoughlin, Canadian fur trader (died 1857)source
  • October 19 – John McLoughlin, physician, fur trader, and merchant (d.1857)Canadasource
  • October 20 – Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (died 1865)source
  • November 24 – Zachary Taylor, 12th President of the United States (died 1850)source
  • November 24 – Zachary Taylor, 12th president of the U.S. from 1849 to 1850 (died 1850)United Statessource
  • Teodor Narbutt - historian and military engineerRussiasource

Deaths

  • 8 February – Christopher Bassett, Methodist exhorter, 30 (tuberculosis)Walessource
  • February 27 – Count of St. Germain, French philosopher, adventurer (born 1710)source
  • April 26 – Nano Nagle, Irish convent founder (born 1718)source
  • April 29 – Agustín de Jáuregui, Spanish colonial governor (born 1711)source
  • May 3 – Anthony Benezet, French-born American abolitionist and educator (born 1713)source
  • June 11 – Lê Quý Đôn, Vietnamese philosopher, poet, encyclopedist, and government official (born 1726)source
  • June 26 – Caesar Rodney, American lawyer, signer of the United States Declaration of Independence (born 1728)source
  • July 1 – Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, German composer (born 1710)source
  • July 31 – Denis Diderot, French philosopher, encyclopedist (born 1713)source
  • August 10 – Allan Ramsay, Scottish portrait-painter (born 1713)source
  • August 28 – Junípero Serra, Spanish Franciscan missionary (born 1713)source
  • September 8 – Ann Lee, American religious leader (born 1736)source
  • December 5 – Phillis Wheatley, first published African-American author (born 1753)source
  • December 5 – Phillis Wheatley, first published African-American female poet (born 1753)United Statessource
  • December 13 – Samuel Johnson, English writer, lexicographer (born 1709)source
  • December 13 – Dr. Samuel Johnson dies in London. (b.1709)Canadasource
  • December 26 – Seth Warner, American revolutionary leader (born 1743)source
  • Alexander Lanskoy - favorite of Catherine the GreatRussiasource