1880 CE

School is made compulsory for children aged 6 to 14 in New South Wales. The first stone is laid for the Clarkson Memorial in Wisbech, England. The John N Gamewell, a small American brigantine, sinks off the west coast of the Cape Colony near Port Elizabeth.

In the 1880s, the 19th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • 11 April – A presidential election results in the assumption of the presidency by General Julio Argentino Roca, who defeats the Governor of Buenos Aires Province, Carlos Tejedor. Thus the Generation of '80 begins its rule in Argentina. Under Roca's presidency, the so-called "laicist laws" (Leyes Laicas) are passed, which nationalizing functions that had previously been under the control of the Church.Argentinasource
  • April 18 – 1880 United Kingdom general election: William Ewart Gladstone defeats Benjamin Disraeli, to become Prime Minister for the second time.source
  • April 19 – The Prime Minister of Sweden, Louis De Geer, resigns over the defeat of a defense reform bill in the country's Riksdag; he is succeeded by Count Arvid Posse (1880–1883).source
  • 29 April – At the United Kingdom general election, Wales elects 28 Liberal MPs. David Davies, Llandinam, is returned unopposed as member for Cardigan.Walessource
  • May 4 – Edward Blake becomes the new leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.Canadasource
  • 8 June – Partial legislative elections of 1880Belgiumsource
  • July 22 – Abdur Rahman Khan becomes Emir of Afghanistan.source
  • August 1 – Rufus W. Cobb is reelected the 25th governor of Alabama defeating James Madison Pickens.United Statessource
  • November 2 – 1880 United States presidential election: James Garfield defeats Winfield S. Hancock.source
  • December 1 – Manuel González Flores becomes the 31st President of Mexico.source
  • December 30 – The Transvaal becomes a republic, and Paul Kruger becomes its first president.source
  • The Volksraad meet at Paardekraal, as Kruger, Joubert, and Pretorius form the new republic's government. Kruger-based in Heidelberg, armed forces take positions on the Natal border and around the British garrison in the Transvaal. Kruger seeks negotiations, knowing that the British forces are stronger.South Africasource
  • Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza signs a treaty of protection with the chief of the large Teke tribe, and begins to establish a French protectorate on the north bank of the Congo River.source
  • England defeat Australia by 5 wickets in a Cricket Test held at The Oval.Australiasource
  • New Zealand Cup winner: Le LoupNew Zealandsource

Conflict & Security

  • February 4 – The Black Donnelly Massacre takes the lives of five members of one family in Biddulph Township, Middlesex County, Ontario, Canada.source
  • March 22 - Battle of Los ÁngelesBoliviasource
  • 19 April – Second Anglo-Afghan War: British victory at the Battle of Ahmed Khel.United Kingdomsource
  • April – The government of Cape Colony sets a deadline for the Basuto people to surrender their weapons; non-compliance leads to the Basuto Gun War.source
  • 21 June – Battle of Los Corrales: Troops of Carlos Tejedor, governor of Buenos Aires, are defeated by the National Army led by president Nicolás Avellaneda.Argentinasource
  • June 29 – France annexes Tahiti.source
  • 29 June – France annexes Tahiti.Francesource
  • July 27 – Second Anglo-Afghan War – Battle of Maiwand: Afghan troops under Ayub Khan defeat British and Indian forces, under Brigadier General George Burrows.source
  • September 1 – Second Anglo-Afghan War – Battle of Kandahar: General Frederick Roberts, commanding British forces, defeats the Afghan troops of Mohammad Ayub Khan, bringing an end to the war.source
  • December 20 – First Boer War: The Battle of Bronkhorstspruit results in a Boer victory over the British.source
  • Fietas, Johannesburg is known as the 'Malay Location'. Its population is mainly 'coloured', 'Cape coloured', and Malay.South Africasource
  • The assassination attempt by the People's Deputy I. O. Mlodetsky on M. T. Loris-MelkovRussiasource
  • Sir William Boyd Dawkins – Early Man in Britain and his place in the Tertiary PeriodWalessource

Exploration & Expansion

  • 31 January – training frigate HMS Atalanta leaves Bermuda bound for Falmouth but is lost in the Atlantic with all 281 on board.United Kingdomsource
  • The Gokstad ship is found in Norway, the first Viking ship burial to be excavated.source
  • January – The White slave trade affair is exposed in Brussels and attracts international attention.Belgiumsource
  • February 2 – The first successful shipment of frozen mutton from Australia arrives in London, aboard the SS Strathleven.source
  • 5 February – Cape Western – Fraserburg Road to Beaufort West, 48 mi 45 ch.South Africasource
  • 18 April – A banquet is held for Nordenskiöld and the other members of the Vega Expedition in the Great Hall of Børsen in Copenhagen.Denmarksource
  • August 24 – The SS Columbia completes her maiden voyage, arriving without incident in Portland, Oregon, after a stopover in San Francisco.source
  • 10 October – Geologist Lamont Young and four others disappear on a boat trip north from Bermagui, New South Wales.Australiasource
  • October – the SS Ferret is fraudulently chartered at Greenock and taken to Australia.Scotlandsource
  • 1 December – Natal – Botha's Hill to Pietermaritzburg, 41 mi 9 ch.South Africasource
  • Charles G.D. Roberts, Orion and Other PoemsCanadasource

Religion & Belief

  • 20 May – foundation stone laid for Truro Cathedral in Cornwall, the first to be built on a new site since the 13th century.United Kingdomsource
  • 14 August – Construction of the Cologne Cathedral is finally completed after over 600 years.Germanysource
  • September 14 – Cologne Cathedral is completed, after construction began in 1248, 632 years earlier.source
  • 16 December – High Court of Justice reorganised into the Chancery, Queen's Bench and the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Divisions, with abolition of the Common Pleas and Exchequer Divisions.United Kingdomsource
  • 25 December – Pope Leo XIII issues a breve to establish a new chair in Thomist philosophy at the Catholic University of Louvain.Belgiumsource
  • The Capuchin catacombs of Palermo are officially closed (there will be some burials afterwards).source
  • Charles Soubre, The Arrival of Charles Rogier and the Volunteers of Liège in BrusselsBelgiumsource
  • Muslim women are forbidden to marry non-Muslims in Islamic lawChinasource
  • Konstantin Petrovich Pobedonostsev was appointed to the post of Chief Prosecutor of the Holy SynodRussiasource
  • Joseph Parry – Emmanuel (cantata)Walessource

Economy & Finance

  • 3 April – German company Munich Re is founded.Germanysource
  • August 26 – Competing circus owners P. T. Barnum and James A. Bailey sign a contract in Bridgeport, Connecticut, to create the Barnum & Bailey Circus. In 1907, the circus will merge forces with another competitor, the Ringling Brothers Circus.source
  • October 1 – German company Munich Re is founded in Munich.source
  • German company Bilfinger is founded.Germanysource
  • India Stock (Powers of Attorney) Act (British statute)Indiasource
  • The III Branch of the Imperial Chancellery was abolishedRussiasource
  • A. & R. Scott begin producing the predecessor of Scott's Porage Oats in Scotland.United Kingdomsource

Technology & Infrastructure

  • 20 January – The Hillerød-Græsted section of the Gribskov Railway opens.Denmarksource
  • January 27 – Thomas Edison is granted a patent for the incandescent light bulb. Edison filed for a US patent for an electric lamp using "a carbon filament or strip coiled and connected ... to platina contact wires." Although the patent described several ways of creating the carbon filament, including using "cotton and linen thread, wood splints, papers coiled in various ways," Edison and his team later discovered that a carbonized bamboo filament could last more than 1200 hours.source
  • February 2 – The first electric streetlight is installed in Wabash, Indiana.source
  • May 2 – After having her lights installed by Edison's personnel, the SS Columbia is lit up for the first time at the foot of Wall Street, in New York City.source
  • May 11 – Mussel Slough Tragedy: A land dispute between the Southern Pacific Railroad and settlers in Hanford, California, turns deadly when a gun battle breaks out, leaving 7 dead.United Statessource
  • May 13 – In Menlo Park, New Jersey, Thomas Edison performs the first test of his electric railway.source
  • June 1 – Tinius Olsen is awarded a United States Patent, for the Little Giant Testing Machine.source
  • 15 June – The Natal South Coast railway line from Durban is opened to traffic to Isipingo.South Africasource
  • June – The SS Columbia sets off on her maiden voyage around Cape Horn to Portland, Oregon, carrying 13 locomotives and 200 railcars.source
  • July 14 – Dorchester Penitentiary opens in Canada.source
  • August – The first telephone exchange in Australia opened in Melbourne.Australiasource
  • 6 October – The ironclad ARA Almirante Brown is officially launched from a London shipyard.Argentinasource
  • November 4 – The first cash register is patented by James and John Ritty of Dayton, Ohio.source
  • Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR). British-backed Canadian firm, headed by US railroad building genius (Sir William Cornelius Van Horne) gets the deal: $25 million, 25 e6acre, already completed sections free, all under-construction sections finished free, 20 year monopoly as only railway and 20-year control over rate-setting.Canadasource
  • East India Loan (East Indian Railway Debentures) Act (British statute)Indiasource
  • Berdichev machine-building plantRussiasource

Science & Discovery

  • February 24 – The SS Columbia, which will be the first outside usage of Thomas Edison's incandescent light bulb, is launched at the Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engine Works of John Roach & Sons in Chester, Pennsylvania.source
  • February – The journal Science is first published, with financial backing from Thomas Edison.United Statessource
  • July – John Venn popularises Venn diagrams.source
  • 30 September – HDMS Tordenskjold is launched at Nyholm in Copenhagen.Denmarksource
  • September 30 – Amateur astronomer Henry Draper takes the first ever photograph of the Orion Nebula.United Statessource
  • 9 December – Jens Peter Jacobsen's Niels Lyhne by Gyldendal.Denmarksource
  • Piezoelectricity is discovered by Pierre Curie and Jacques Curie.source
  • Discovery of piezoelectricity by Pierre Curie and Jacques Curie.Francesource
  • The Department of Scientific Temperance Instruction of the Women's Christian Temperance Union is established.United Statessource

Health & Medicine

  • May – School is made compulsory for children aged 6 to 14 in New South Wales.Australiasource
  • June 1 – United States Census is 50,155,783. More than 100,000 Chinese men and 3,000 Chinese women are living in the western United States.United Statessource
  • 26 August – Elementary Education Act ("Mundella's Act") enforces school attendance up to the age of ten in England and Wales.United Kingdomsource
  • September – Queen Marie Henriette visits Aachen for her health.Belgiumsource
  • 27 November – Rev. Richard Enraght is imprisoned for 49 days in Warwick Prison and deprived of his parish in Birmingham as a result of proceedings under the Public Worship Regulation Act 1874.United Kingdomsource
  • Emily Stowe becomes the first woman doctor to practise medicine in CanadaCanadasource
  • English philanthropists are active in connection with the west of Ireland: Quaker James Hack Tute distributes aid and publishes Irish Distress and its Remedies; heiress Angela Burdett-Coutts, 1st Baroness Burdett-Coutts, offers to advance £250,000 to the authorities for the supply of seed potatoes, forcing the government to take action itself.Irelandsource

Crime & Justice

  • 20 January – Bushranger Captain Moonlite (real name Andrew George Scott) hanged in Sydney.Australiasource
  • The international White slave trade affair scandal in Brussels is exposed and attracts international infamy.source
  • 20 March – £50,000 worth of diamonds are reported stolen from Cape Town's post office.South Africasource
  • March 25 – George Brown fatally shot by a disgruntled employee.Canadasource
  • June 28 – Australian police capture bank robber Ned Kelly, after a gun battle at Glenrowan, Victoria.source
  • October 15 – Mexican soldiers kill Victorio, one of the greatest Apache military strategists.source
  • October – Irish tenants ostracise landholder's agent Charles Boycott.United Kingdomsource
  • November 11 – Australian bushranger and bank robber Ned Kelly is hanged in Melbourne.source
  • Auckland Cup winner: Foul PlayNew Zealandsource
  • Moscow Circus on Tsvetnoy BoulevardRussiasource
  • Strachur and District Shinty ClubScotlandsource
  • Chair – W. B. Joseph, "Athrilyth"Walessource

Disasters & Accidents

  • 21 January – an underground firedamp explosion at Fair Lady Pit, Leycett, in the North Staffordshire Coalfield, kills 62 coal miners.United Kingdomsource
  • 9 February – the Theatre Royal, Dublin, burns to the ground.Irelandsource
  • 25 February – The Resurgam, an early mechanically-powered submarine, sinks off Rhyl.Walessource
  • March 4 – The Belgian ship Mercator founders off the coast of the Netherlands port of Vlissingen with the loss of her entire crew of more than 60 people.source
  • 8 September – an underground explosion at Seaham Colliery, County Durham, kills 164 coal miners.United Kingdomsource
  • 29 October – Wells lifeboat disaster: RNLI life-boat Eliza Adams of Wells-next-the-Sea, Norfolk, capsizes on service; 11 of 13 crew lost.United Kingdomsource
  • 10 December – an underground firedamp explosion at Naval Steam Colliery, Penygraig, in the Rhondda, kills 101 coal miners.United Kingdomsource
  • The Muizenberg Flyer, a faster suburban passenger train service, is introduced in Cape Town.South Africasource
  • The John N Gamewell, a small American brigantine, sinks off the west coast of the Cape Colony near Port Elizabeth.South Africasource

Climate & Environment

  • January–March – great fog continues to engulf London.United Kingdomsource
  • 18 September – 151 people were buried in a landslip at Naini Tal following 36 inch of rain in 68 hours.Indiasource
  • October 15 – A blizzard marks the start of the Hard Winter in North America.source
  • October 15 – The first blizzard mentioned in Laura Ingalls Wilder's The Long Winter sweeps over the prairie in Dakota Territory.United Statessource
  • 30 Octeober – The temperature drops to -11.9 °, the coldest temperature ever recorded in Denmark in the month of October.Denmarksource
  • November 9 – A major earthquake strikes Zagreb and destroys many buildings, including Zagreb Cathedral.source

Culture & Society

  • 22 January – Toowong State School is founded in Queensland.Australiasource
  • February 14 – The wife of the governor general, The Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne, is seriously injured when the viceregal sleigh overturns on a Rudolph Ottawa street.Canadasource
  • 7 March – Reception in the winter garden at Royal Palace of Laken to celebrate the engagement of Princess Stéphanie of Belgium to Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria.Belgiumsource
  • March 19 – The horse Empress and its jockey, Tommy Beasley, win the 1880 Grand Nationalsource
  • March 20 – For the first and last time in its history, the annual side-by-side rowing race between the 8-member teams of University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge on the River Thames is postponed. The call comes because of a thick fog that makes visibility impossible. Two days later, Oxford wins the race by 3+3⁄4 lengths.source
  • April 27 – The Royal University of Ireland is founded by charter, allowing the Catholic University of Ireland to re-form as University College Dublin.source
  • May – The funeral of Icelandic independence movement leader Jón Sigurðsson takes place.Icelandsource
  • 26 September – Aarhus Gymnastikforening is founded.Denmarksource
  • September: The Waikato Mail begins publishing in Cambridge. The newspaper is produced three times a week. It ceases to publish in 1883.New Zealandsource
  • October 6 – The University of Southern California opens its doors to 53 students and 10 faculty.source
  • October 28 – The first stone is laid for the Clarkson Memorial in Wisbech, England.source
  • November 22 – Vaudeville actress Lillian Russell makes her debut at Tony Pastor's Theatre, in New York City.source
  • The Department of Scientific Temperance Instruction, of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, is established in the United States.source
  • Rugby union – Cwmbran RFC and Crumlin RFC are founded.Walessource

Births

  • 7 January – Santiago Copello, Roman Catholic cardinal and Archbishop of Buenos Aires (died 1967)Argentinasource
  • January 26 – Douglas MacArthur, American general (died 1964)source
  • January 29 – W. C. Fields, American actor, comedian (died 1946)source
  • February 19 – Álvaro Obregón, 39th President of Mexico (died 1928)source
  • March 15 – Montagu Love, English actor (died 1943)source
  • May 6 – Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside, British field marshal (died 1959)source
  • May 21 – Tudor Arghezi, Romanian writer (died 1967)source
  • 21 May – Mona Rudao, Seediq chiefTaiwansource
  • June 27 – Helen Keller, American spokeswoman for the deaf and blind, writer and lecturer (died 1968)source
  • 8 July – Branca de Gonta Colaço, writer, scholar and linguist (died 1945)Portugalsource
  • July 12 – Tod Browning, American motion picture director, horror film pioneer (died 1962)source
  • August 8 – Sir Earle Page, 11th Prime Minister of Australia (died 1961)source
  • August 22 – George Herriman, American cartoonist (died 1944)source
  • August 31 – Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands (died 1962)source
  • September 12 – H. L. Mencken, American journalist (died 1956)source
  • October 12 – Mirza Kuchik Khan, Iranian revolutionary.Iransource
  • November 10 – Jacob Epstein, American-born sculptor (died 1959)source
  • December 31 – George C. Marshall, United States Secretary of State, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (died 1959)source

Deaths

  • January 8 – Joshua A. Norton, self-anointed Emperor Norton I of the United States of America (born 1811)source
  • January 20 – Captain Moonlite, Australian bushranger (hanged) (born 1842)source
  • May 8 – Gustave Flaubert, French novelist (born 1821)source
  • 25 May – Peter Wilhelm Lund, natural scientist (born 1801 in Denmark)Brazilsource
  • June 8 – Maria Alexandrovna (Marie of Hesse), Empress Consort of Czar Alexander II of Russia (born 1824)source
  • June 28 – Texas Jack Omohundro, American frontier scout, actor, and cowboy (born 1846)source
  • July 9 – Paul Broca, French physician and anthropologist (born 1824)source
  • August 17 – Ole Bull, Norwegian violinist (born 1810)source
  • August 24 – Chief Ouray, Native American leader (born c. 1833)source
  • October 5 – Jacques Offenbach, German-born French composer (born 1819)source
  • 6 November – Estanislao del Campo, poet (born 1834)Argentinasource
  • November 11 – Ned Kelly, Australian bush ranger (hanged) (born c. 1855)source
  • November 11 – Lucretia Mott, American social activist (born 1793)source
  • November 23 – Sir Redmond Barry, Australian judge, sentenced Ned Kelly to death (born 1813)source
  • December 22 – George Eliot, English writer (born 1819)source
  • Tom Wills, Australian cricketer, pioneer of Australian rules football (born 1835)source
  • Ng Akew, Chinese opium smuggler and house owner in Hong KongChinasource
  • ? – Mohammad Hasan Afshar, Qajar Persian court painter.Iransource