1894 CE

A Colonial Conference, held in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, resolves to lay a telegraph cable between Canada and Australia. War is declared between the Qing Empire of China and the Empire of Japan over their rival claims of influence on their common ally, the Joseon dynasty of Korea. The event marks the start of the First Sino-Japanese War. Wedding of Nicholas II of Russia and Alix of Hesse in the Grand Church of the Winter Palace at Saint Petersburg.

In the 1890s, the 19th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • January 4 – A military alliance is established between the French Third Republic and the Russian Empire.source
  • February 28 – Prime Minister Crispi reveals the "evidence" for a widespread conspiracy in parliament: the so-called "International Treaty of Bisacquino", signed by the French Government, the Czar of Russia, Giuseppe De Felice Giuffrida, the anarchists and the Vatican, with the goal to detach Sicily from the rest of the country and put it under a Franco-Russian protectorate. The Radical deputy Felice Cavallotti ridicules the conspiracy of Crispi.Italysource
  • March 1 - Brazilian presidential election, 1894Brazilsource
  • March 2 – William Gladstone resigns as British Prime Minister.source
  • March 5 – The Local Government Act (coming into effect December 1894–January 1895) reforms local government in Britain, creating a system of urban and rural districts with elected councils, with elected civil parish councils in rural areas, and gives women, irrespective of marital status, the right to vote and stand in local (but not national) elections.source
  • 15 April – Portuguese legislative election, 1894Portugalsource
  • 12 May – Publication of an Anglo-Belgian Agreement leasing Bahr el Ghazal to the Congo Free State and a stretch of Congolese territory to the British. The exchange of territory was later rescinded under French and German pressure in the diplomatic build-up to the 1898 Fashoda Incident.Belgiumsource
  • June 22 – Dahomey becomes a French colony.source
  • June 25 – Paul Kruger, President of the Transvaal Republic, meets British High Commissioner Sir Henry Loch in Pretoria to discuss the grievances of the Uitlanders.South Africasource
  • July 4 – The short-lived Republic of Hawaii is proclaimed by Sanford B. Dole.source
  • July 16 – The United Kingdom and Japan sign the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation, as the U.K. becomes the first of the Western nations to agree to give up its extraterritorial rights in Japan.source
  • October 1 – Petrópolis becomes the capital of the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro, until 1902.source
  • December 18 – Women in South Australia become the first in Australia to gain the right to vote and the first in the world with the right to be elected to Parliament, taking effect from 1895, after decades of activism.source
  • 18 December - South Australia is the first colony to legislate women equal franchise with men, taking effect in 1895.Australiasource
  • December 21 – Mackenzie Bowell becomes Canada's fifth prime minister.source
  • Serfdom (Vistarband) is abolished in Iceland.Icelandsource
  • Men's doubles – J. Marshall and P. MarshallNew Zealandsource

Conflict & Security

  • January 3 – Prime Minister Francesco Crispi declares a state of siege throughout Sicily to quell the revolt of the Fasci Siciliani. General Roberto Morra di Lavriano is dispatched with 40,000 troops. A solidarity revolt of anarchists and republicans in the Lunigiana was crushed as well. The old order is restored through the use of extreme force, including summary executions. The Fasci are outlawed, the army and the police kill scores of protesters, and hundreds wounded.Italysource
  • 7 January – Søren Jaabæk, politician and farmer (born 1814)Norwaysource
  • February 12 – Ère des attentats: Café Terminus attack – In one of the first acts of modern terrorism, French anarchist Émile Henry throws a bomb into the Café Terminus in Paris, France, killing one person and injuring at least seventeen.source
  • May Day riots break out in Cleveland, Ohio.source
  • June 18 – Britain establishes a protectorate over Uganda.source
  • June 27 - Federalist Revolution: Battle of Passo Fundo in the state of Rio Grande do SulBrazilsource
  • June 28 – July 9 – Colonial Conference of 1894 held in Ottawa.Canadasource
  • August 1 – War is declared between the Qing Empire of China and the Empire of Japan over their rival claims of influence on their common ally, the Joseon dynasty of Korea. The event marks the start of the First Sino-Japanese War.source
  • September 17 - Battle of the Yalu River (1894)Chinasource
  • November 3 – Waziristan campaign (1894–1895): Battle of Wana Camp – British colonial forces stationed in Wana would come under attack by rebel Mahsud tribesmen. The battle began a campaign of offensive actions against the Mahsud tribes in Waziristan to reduce their strength.source
  • 10 November - Jandamarra, an Indigenous Australian of the Bunuba people, leads one of the few armed insurrections against Europeans.Australiasource
  • November 21 – First Sino-Japanese War: Battle of Lushunkou – Japanese troops secure a decisive victory over the Chinese, capture the port city of Lüshunkou, and begin the Port Arthur massacre, in which more than 1,000 Chinese servicemen and civilians die.source
  • Top New Zealand stakes earner – Blue FireNew Zealandsource

Exploration & Expansion

Religion & Belief

  • 20 June – The commune of Porvenir is founded.Chilesource
  • 11 July – rebuilt St Cuthbert's Church, Edinburgh, dedicated.Scotlandsource
  • 19 August – Frederick's Church to its final design by Ferdinald Meldahl, almost 25+ years after its construction was first started by Nicolai Eigtved.Denmarksource
  • Mahatma Gandhi becomes the first Indian to be enrolled as an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Natal.South Africasource
  • November 7 – The Masonic Grande Loge de France is founded, splitting from the larger and older Grand Orient de France.source
  • Monarch – Umberto I (1878–1900)Italysource
  • Gisle Johnson, theologian (born 1822)Norwaysource
  • New York Giants defeat Baltimore Orioles 4 games to 0 to win the First Temple Cup in the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs.United Statessource
  • W. J. Davis – Hanes Plwyf Llandysul, first publication by Gomer Press, LlandysulWalessource

Economy & Finance

  • January 1 – the town of Calgary is incorporated as a cityCanadasource
  • May 17 – Testimony at the Banca Romana scandal trial reveals that former Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti had been aware of the financial disorder at the Banca Romana in 1889 already, but had held back that information. Gioltti also allegedly received money from the bank for election purposes.Italysource
  • August 31 – New Zealand enacts the world's first minimum wage law, to take effect on January 1, in the passage of the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act of 1894.source
  • 25 December – Julius Nicolai Jacobsen, businessperson and politician (born 1829)Norwaysource
  • The Australian Workers' Union is formed from the joining of the Amalgamated Shearers' Union of Australasia and the General Labourers' Union.Australiasource
  • The German company Wintershall is founded.Germanysource
  • Hið íslenska kvenfélag is founded in Reykjavík.Icelandsource
  • Punjab National Bank was founded by Lala Lajpat RaiIndiasource
  • New Zealand enacts the world's first national minimum wage law, by the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act.New Zealandsource

Technology & Infrastructure

  • January 7 – William Kennedy Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film in the United States.source
  • January 7 – William Kennedy Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film.United Statessource
  • January 9 – New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard, in Lexington, Massachusetts.source
  • March 12 – Coca-Cola is sold in bottles for the first time.source
  • 29 March – Jacob Smith Jarmann, firearms designer (born 1816)Norwaysource
  • April 29 – Opening of the Roma San Pietro railway station (Stazione di Roma San Pietro) in Rome.Italysource
  • 5 May – Exposition Internationale d'Anvers opens (to 5 November)Belgiumsource
  • May 14 – Blackpool Tower is opened in Blackpool, in north-west England, as a visitor attraction.source
  • May 21 – The Manchester Ship Canal and Docks are officially opened by Queen Victoria, linking the previously landlocked industrial city of Manchester, in north-west England, to the Irish Sea.source
  • 28 June - A Colonial Conference, held in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, resolves to lay a telegraph cable between Canada and Australia.Australiasource
  • June 30 – Tower Bridge in London opens for traffic.source
  • July 22 – The Paris–Rouen Competition for Horseless Carriages, the first automobile competition, is held.source
  • September 3 – Labour Day celebrated for the first time in Canada.Canadasource
  • October 20 – The railway line between Lourenço Marques and Pretoria is completed at Balmoral.South Africasource
  • October 30 – Domenico Menegatti obtains a patent for a procedure to be applied in producing pandoro industrially.source
  • Auðkúlukirkja is constructed at the Svínavatn lake, North Iceland.Icelandsource

Science & Discovery

  • March 21 – A syzygy of planets occurs, as Mercury transits the Sun as seen from Venus, and Mercury and Venus both transit the Sun as seen from Saturn, but no two of the transits are simultaneous.source
  • 1 October – Leipziger Volkszeitung is first published.Germanysource
  • Oil is discovered on the Osage Indian reservation, making the Osage the "richest group of people in the world".source
  • Camille Flammarion - Omega: The Last Days of the WorldFrancesource
  • Professor John Joly of Trinity College Dublin, devises a colour photographic process.Irelandsource
  • Fours – J. Davidson, A. Owen, J. Wedderspoon and J. Evans (skip) (Caledonian)New Zealandsource
  • Ian Maclaren's stories Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush are published.Scotlandsource
  • Date unknown - Kata Dalström is engaged as a lecturer for the Socialists.Swedensource
  • Argon discovered by Lord Rayleigh and Sir William Ramsay.United Kingdomsource
  • Owen Morgan Edwards makes his first report on county schools in WalesWalessource

Health & Medicine

  • May – Third plague pandemic: Bubonic plague breaks out in the Tai Ping Shan area of Hong Kong (by the end of the year, the death toll is 2,552 people); it also breaks out this year in Canton.source
  • 22 June / 23 June – Glamorgan play against the touring South Africans. The Glamorgan team contains three Wales rugby internationals, Billy Bancroft, Selwyn Biggs and Ralph Sweet-Escott.Walessource
  • 13 July – Daniel Cornelius Danielssen, physician (born 1815)Norwaysource
  • July 19 – A package of anti-anarchist laws and public safety measures is enacted.Italysource
  • July – Marion Gilchrist becomes the first woman to graduate from the University of Glasgow and the first woman to qualify in medicine from a Scottish university.Scotlandsource
  • September 1 – Great Hinckley Fire: A forest fire in Hinckley, Minnesota, kills more than 450 people.source
  • 22 October - Martha Needle is hanged in Melbourne Gaol for the poisoning of her husband, and three children, in an attempt to obtain money from insurance policies.Australiasource
  • Elsie Inglis sets up a medical practice in Edinburgh.Scotlandsource
  • Patrick Manson develops the thesis that malaria is spread by mosquitoes.United Kingdomsource

Crime & Justice

  • 17 February-15 March – first exhibition of La Libre Esthétique in Brussels.Belgiumsource
  • February 17 – Outlaw John Wesley Hardin is released from prison.United Statessource
  • May 30 – The leaders of the Fasci Siciliani are sentenced in Palermo: Giuseppe de Felice Giuffrida to 18 years and Rosario Garibaldi Bosco, Nicola Barbato and Bernardino Verro to 12 years in jail.Italysource
  • Coxey's Army arrives in Washington; Coxey is arrested on the Capitol grounds.source
  • October 15 – Dreyfus affair: French Army officer Alfred Dreyfus is arrested for spying.source
  • The Sociedad Protectora de la Infancia (Child Protection Society) is founded in Santiago.Chilesource
  • 19 December – Trial and conviction of Alfred Dreyfus begins at the Cherche-Midi prison and lasts four days.Francesource
  • December 22 – Dreyfus affair: French Army officer Alfred Dreyfus is convicted of treason. It will be 12 years before his innocence is officially recognised.source
  • Spillers Records is founded in Cardiff (Wales), the world's oldest record shop still in operation.source
  • Winners: Distillery 2–2, 3–2 LinfieldIrelandsource
  • 100 yards freestyle – T. Needham (New South Wales, Australia)New Zealandsource
  • Chair – Howell Elvet Lewis, "Hunanaberth"Walessource

Disasters & Accidents

  • April 21 – A bituminous coal miners' strike closes mines across the central United States.source
  • May 11 – Pullman Strike: Three thousand Pullman Palace Car Company factory workers go on a "wildcat" (without union approval) strike in Illinois.source
  • May 11 – Pullman Strike: Three thousand Pullman Palace Car Company workers go on a "wildcat" (without union approval) strike to protest lowered wages without an equivalent reduction in expenses charged in the company town of Pullman, Chicago.United Statessource
  • 14 June – hooker Victory capsizes off Westport, County Mayo with the loss of at least 30 aboard.Irelandsource
  • 23 June – a firedamp explosion at Albion Colliery, Cilfynydd, Glamorgan, kills 290 coal miners and 123 horses underground.United Kingdomsource
  • 23 June – A firedamp explosion at Albion Colliery, Cilfynydd, Glamorgan, results in the death of 290 coal miners and 123 horses underground, making it the worst disaster in Welsh mining history to date (it will be exceeded only by that at Senghenydd in 1913).Walessource
  • 5 July – racing cutter Valkyrie II (1893) collides with Satanita on the Firth of Clyde and sinks, with one fatality.Scotlandsource
  • July 6 – A fire at the site of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago destroys most of the remaining buildings.source
  • July – A fire at the site of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago destroys most of the remaining buildings.United Statessource
  • September 26 – The SS Ohio and the schooner barge Ironton collide and sink in Lake Huron. While the crew of the Ohio is rescued, five of the other craft's seven-member crew, including the captain, are lost.source
  • 30 October: Luxury steamer SS Wairarapa, carrying 230 passengers from Sydney bound for Auckland, is wrecked on Great Barrier Island with the loss of 135 lives.New Zealandsource
  • November 8 – The Italian cargo steamship Etnea struck the rocks of the islet of Školjić west of Unije and sank.source
  • Lady Victoria Colliery comes into production at Newtongrange, Midlothian.Scotlandsource

Climate & Environment

  • January - A cyclone hits the north west of Western Australia, killing approximately 50 personsAustraliasource
  • February 15 – In Korea, peasant unrest erupts in the Donghak Peasant Revolution, a massive revolt by followers of the Donghak movement. Both China and Japan send military forces, claiming to come to the ruling Joseon dynasty government's aid.source
  • April 27 – Canada's largest known landslide occurs in Saint-Alban, Quebec, displacing 185 million m³ of rock and dirt, and leaving a 40 m scar that covers 4.6 million m².source
  • April 27 – Canada's largest known landslide occurs in Saint-Alban, Quebec. It displaced 185 million m³ of rock and dirt and left a 40 m scar that covered 4.6 million m².Canadasource
  • 5 November – Exposition Internationale d'Anvers ends.Belgiumsource
  • November 6 – Republicans win by a landslide in the United States House of Representatives elections, which sets the stage for the decisive presidential election of 1896.source
  • November 6 – Republican win by a landslide in the House of Representatives elections, which sets the stage for the decisive 1896 presidential election.United Statessource
  • November 16 – An earthquake hits Calabria and the towns Reggio Calabria and Messina in Sicily.Italysource

Culture & Society

  • 4 February – Hamar IF were the local technical organisers of the first official national championships of skating at Åkersvika, Mjøsa in Hamar in Norwegian Allround Championships (first champion: Einar Halvorsen) and Norwegian Figure Skating Championships (first champion: Johan Lefstad).Norwaysource
  • March 22 – Montreal Hockey Club defeats Ottawa to win the first Stanley Cup challenge.Canadasource
  • March 25 – Coxey's Army (of the unemployed), the first significant protest march in the United States, departs from Massillon, Ohio, for Washington, D.C.source
  • April 16 – Manchester City Football Club is formed in north-west England under this name.source
  • June 23 – The International Olympic Committee is founded at the Sorbonne, Paris, at the initiative of Baron Pierre de Coubertin.source
  • July 4 – The football club FC La Chaux-de-Fonds is founded in Switzerland.source
  • August 22 – The Natal Indian Congress is founded by Mahatma Gandhi.South Africasource
  • September 4 – In New York City, 12,000 tailors strike against sweatshop working conditions.source
  • September 10 – Richard Strauss marries Pauline De Ahna.source
  • November 1 – Emperor Alexander III of Russia is succeeded by his son, Nicholas II.source
  • November 1 – The first issue of Billboard magazine is published in Cincinnati, Ohio by William Donaldson and James Hennegan. Initially, it covers the advertising and bill posting industry, and is at the time known as Billboard Advertising.source
  • November 8 – The Touring Club Ciclistico Italiano (TCCI) is founded in Milan by a group of bicyclists to promote the values of cycling and travel; its founding president is Luigi Vittorio Bertarelli.Italysource
  • November 26 – Wedding of Nicholas II of Russia and Alix of Hesse in the Grand Church of the Winter Palace at Saint Petersburg.source
  • December 6 – Kate Chopin's feminist short story "The Story of an Hour" is first published, in the American magazine Vogue.source
  • The Society of Beaux-Arts Architects is founded in the United States.source
  • Edward B. Marks and Joe Stern publish the waltz The Little Lost Child in the United States, promoting the playing of the waltz with slides projected by a magic lantern, the earliest version of music video known as the illustrated song.source
  • The Liga Femeilor Române, the first women's organisation in Romania, is founded.source
  • The novel Seven Little Australians is published by Ethel TurnerAustraliasource
  • 4-11 August – International congress of applied chemistry held in Brussels and AntwerpBelgiumsource
  • The Reichstag building in Berlin is completed and opened.Germanysource
  • The 2nd National Amateur Championships were held in ChristchurchNew Zealandsource

Births

Deaths

  • January 1 – Heinrich Hertz, German physicist (born 1857)source
  • February 15 – French anarchist Martial Bourdin dies of an accidental detonation of his own bomb, next to the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, in London, England.source
  • February 21 – Gustave Caillebotte, French painter (born 1848)source
  • March 2 – Jubal Early, American Confederate general (born 1816)source
  • March 20 – Lajos Kossuth, Hungarian politician (born 1802)source
  • July 6 – Takahashi Yuichi, yōga painter (born 1828)Japansource
  • July 30 – Walter Pater, English essayist, critic (born 1839)source
  • August 16 – Italian anarchist Sante Geronimo Caserio is executed by guillotine for the assassination of French President Carnot in Lyon.source
  • August 16 – Sante Geronimo Caserio, Italian anarchist and the assassin of Marie François Sadi Carnot, President of the French Third Republic (born 1873)Italysource
  • September 1 – Nathaniel P. Banks, American politician, general (born 1816)source
  • October 7 – Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., American author (born 1809)source
  • November 1 – Emperor Alexander III of Russia (born 1845)source
  • November 20 – Anton Rubinstein, Russian pianist, composer (born 1829)source
  • November 24 - Pardal Mallet, novelist and journalist (born 1864; tuberculosis)Brazilsource
  • November 25 – Solomon Caesar Malan, Swiss-born orientalist (born 1812)source
  • December 3 – Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author (born 1850)source
  • December 29 – Christina Rossetti, English poet (born 1830)source
  • date unknown – Rafael de la Barra López, lawyer and politicianChilesource