1751 1752 1753 1754 1755 1756 1757 1758 1759 1760
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Corsican patriot Pasquale Paoli, 30, returns from exile and overcomes the Genoese faction that has controlled the island for decades. He is elected to executive office under a constitution that is more democratic than any other in Europe and will rule the island until 1764, fighting first Genoa and then Genoa's French allies, building up a Navy, using enlightened despotism to substitute order and justice for the traditional system of vendetta, encouraging mining, and instituting national schools and a university (see 1768).
The Royal Navy sends a small fleet under the command of Admiral John Byng, 51, to prevent French forces from taking the island of Minorca in the western Mediterranean. He finds himself outnumbered, breaks off an engagement with a superior French fleet, returns to Gibraltar, and is condemned for cowardice. Prime Minister Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st duke of Newcastle, says of Byng, "He shall be tried immediately; he shall be hung directly" (see 1757).
Vice Admiral Edward Boscawen, Royal Navy, intercepts a French squadron en route to North America in April, captures the 64-gun ships Alcide and Lys, returns to Spithead with his prizes and 1,500 prisoners, and receives the thanks of Parliament.
General Edward Braddock, 59, lands at Hampton Roads, Virginia, February 20, with two regiments of regulars to assume command as commander in chief of British forces in America. A bluff and profane major general, Braddock meets with colonial governors April 14 at Alexandria to plan a fourfold attack on French positions in Nova Scotia, at Fort Duquesne on the Monongahela River, at Crown Point on Lake George, and at Niagara.
Fort Beauséjour surrenders June 16 to a force of 270 British regulars and nearly 2,000 New Englanders under the command of Colonel Robert Monckton, 28, after a fortnight of resistance on the neck of the Acadian peninsula linking Louisburg with French Canada (but see 1758). The British reward Monckton's "zeal and ability" by making him lieutenant governor of Nova Scotia: some 6,000 Acadians who refuse to swear allegiance to George II are sent to Georgia and South Carolina with instructions from the British governor that they are to be "disposed of in such manner as may best answer our design of preventing their reunion." The property of the 9,000 remaining Acadians is for the most part confiscated, and Canada's new masters deport some 10,000 French-speaking Roman Catholics.
The Battle of the Monongahela River seven miles from Fort Duquesne July 9 ends in defeat for a British force of 1,459 regulars and 450 colonials who have marched from Fort Cumberland in northwest Maryland under the command of General Braddock (see 1754). French and Indian forces led by Captain Daniel de Beaujeu engage the enemy. Beaujeu is killed, Captain Jean Dumas takes over, and he routs the British regulars, who are unaccustomed to anything but European methods of fighting in formation and whose colonial allies are in many cases raw recruits. Nearly 1,000 British and colonial troops are killed or wounded, as are 60 French and Indians; George Washington survives the encounter, but General Braddock sustains mortal wounds, and he dies 4 days later (July 13) at age 60. In addition to George Washington, his 44th Regiment includes notably English-born officers Thomas Gage, 36; Horatio Gates, 27; and Charles Lee, 24, all of whom will gain prominence in years to come (Lee will be sent next year to New York's Mohawk Valley, where he will buy a captaincy for £900). Colonel Thomas Dunbar withdraws to Fort Cumberland with the remainder of Braddock's command.
The Battle of Lake George September 8 ends in defeat for the French, but the British under Sir William Johnson fail to reach Crown Point. Sir William erects Fort William Henry at the head of Lake George. An expedition to Niagara reaches Oswego under the command of the Massachusetts colony's governor William Shirley; he leaves a garrison of 700 but does not proceed (see 1756).
Ethiopia's Solomonid emperor dies and is succeeded by his son, who will reign until 1769 as the emperor Iyoas.
Rangoon is founded on the site of the Mon fishing village of Dagon by the Burmese king Aloung P'Houra (see 1753; 1757).
"Essay on the Nature of Commerce in General" ("Essai sur la nature du commerce en géneral") by the late economist and financier Richard Cantillon is pubished at Paris through the good offices of political economist Victor Riqueti, marquis de Mirabeau (see crime, 1734). Cantillon's manuscript survived the burning of his house 21 years ago; his theory of relative wages, prices, and interest, his views on the workings of currency circulation, the role of precious metals in international commerce, and other subjects will be widely influential.
The first steam engine in the Western Hemisphere begins operations at a copper mine on the Passaic River outside Belleville in the New Jersey colony. Staffordshire-born mechanical engineer Josiah Hornblower, 26, arrived in the colonies 2 years ago carrying duplicates and triplicates of steam engine parts in violation of British law against export of such technology.
Vacheron-Constantin watches have their beginnings in a Geneva watchmaking shop opened by Swiss entrepreneur Barthélémy Vacheron (see 1819).
Württemberg-born astronomer Johann T. (Tobias) Mayer, 32, at the University of Göttingen submits to the British government an amended body of lunar tables to help navigators find their longitude at sea (see Harrison, 1736). Having taught himself mathematics, he had published two original works on geometry by age 23 and last year was named superintendent of Göttingen's university observatory. The British find his tables accurate enough to determine longitude within about half a degree, and a 1770 London edition of Mayer's tables will include not only his method of determining longitude by measuring the angular separation between the moon and another celestial object but also a formula for correcting errors in longitude caused by atmospheric refraction (see Harrison, 1761).
"Experiments upon Magnesia, Quicklime, and other Alkaline Substances" by Scottish chemist-physician Joseph Black, 27, shows that magnesia (magnesium oxide) is a distinct substance completely different from lime (calcium oxide) with which it has been confused (see magnesium metal, 1808). Black last year laid the foundations of quantitative analysis with a doctoral thesis on causticization.
Moscow State University is founded in Russia through the efforts of chemist-author Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosov, 43, and Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler, now 48.
A Dictionary of the English Language, in which the Words are deduced from their Originals and Illustrated in their Different Significations by Examples from best Writers to which are prefixed a History of the English Language and an English Grammar by poet-novelist-lexicographer Samuel Johnson, now 45, appears in two volumes April 15 and establishes the reputation of Doctor Johnson, whose 2,300-page work will be completed in 1773 with well over 40,000 definitions (an abridged dictionary will appear next year). "The chief glory of every people arises from its authors," says Doctor Johnson, who was given 750 guineas by booksellers to undertake the work 9 years ago, rented rooms off Fleet Street, hired six men to help him, and bought or borrowed hundreds, if not thousands, of books from whose pages he has taken the words to be listed and defined (he has based his work in part on the Universal Etymological English Dictionary published in 1721). The weekly entertainment paper The World has published two essays by Johnson's patron Philip D. (Dormer) Stanhope, 59, 4th earl of Chesterfield, in praise of the work, which is 6 years behind schedule but has been completed by just one man in a mere 9 years, and Chesterfield takes partial credit for its success, although he has contributed only £10 toward defraying the cost of its publication (Johnson will later say that Chesterfield taught "the morals of a whore and the manners of a dancing-master." His dictionary defines patron as "one who countenances, supports, or protects. Commonly, a wretch who supports with insolence, and is paid with flattery"; it defines lexicographer as "a writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge").
Nonfiction: "Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks" ("Gedanken über die Nachahmung der griecheischen Wekre in der Malerei und Bildhauerkunst") by Prussian archaeologist and art historian Johann (Joachim) Winckelmann, 37, who has come into contact with Greek art while working as librarian to Count von Büneau at Nöthnitz, near Dresden. "The only way for us to become great, or even inimitable if possible, is to imitate the Greeks," says Winckelmann; his essay will soon be translated into different languages and arouse interest in the classical Greek ideal of education and art.
Philosopher-jurist Charles Louis de Secondat, baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu, dies at Paris February 10 at age 66; soldier-memoirist Louis de Rouvroy, duc de Saint-Simon, at his native Paris March 2 at age 80.
Painting: Milkmaid and Woodcutter by Thomas Gainsborough; A Father Explaining the Bible to His Children by French painter Jean Baptiste Greuze, 30, who wins admission to the Paris Académie.
Theater: Miss Sara Sampson by German playwright Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, 26, 7/10 at Frankfurt der Oder.
Venetian authorities imprison adventurer Giovanni Jacopo Casanova de Seingalt, 30, as a spy upon his return to the city after 14 years of traveling from one European capital to another as preacher, alchemist, gambler, and violin player. Expelled from the Seminary of St. Cyprian at age 16 for scandalous behavior, Casanova has ventured as far as Constantinople. He will effect a daring escape from prison next year and continue his roguish life, accumulating a fortune as director of state lotteries for France's Louis XV in Paris, receiving the papal order of the Golden Spur, and engaging in duels before accepting employment as librarian to Bohemia's Count von Waldstein at Dux Castle, where he will write his memoirs of amours and escapades (see 1838).
A Benedictine abbey church is completed at Ottobeuren to designs by Bavarian architect Johann Michael Fischer, 63, whose huge rococo structure is centered on three successive cupolas and is elegantly decorated with paint, sculpture, and stuccowork.
The Golden Horn freezes over completely in one of the coldest winters on record.
An earthquake rocks northern Persia June 7 killing 40,000.
The Lisbon earthquake November 1 is the worst in Europe since the Lisbon quake of 1531. The ensuing seismic sea wave, flooding of the Tagus River, and a great fire takes 10,000 to 30,000 lives (60,000 by some accounts); Portugal's chief minister the marques de Pombal, now 56, takes charge of rebuilding the city and seizes the opportunity to create a great square on the banks of the Tagus, but the All Souls' Day disaster shakes the confidence of all Europe (see Voltaire, 1759).
An earthquake rattles New England; Cambridge, Massahusetts, astronomer-mathematician John Winthrop, 40, suggests the "wave" nature of earthquakes, the first scientist to do so.
English stock breeder Robert Bakewell, 30, in Leicestershire develops a new breed of sheep that will be called Leicester.
Doctor Johnson defines oats in his Dictionary as "a cereal grass of the genus avena (avoin in France), the best-known species being Scots oats, a grain they fed to horses, fine live-stock and to men in Scotland" (Johnson has not yet visited Scotland; see 1773). To which Doctor Johnson's Scottish biographer James Boswell will reply, "Yes, and that is why in England you have such fine horses and in Scotland we have such fine people." Scottish oat cakes are thin, round cakes of oats combined with fat, baking soda, salt, and water and baked in a hot oven (see haggis, 1785).
About 1,500 refugees from Acadia regroup in the French territory of Louisiana south and west of New Orleans, bringing with them French recipes; some will spread as far west as the Texas border (see 1784).
"Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind" by Benjamin Franklin expresses Franklin's faith in human progress. Born the 12th of 14 children in an age of high infant mortality, Franklin attacks the idea of "inevitable" poverty and limited growth, voicing confidence that America's colonial population will double every 20 or 25 years.
1751 1752 1753 1754 1755 1756 1757 1758 1759 1760
