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Wars of liberation against the French begin in the wake of Napoleon's disastrous Russian expedition. Prussia's Friedrich Wilhelm III issues an appeal February 3 from Breslau calling for a volunteer corps, young men and students rally to the cause, the Treaty of Kalisch February 28 makes Russia a Prussian ally, and Friedrich Wilhelm establishes the Landwehr and the Landsturm Iron Cross March 17.
A Swedish army of 30,000 under the command of Crown Prince Bernadotte takes the field following a March 3 treaty with Britain. The British have paid 1 million rix-dollars and promised not to oppose the union of Norway with Sweden.
Russian troops occupy Hamburg in late March, and the dukes of Mecklenburg withdraw from the Confederation of the Rhine. Russian and Prussian troops occupy Dresden March 27 following the withdrawal of Marshal Davout, but Prince Kutuzov falls ill and dies at Bunzlau/Boleslawiec April 28 at age 67, and Napoleon raises a new army of 500,000 to replace his Russian losses.
Marshal Jean-Baptiste Bessières, duc d'Istrie, reconnoiters behind Allied lines on the Elbe May 1 and is killed in a clash at Rippach May 1 at age 44.
An Allied army of 73,000 attacks Napoleon on the Elbe, but the emperor has 100,000 men and gains victory May 2 at the Battle of Lützen (Gross-Görschen) 13 miles southwest of Leipzig. Commanded by General Ludwig Wittgenstein and General Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, 70, the Allies have surprised Marshal Ney's corps, but Napoleon has mounted a counterattack and follows up an infantry charge with a concentrated artillery barrage; French casualties total 20,000, Russo-Prussian 22,000. The Allies withdraw to Lusatia, the emperor enters Dresden May 9, and the king of Saxony returns from Prague to form a close alliance with the French.
Generals Wittgenstein and von Blücher take up a position at Bautzen on the Spree River 30 miles northwest of Dresden, General Barclay de Tolly is recalled to service and commands a Russian force, but the 100,000-man Allied army is far outnumbered by Napoleon's 115,000 men, who have the support of Marshal Ney's 84,000. Sending Ney on a flanking march to the north, Napoleon mounts a frontal assault on the Allied army and defeats it in the Battle of Bautzen May 20 to 22, sustaining 13,000 casualties to the enemy's 15,000, but General Duroc is killed in action May 22. The emperor forces the Allies back across the Spree into Silesia. Barclay de Tolly is made commander in chief of Russian forces.
Hamburg falls to Marshal Davout May 30 following the withdrawal of Russian troops, and the Armistice of Poischwitz June 4 halts hostilities until August 12.
Britain agrees to subsidize Prussia and Russia under terms of a June 15 treaty signed at Reichenbach, but Prussian general Gerhard Johann David von Scharnhorst dies at Prague June 28 at age 57 of wounds sustained in early May at the Battle of Lützen. As General von Blücher's chief of staff, he has worked with General August Neidhardt von Gneisenau, now 52, to reshape the Prussian Army from what basically was a force of mercenaries into a citizens' army whose officers are promoted on the basis of merit, with no special privileges for the upper classes and an emphasis on field maneuvers rather than parade-ground drill.
Austria declares war on France August 12 following the breakdown of negotiations at Prague in which Metternich has tried to mediate with France's new minister of foreign affairs Armand Augustin Louis, marquis de Caulaincourt, 41, and the Prussian envoy Baron Wilhelm von Humboldt, 46, a brother of the naturalist.
Prussian general Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Bülow, 58, saves Berlin August 23 by defeating the French at Grossbeeren. The crown prince of Saxony looks on, refusing to aid the French general Nicolas-Charles Oudinot, now 46, who is badly defeated and superseded by Marshal Ney. Von Blücher scores a victory August 26 at the Battle of Katzbach, defeating a French army under General Jacques Macdonald, now 48. Friedrich Wilhelm III makes von Blücher prince of Wahlstatt.
The Battle of Dresden August 26 to 27 gives Napoleon his last major victory on German soil. His 70,000-man army defeats an Allied army of 158,000 under the Austrian prince Karl Philipp von Schwarzenberg, who served with Napoleon last year in Russia and now commands a Bohemian army. The Allies have attacked the city, believing it to be only lightly defended, but Napoleon arrives with three additional corps, mounts a counterattack, inflicts 38,000 casualties, and captures 40 guns while suffering 10,000 casualties. One of his corps commanders, General Dominique-René Vandamme, 42, comte d'Unebourg, tries to intercept Prince von Schwarzenberg as he withdraws across the mountains into Bohemia, but his 30,000-man force is surrounded and overwhelmed at Kulm, and Vandamme is taken prisoner.
The Battle of Dennewitz September 6 results in victory for Baron von Bülow, who prevents Marshal Ney from taking Berlin.
Former French revolutionary general Jean Victor Marie Moreau dies at Laun in Bohemia September 2 at age 50 and is buried at St. Petersburg. He joined in the Russian attack on Dresden in August, had both legs broken by a French cannon ball, and underwent amputations but to no avail.
Britain agrees October 3 in the Treaty Alliance of Teplitz to pay Austria £1 million in return for Austria's agreement to put 150,000 men in the field.
The Battle of Leipzig October 16 to 19 will be called the "Battle of the Nations" because it pits a 450,000-man French army against 270,000 Prussians, 130,000 Austrians, and 110,000 Swedes. It ends in defeat for Napoleon, who has left Dresden in order to avoid being cut off from France by the Allied armies, whose strategy has been planned by generals who include Joseph W. Radetzky, now 46. Napoleon has lost 219,000 men to typhus and 105,000 in battle, his Saxon and Württemberg contingents desert him October 18, the Allies storm Leipzig October 19, capturing the king of Saxony, Gen. Macdonald barely escapes death, and Napoleon retreats after losing another 30,000 men.
The kingdom of Westphalia comes to an end following the great French defeat at Leipzig. Napoleon's brother Jérôme flees from Cassel, and the old rulers are restored in Cassel, Brunswick, Hanover, and Oldenburg. Bavaria's Maximilian I Joseph abandons Napoleon and joins the Allies (see constitution, 1818).
The Austrian emperor Franz I makes Metternich a hereditary prince of the empire October 20. Bound by no constitutional constraints, having no electoral constituencies to placate or committees to consult, the emperor and his ministers exercise complete control over the empire; Metternich will later say, "I ruled Europe sometimes, but I never governed Austria."
A Dutch revolt November 15 expels French officials, and an Allied army under General von Bülow enters Holland while Prince Bernadotte invades Holstein with a Swedish army.
The duke of Wellington advances through northeast Spain following the recall of much of the French Army to support Napoleon against the Prussians and Russians. The Battle of Vitoria June 21 ends in triumph for Wellington's combined British, Spanish, and Portuguese army of 72,000 men and 90 guns over a 57,000-man French army under the command of Marshal Jourdan and King Joseph Bonaparte, who is sent scurrying back to Paris. French casualties (dead, wounded, and captured) total about 8,000, allied losses about 5,000. The French retreat to Pamplona, leaving behind all their artillery plus large stores of baggage and goods which they have plundered. Pamplona falls to British and Spanish forces October 31 after a long siege, the British and their allies gain control of the Basque provinces, the French pull back behind the Pyrenees, and Wellington crosses the French frontier to defeat Marshal Soult November 10. Napoleon releases Spain's Ferdinand VII from confinement in December in order to scrap the Constitution of Cádiz adopted in 1812.
Dresden surrenders to Allied forces November 11; Stettin, November 21; Lübeck, December 5; Zamose, Modlin, and Torgau, December 26; and Danzig, December 30 as the Allies vow to invade France if Napoleon will not make peace.
The War of 1812 continues between British and U.S. forces. The Battle of Raisin River in Michigan January 22 pits 700 Kentucky volunteers under the command of Brig. Gen. James Winchester against 1,200 British regulars supported by 1,400 Indians commanded by General Henry A. Proctor; the Americans have captured an enemy store but set up camp in a position hard to defend, the British take them by surprise, artillery and musketfire kill more than 400 Kentuckians, 80 of their wounded are left behind to face Indian tomahawks, and only 15 to 20 survive (they include Bland W. Ballard, now 53, who sustains wounds). Colonel Zebulon Pike of Pike's Peak fame leads a successful attack on York (later Toronto) April 27 but is killed in action that day at age 34. York's population is only 700 and has been virtually defenseless, the Americans pillage the town and occupy it for 11 days before being driven out by the British, and they carry off the royal standard and the mace of the parliamentary speaker (the mace will be returned, but not until 1934).
H.M.S. Shannon of the Royal Navy lures the U.S. Navy frigate Cheseapeake out of Boston Harbor and destroys her June 1, avenging losses suffered to the Americans last year and earlier this year. Naval officer James Lawrence, 32, defeated the British brig H.M.S. Peacock February 24 off the mouth of the Demerara River in what later will be British Guiana. He has been transferred to the Chesapeake, but the British defeat him in about 15 minutes. Mortally wounded, he is carried below decks crying, "Tell the men to fire faster and not to give up the ship; fight her till she sinks." Privateer Enos Collins has manned H.M.S. Shannon with about 48 of his toughs and sails her into Halifax harbor June 6 with the Chesapeake in tow (Collins, 29, will live to age 97, becoming one of the richest men in North America).
British naval forces gain control of Lake Champlain. Delaware-born Lieut. Thomas Macdonough, 29, U.S. Navy, has ordered Lieut. Sidney Smith June 2 to sail north to the Canadian border with another sloop to block the British from entering the lake but not to cross the border; Smith has deliberately disobeyed, British warships have captured both sloops after a 4-hour battle and imprisoned their crews, Macdonough moves his own fleet farther south to Burlington, Vermont, and he receives orders June 17 to "regain by every possible exertion the ascendancy which we have lost, for which purpose you are authorized to purchase, arm, and equip two of the best sloops to be procured on the lake." A British flotilla lands 1,000 men at Plattsburgh July 31; they burn public property and pillage private homes before sailing south to attack Macdonough at Burlington (see 1814).
The Battle of Stony Creek on Lake Ontario June 6 ends in victory for a 704-man British force under General John Vincent, who attacks the U.S. encampment near Hamilton at night, capturing Generals William Winder and John Chandler, who have 2,000 men but lose their artillery and baggage in the engagement. The U.S. survivors withdraw to Fort George; some 540 U.S. regulars on a raiding mission surrender June 24 to a British lieutenant and a small party of Indians at Beaver Dam, within 20 miles of the fort, and the U.S. commander, General Henry Dearborn, is dismissed.
The Battle of Lake Erie September 10 ends in victory for an improvised U.S. squadron commanded by Rhode Island-born Captain Oliver Hazard Perry, 28, who sends a message to General Harrison of 1811 Tippecanoe fame: "We have met the enemy and they are ours: two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop."
The Battle of the Thames (Moraviantown) in Ontario October 5 reestablishes U.S. supremacy in the Northwest. General Harrison defeats a British army under Henry A. Proctor, whose Shawnee ally Tecumseh is killed at age 45 after trying for a decade to join the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, Kickapoo, Menominee, Osage, Potawatomi, Seneca, Shawnee, Sioux, and Winnebago into a multi-tribal alliance or confederation that would resist white incursions. Tecumseh has traveled thousands of miles, going as far north as Wisconsin and as far south as the Alabama and Mississippi territories.
The Battle of Châteauguay River (Spears) in southern Quebec Province October 26 ends in ignominious defeat for a 4,000-man U.S. force under the command of General Wade Hampton at the hands of a 1,500-man British force (at least 90 percent of them French-Canadian) commanded by Colonel Charles de Salaberry, who confuses the invaders by having bugles sounded in different locations to give the impression that his numbers are far greater than 1,500. Casualties are light, but the Battle of Crysler's Farm November 11 is costlier to both sides. A 7,000-man invasion force under the command of General James Wilkinson, now 56, has moved down the St. Lawrence River from Sacketts Harbor, New York, to attack Montreal. He has dispatched General Boyd with a rear-guard detachment of 1,800 men to disperse the British who have been harassing his lines, the British have only 600 men under the command of Colonel J. W. Morrison, but they rout the Americans and force them back to their boats, taking about 100 prisoner after killing and wounding 249 (British losses total 203 dead and wounded). Canadian resistance decisively thwarts the U.S. attempt to seize Montreal, and when Wilkinson learns of Wade Hampton's defeat at Châteauguay he falls back across the river to St. Regis, New York. Glasgow-born politician-fur trader-merchant James McGill dies at Montreal December 19 at age 69, having served as an honorary colonel in the city's Infantry Volunteer Regiment (see McGill University, 1821).
Carolina-born general Andrew Jackson, 46, defeats Creek warriors at Talledega in the Mississippi Territory November 9. Some of the Creek (the Red Sticks) have allied themselves with the British and attacked Fort Mims on Lake Tensaw in Alabama territory August 30, massacring 553 whites, Jackson has raised a force of 5,000 militia, and he retaliates, wiping out the Creek villages of Tallasahatchee and Talladega (see 1814).
Former U.S. diplomat and steamboat financier Robert R. Livingston dies suddenly at Clermont in Columbia County, New York, February 26 at age 66; former U.S. secretary of the navy Benjamin Stoddert dies deeply in debt at Bladensburg, Maryland, December 18 at age 62.
Simón Bolívar retakes Caracas (see 1811). Commissioned by the Congress of New Granada to fight the Spaniards in Venezuela, Bolívar becomes virtual dictator (see 1815).
Pro-Spanish forces in upper Peru (later Bolivia) defeat the Argentine commander Manuel Belgrano, who has previously gained victories at Tucamán and Salta in the northwest part of his country (see 1810). He will be superseded as commander next year by José de San Martín.
A Mexican Congress convened at Chilpancingo September 14 declares independence from Spain November 6. It makes José María Morelos head of government, drafts a constitution, and adopts reforms, but Morelos will turn increasingly to guerrilla tactics for lack of adequate manpower to consolidate his control, and the struggle for independence will continue until 1821 (see 1814).
Persia's Fath Ali Shah makes peace with Russia after suffering disastrous defeats in the war that began in 1804. Persia loses Dagestan and Baku to the Russians under terms of the Treaty of Gulistan, which also gives St. Petersburg sovereignty over a wide area of the khanates from Länkäran north to Derbent in the north Caucusus (see 1826).
Vietnam's emperor Gia Long names his adviser Le Van Duyet viceroy of the country's southernmost portion and gives him the title Grand Eunuch of the Court of Hue.
Sweden abandons the slave trade (see Denmark, 1803; Britain, U.S., 1807; Holland, 1814).
English Quaker Elizabeth Fry, 33, begins working to improve the conditions of women in Newgate Prison, where inmates are not segregated by sex. Fry will be instrumental in introducing education and employment into British prisons and will open soup kitchens for London's poor.
Surveyor George W. Evans leads a 7-week expedition into the interior of New South Wales and becomes the first European to make a complete crossing of the Great Dividing Range (see 1804). Now 33, he will discover the Lachlan River in 1815 and follow its course as far as Mandagery Creek.
Leaders of England's Luddite movement are hanged or transported following a mass trial at York (see 1812). It has required some 14,000 troops to suppress the rioters, a special assize at York finds three young men guilty January 2 of William Horsfall's murder last year, they are hanged 6 days later, seven others are tried January 9 for their attack on the Rawfolds Mill, five are hanged, and nine more are hanged in March for stealing arms and money (see 1816).
Merchant George Clymer dies at Philadelphia January 24 at age 73, having signed the Declaration of Independence, had his property looted by vandals or redcoats during the Revolution, and seen his country go to war once again with the British; Continental Army veteran and banker Samuel Osgood dies at New York August 12 at age 66.
English humanitarians organize a Society for the Prevention of Accidents in Coal Mines after a series of mine disasters (see technology [Davy's safety lamp], 1815).
The British East India Company loses its monopoly in the India trade but continues to monopolize the China trade (see 1833).
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, newspaper publisher Charles Miner joins with local investor Jacob Cist to lease anthracite coal mines at Mauch Chunk with a view to sending the coal down the Lehigh River to Philadelphia (see 1812). A signed editorial by Miner published December 31 extols the promise of wealth from the coal mines; he and Cist sell the coal to a Philadelphia wire maker for $21 per ton. That price is not enough to cover their expenses, their venture will fail, but the wire manufacturer will use the coal and pursue Miner's vision of a canal system to exploit the coal deposits (see Morris Canal, 1831).
The first U.S. raw cotton-to-cloth mill opens February 23 at Waltham, Massachusetts.
Berlin, Connecticut-born pistol and rifle manufacturer Simeon North, 47, receives a government contract April 16 for 20,000 pistols. North opened a small scythe-making business in an old mill next to his farm 18 years ago, developed a reputation for craftsmanship, and was awarded a contract in 1799 for 500 horse pistols to be delivered within 1 year. To fulfill the new contract he suggests that the specifications call for each firearm to be of identical construction to permit their being assembled on a mass-production basis (see 1823).
Scottish inventor William Horrocks produces the world's first practical power loom (see Cartwright, 1785). Made of iron rather than wood, the compact machine requires little space, winds the woven fabric onto the cloth beam, and incorporates other improvements (see Bigelow, 1837).
Théorie Elémentaire de la Botanique by Swiss botanist Augustin Pyrame de Candolle, 35, advances the sciences of plant morphology, taxonomy, and physiology beyond the levels established by Linnaeus in his Philosophia Botanica of 1750.
Chemist Anders Ekeberg dies at Uppsala February 11 at age 46; mathematician-astronomer Joseph-Louis, comte de Lagrange, at Paris April 10 at age 77; chemist Peter Jacob Hjelm at Stockholm October 7 at age 67.
Sir Humphry Davy arrives at Paris October 27 with his wife, her maid, and his new laboratory assistant Michael Faraday, 22. André Ampère shows him a sample of the substance found by Bernard Courtois in 1811. Chemist Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac announces December 6 that the substance (iodine) is almost certainly a new element that he calls iode. "It forms with hydrogen a new acid," he says (see 1814).
Physician Benjamin Rush dies at Philadelphia April 19 at age 67, obstinately believing to the end in the efficacy of bleeding (which has killed many of his patients).
"Uncle Sam" is used for the first time to mean the United States in an editorial published September 7 in the Troy (New York) Post. Arlington, Massachusetts-born Troy meat packer Samuel Wilson, 46, has been shipping meat to the U.S. Army in barrels stamped with the initials U.S., and someone has suggested that the initials stood for Uncle Sam (see 1852).
Times of London founder John Walter dies at Tennington, Middlesex, November 16 at age 73. His sons William and John II have been managing the paper since 1795; John II, now 36, took over from his older brother in 1803 and will make the Times solvent by 1814, when he will adapt steam power to printing.
Nonfiction: On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason (Uber die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden Grunde) by Danzig (Gdansk)-born German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, 25, who receives a doctorate at Jena for his dissertation.
Author Michel Guillaume Jean de Crèvecoeur dies in his native France November 12 at age 78. He returned from America in 1790.
Fiction: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Published anonymously, as was last year's Sense and Sensibility, Austen's new novel tells the story of Elizabeth Bennet, one of five daughters of a foolish, husband-hunting mother and income-limited father.
Poetry: "Giaour" and "The Bride of Abydos" by Lord Byron; "Queen Mab" by English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, 21, who was expelled from Oxford 2 years ago for circulating his pamphlet "The Necessity of Atheism." In addition to his antireligious poem, Shelley issues a treatise on vegetarianism; The Queen's Wake by James Hogg; The Life of Nelson by Robert Southey, who is named poet laureate; verses published anonymously in Charles Holt's Columbian December 22 are by Connecticut-born poet Fitz-Greene Halleck, 23: "When the bright star of peace from our country was clouded,/ Hope fondly presaged it would still reappear." The war has forced Halleck's New York mercantile firm Halleck & Barker to suspend payments.
Juvenile: The Swiss Family Robinson (Der Schweizerische Robinson) by Swiss writer-philosopher Johann Rudolf Wyss, 32, who has based the story on a tale his father Johann David, 70, has told about a family shipwrecked on a tropical island. Young Wyss 2 years ago wrote the words to the Swiss national anthem.
Painting: Frosty Morning by J. M. W. Turner.
Opera: Tancredi 2/6 at Venice's Teatro de la Fenice, with music by Italian composer Gioacchino Antonio Rossini, 20; L'Italiana in Algeri 5/22 at Venice's San Benedetto, with music by Rossini.
The Royal Philharmonic gives its first concert March 8 at London.
First performances: Symphony No. 1 in D major by Austrian composer Franz (Peter) Schubert, 16, in the autumn at Vienna's Stadtkonvikt (City Church School; private performance); Symphony No. 7 in A major by Ludwig van Beethoven 12/8 at the University of Vienna.
The waltz gains widespread popularity in Europe.
Architect James Wyatt dies in a carriage accident at Marlborough September 4 at age 67 and is buried in Westminster Abbey.
A flight of passenger pigeons seen by painter John James Audubon takes 3 days to pass overhead; Audubon describes it as a "torrent of life" (see 1803; Wilson, 1810; painting Birds of America, 1830).
Ornithologist-poet Alexander Wilson dies at Philadelphia August 23 at age 47; his assistant, George Ord, will complete work on Wilson's American Ornithology, whose first six volumes have been published.
President Madison's wife, Dolley (née Payne), 40, serves ice cream at his inauguration party March 4 (see Jefferson, 1802).
English inventor Edward Howard devises a vacuum pan that will spur the growth of the canning industry; he will obtain a patent in 1835 (see Borden, 1853).
Commercial salt production begins at Syracuse, New York, to compensate for the cutoff of salt shipments from Bermuda and Europe (see 1786; 1863).
France has 334 sugar plantations by year's end and has produced 35,000 tons of beet sugar (see 1814; Delessert, 1811).
Noilly Prat vermouth is introduced in France.
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