Year 1870 (MDCCCLXX) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Thursday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar).

[edit] Events of 1870

[edit] January - March

• January 1
  • The first edition of The Northern Echo newspaper is published in Priestgate, Darlington, England.
  • Plans for the Brooklyn Bridge are completed.
• January 3 - Construction of the Brooklyn Bridge begins.
• January 6 - The Musikverein, Vienna is inaugurated in Austria-Hungary.
• January 10 - John D. Rockefeller incorporates Standard Oil.
• January 15 - A political cartoon for the first time symbolizes the United States Democratic Party with a donkey ("A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" by Thomas Nast for Harper's Weekly).
• January 26 - Reconstruction: Virginia rejoins the Union.
• January 27 - The first college sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta, is established at DePauw University.
• February - Vrain Denis-Lucas is sentenced to 2 years in prison for multiple forgery in Paris.
• February 1 - Goodna State School in Goodna, Queensland, Australia is founded.
• February 2 - It is revealed that the famed Cardiff Giant is just carved gypsum and not the petrified remains of a human.
• February 3 - The 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution, guaranteeing African-Americans the right to vote, is passed.
• February 10
  • Anaheim, California is incorporated.
  • The YWCA is founded in New York City.
• February 12 - Women gain the right to vote in Utah Territory.
• February 23 - Military control of Mississippi ends and it is readmitted to the Union.
• February 25 - Hiram Rhodes Revels, a Republican from Mississippi, is sworn into the United States Senate, becoming the first African American ever to sit in the U.S. Congress.
• February 26 - In New York City, the first pneumatic subway is opened.
• February 28 - The Bulgarian Exarchate is established by decree of Sultan Abd-ul-Aziz of the Ottoman Empire.
• March 2 - Francisco Solano López' last troops are cornered by Triple Alliance troops at Cerro Cora. López refuses to surrender and is killed. Fighting ends in Paraguay - the War of the Triple Alliance is over.
• March 4 - Thomas Scott is executed by Louis Riel's provisional government during the Red River Rebellion in modern day Manitoba Canada.
• March 19 - The Ohio Legislature passes the Cannon Act, thereby establishing the Ohio Agriculture and Mechanical College, later Ohio State University.
• March 24 - Syracuse University is established and officially opens.
• March 30
  • The 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution, giving blacks the right to vote, is ratified.
  • Texas is readmitted to the Union following Reconstruction.
• March 31 - Thomas Mundy Peterson is the first African-American to vote in an election.

[edit] April - June

• May 12 - The Canadian province of Manitoba is created in response to Louis Riel's Red River Rebellion.
• May 14 - The first rugby match is played in New Zealand, between the Nelson Football Club and Nelson College.
• May 24 - The Port Adelaide Football Club plays their first match of Australian rules football at Buck's Flat, Glanville, South Australia.
• June 22 - The U.S. Congress creates the United States Department of Justice.
• June 26
  • Christmas is declared a federal holiday in the United States.
  • Richard Wagner's opera Die Walküre is first performed at Munich's National Theatre.

[edit] July - September

• July 13 - The Ems Dispatch serves as a reason for a war between Prussia and France.
• July 15 - Reconstruction: Georgia becomes the last former Confederate state to be readmitted to the Union, and the C.S.A. is dissolved.
• July 18 - Pastor Aeternus: Pope Pius IX declares papal infallibility in matters of faith and morals.
• July 19 - Franco-Prussian War: France declares war on Prussia.
• August 8 - The Republic of Ploieşti, an uprising against Domnitor Carol of Romania, fails.
• August 24 - The Red River Rebellion ends with the arrival of the Wolseley Expedition and the fleeing of Louis Riel.
• September 2 - Franco-Prussian War - Battle of Sedan: Prussian forces defeat the French armies and take emperor Napoleon III and 100,000 of his soldiers prisoner at Sedan.
• September 4 - Emperor Napoleon III of France is deposed and the Third Republic is declared. Empress Eugenie flees to England with her children.
• September 6 - Louisa Ann Swain of Laramie, Wyoming, becomes the first woman in the United States to cast a vote legally since 1807.
• September 20 - With Bersaglieri soldiers entering Rome at Porta Pia, the unification of Italy is completed, ending the last remnant of the Papal States.

[edit] October - December

• October 2 - A plebiscite held in Rome supports, by 133,681 votes to 1,507, the annexation of the city by Italy.
• October 6 - Rome becomes the capital of unified Italy.
• October 8 - Leon Michel Gambetta escapes the besieged Paris in a hot-air balloon.
• November 1 - In the United States, the newly-created Weather Bureau (later renamed the National Weather Service) makes its first official meteorological forecast: "High winds at Chicago and Milwaukee... and along the Lakes".
• November 16 - The Spanish Cortes Generales proclaims Amadeo de Saboya as King Amadeus I of Spain.
• December 30 - Juan Prim, prime minister of Spain, is assassinated.

[edit] Undated

• Infanticide is banned in India.
• 1 of the 916 members of Indian Civil Service is Indian.
• Antonio Guzmán Blanco becomes the president of Venezuela.

[edit] Births

[edit] January - June

• January 2 - Ernst Barlach, German sculptor, graphic artist, and poet (d. 1938)
• January 6 - Gustav Bauer, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1944)
• January 8 - Miguel Primo de Rivera, dictator of Spain (d. 1930)
• January 11 - Alexander Stirling Calder, American sculptor (d. 1945)
• February 7 - Alfred Adler, Austrian psychologist (d. 1937)
• February 12 - Marie Lloyd, English singer (d. 1922)
• March 4 - Thomas Sturge Moore, English poet, author and artist (d. 1944)
• March 5 - Rosa Luxemburg, Polish-born German political theorist, socialist philosopher, and revolutionary (d. 1919)
• March 5 - Frank Norris, American writer (d. 1902)
• March 13 - Seale Harris, American Physician (d. 1957)
• March 17 - Horace Donisthorpe, English entomologist (d. 1951)
• March 20 - Paul Erich von Lettow-Vorbeck, German general (d. 1964)
• April 1 - Hamaguchi Osachi, 27th Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1931)
• April 4 - George Albert Smith, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d. 1951)
• April 22 - Vladimir Lenin, Russian revolutionary and first Premier of the Soviet Union (d. 1924)
• April 30 - Franz Lehár, Austrian composer (d. 1948)
• May 9 - Harry Vardon, English Golf Professional (d. 1937)
• May 19 - Albert Fish, American serial killer (d. 1936)
• June 13 - Jules Bordet, Belgian immunologist and microbiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1961)

[edit] July - December

• July 3 - Richard Bedford Bennett, eleventh Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1947)
• July 12 - Louis II, Prince of Monaco (d. 1949)
• July 16 - Lambert McKenna, Irish scholar (d. 1956)
• July 25 - Maxfield Parrish, American illustrator (d. 1966)
• July 29 - George Dixon, Canadian boxer (d. 1909)
• August 3 - Carrie Ingalls, younger sister of author Laura Ingalls Wilder (d. 1946)
• August 11 - Tom Richardson, English cricketer (d. 1912)
• August 31 - Maria Montessori, Italian educator (d. 1952)
• September 25 - James A. Hawken, schoolteacher (d. 1964)
• September 26 - King Christian X of Denmark (d. 1947)
• September 30 - Jean Baptiste Perrin, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1942)
• October 10 - Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin, Russian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1953)
• November 21 - Sigfrid Edström, Swedish sports official (d. 1964)
• November 27 - Juho Kusti Paasikivi, Prime Minister and President of Finland (d. 1956)
• December 5 - Vítězslav Novák, Czech composer (d. 1949)
• December 10 - Mary Bonaparte, pretender to the French imperial throne (d. 1947)
• December 12 - Walter Benona Sharp, American oil pioneer (d. 1912)
• December 18 - Saki, English writer (d. 1916)

[edit] Unknown

• Joseph "Sport" Sullivan Gambler
• Curtis Hidden Page, New Hampshire politician (d. 1946)

See also Category: 1870 births.

[edit] Deaths

[edit] January - June

• January 29 - Leopold II, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1797)
• February 7 - Sylvain Salnave a Hatian president (b. 1827)
• February 19 - Nathaniel de Rothschild, French wine grower (b. 1812)
• March 11 - Moshoeshoe I of Lesotho (b. 1786?)
• March 28 - George Henry Thomas, American general (b. 1816)
• May 6 - Sir James Young Simpson, Scottish physician and researcher (b. 1811)
• June 9 - Charles Dickens, British novelist (b. 1812)
• June 24 - Adam Lindsay Gordon, Australian poet (b. 1833)

[edit] July - December

• July 20 - Jules Alfred Huot de Goncourt, French writer and publisher (b. 1830)
• August 17 - Pedro Figueredo, Cuban poet, musician, and freedom fighter (b. 1818)
• September 12 - Fitz Hugh Ludlow, American author and explorer (b. 1836)
• September 23 - Prosper Mérimée, French writer (b. 1803)
• October 12 - Robert E. Lee, American Confederate general (b. 1807)
• November 24 - Comte de Lautreamont, French poet and writer (b. 1846)
• November 28 - Frédéric Bazille, French painter (b. 1841)
• December 5 - Alexandre Dumas, père, French author (b. 1802)
• December 27 - General Prim, Spanish dictator (b. 1814)
• date unknown - Patrick MacDowell, Northern Irish sculptor (b. 1799)

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1870

See also Category: 1870 deaths.