1856

Year 1856 (MDCCCLVI) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Sunday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar).

Events of 1856

January - June

* January 8 - Borax deposits are discovered in large quantities by John Veatch.
* January 24 - U.S. President Franklin Pierce declares the new Free-State Topeka government in "Bleeding Kansas" to be in rebellion.
* January 26 - First Battle of Seattle (1856): Marines from the "USS Decatur" drive off American Indian attackers after an all day battle with settlers.
* January 29 - Queen Victoria institutes the Victoria Cross.
* February - The Tintic War breaks out in Utah.
* February 1 - Auburn University is first chartered as the East Alabama Male College.
* February 2 - Dallas, Texas is incorporated as a city.
* February 7 - The nawab of Oudh (Wajid Ali Shah) is exiled to Metiabruz.
* February 18 - The American Party (Know-Nothings) convene in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to nominate their first Presidential candidate, former President Millard Fillmore.
* March 5 - Fire destroys the Covent Garden Theatre in London.
* March 6 - Maryland Agricultural College (present-day University of Maryland, College Park) is chartered.
* March 9 - National Fraternity Sigma Alpha Epsilon is founded at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
* March 20 - Costa Rican troops rout Walker's soldiers.
* March 24 - Taiping Rebellion: Suspecting treachery on the part of East King Yang Xiuqing, Shi Dakai garrisons Anhui and begins his march back to the Heavenly Capital, having defeated a strong Xiang Army dettachment.
* March 31 - The Treaty of Paris (1856) is signed, ending the Crimean War.
* April 7 - Nelson College is founded in Nelson, New Zealand.
* April 10 - The Theta Chi Fraternity is founded at Norwich University.
* May 1 - Isabela Province is created in the Philippines in honor of Queen Isabela II of Spain.
* May 16 - The Vigilance Committee is founded in San Francisco, California. It lynches two gangsters, arrests most Democratic Party officials and disbands itself on August 18.
* May 21 - Lawrence, Kansas is captured and burned by pro-slavery forces (the "Sacking of Lawrence").
* May 22 - Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the hall of the United States Senate, for a speech Sumner had made attacking Southerners who sympathized with the pro-slavery violence in Kansas ("Bleeding Kansas"). Sumner is unable to return to duty for 3 years while he recovered; Brooks becomes a hero across the South.
* May 24 - Pottawatomie Massacre: A group of followers of radical abolitionist John Brown kill 5 homesteaders in Franklin County, Kansas.
* June 2 - Battle of Black Jack: Antislavery forces, led by John Brown, defeat proslavery forces in Bleeding Kansas.
* June 9 - 500 Mormons leave Iowa City, Iowa and head west for Salt Lake City, Utah, carrying all their possessions in two-wheeled handcarts.
* June 13 - Taiping Rebellion: Shi Dakai arrives at Nanjing.

July - December

* July 17 - The Great Train Wreck of 1856 (the worst railroad calamity in the world to date) occurs near Philadelphia, PA, USA.
* July 31 - Christchurch, New Zealand is chartered as a city.
* August 10 - A hurricane destroys Last Island, Louisiana, leaving 400 dead. The whole island is broken up into several smaller islands by the storm.
* August 30 - Battle of Osawatomie: Proslavery forces defeat antislavery forces in Bleeding Kansas.
* September 1 - Seton Hall University is founded by Archdiocese of Newark Bishop James Roosevelt Bayley, a cousin of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt and nephew of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton.
* September 2 - Taiping Rebellion: Wei Changhui and Qin Rigang assassinate Yang Xiuqing.
* October 8 - The Second Opium War between several western powers and China begins with the "Arrow Incident" on the Pearl River.
* November 1 - Anglo-Persian War: War is declared between Great Britain and Persia.
* November 4 - U.S. presidential election, 1856: Democrat James Buchanan defeats former President Millard Fillmore, representing a coalition of "Know-Nothings" and Whigs, and John C. Frémont of the fledgling Republican Party, to become the 15th President of the United States.
* November 11 - Taiping Rebellion: Shi Dakai arrives at the Heavenly Capital once more with 100,000 men and demands that Wei Changhui and Qin Rigang be executed. Shi subsequently becomes head of the government.
* November 17 - American Old West: On the Sonoita River in present-day southern Arizona, the United States Army establishes Fort Buchanan in order to help control new land acquired in the Gadsden Purchase.
* November 21 - Niagara University is founded in Niagara Falls, New York.
* December 9 - Bushehr surrenders to the British.

Undated

* Gregor Mendel starts his research on genetics.
* British "Country and Borough Police Act" extends London police model to all of England and Wales.
* Kate Warne, the first female private detective, begins to work for the Pinkerton Detective Agency.
* Pre-human remains are found in the Neanderthal valley in Germany.
* The National Portrait Gallery, London opens.
* St. Paul's School, Belgaum is founded.
* Legal protection of widow remarriage is extended in India.

Ongoing events

* Anglo-Persian War (1856-1857)
* Crimean War (1854-1856)
* Second Opium War (1856-1860)
* Taiping Rebellion (1851-1864)

Births

January - June

* January 11 - Christian Sinding, Norwegian composer (d. 1941)
* January 12 - John Singer Sargent, American-born artist (d. 1925)
* February 2 - Frederick William Vanderbilt, American railway magnate (d. 1938)
* February 14 - Frank Harris, Irish author and editor (d. 1931)
* February 21/28 - Maurycy Gottlieb, Ukrainian painter (d. 1879)
* March 4 - Alfred William Rich, English watercolour painter and author (d. 1921)
* March 8
** Bramwell Booth, Salvation Army general (d. 1929)
** Tom Roberts, Australian artist (d. 1931)
* March 16 - Napoléon Eugène Louis John Joseph, Prince Imperial, son of French Emperor Napoleon III (d. 1879)
* March 20
**Sir John Lavery, Irish artist (d. 1941)
**Frederick Winslow Taylor, American inventor and efficiency expert (d. 1915)
* April 5 - Booker T. Washington, American educator (d. 1915)
* April 12 - William Martin Conway, British art critic and mountaineer (d. 1937)
* April 24 - Henri Philippe Pétain, French soldier and statesman (d. 1951)
* April 26 - Sir Joseph Ward, 17th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1930)
* April 27 - Tongzhi Emperor of China (d. 1875)
* May 6
**Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychiatrist (d. 1939)
**Robert Peary, American Arctic explorer (d. 1920)
* May 15 - L. Frank Baum, American author (d. 1919)
* June 14 - Andrey Markov, Russian mathematician (d. 1922)

July - December

* July 23 - Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Indian political activist (d. 1920)
* July 10 - Nikola Tesla, Serbian inventor (d. 1943)
* July 26 - George Bernard Shaw, Irish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1950)
* August 10 - William Willett, inventor of Daylight Saving Time (d. 1915)
* August 13 - Alfred Deakin, second Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1919)
* August 15 - Ivan Franko, Ukrainian poet, critic, journalist and political activist (d. 1916)
* September 1 - Sergei Winogradsky, Russian scientist (d. 1953)
* September 18 - Wilhelm von Gloeden, German photographer (d. 1931)
* September 19 - Stephanie J. Block, American stage actress (d. 3000)
* November 13 - Louis Brandeis, U.S. Supreme Court Justice (d. 1941)
* November 21 - William Emerson Ritter, American biologist (d. 1944)
* November 22 - Heber J. Grant, seventh president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d. 1945)
* November 24 - Bat Masterson, American lawman (d. 1921)
* November 29 - Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1921)
* December 11 - Georgi Plekhanov, Russian revolutionary and Marxist theoretician (d. 1918)
* December 13 - Svetozar Boroević, Austrian field marshal (d. 1920)
* December 18 - J.J. Thomson, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1940)
* December 22 - Frank B. Kellogg, United States Secretary of State, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1937)
* December 25 - Hans von Bartels, German painter (d. 1913)
* December 28 - Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1924)

Deaths

* January 14 - Janko Drašković, Croatian politician and reformer (b. 1770)
* January 16 - Thaddeus William Harris, American naturalist (b. 1795)
* January 31 - Khedrup Gyatso, 11th Dalai Lama (b. 1838)
* February 4 - Anna Gottlieb, operatic soprano (b. 1774)
* February 17 - Heinrich Heine, German writer (b. 1797)
* May 3 - Adolphe Charles Adam, French composer (b. 1803)
* June 23 - Ivan Kireevsky, Russian literary critic and philosopher (b. 1806)
* July 9 - Amedeo Avogadro, Italian chemist (b. 1776)
* July 11 - Norberto Ramírez, Central American politician
* July 29
** Karel Havlíček Borovský, Czech politician and writer (b. 1821)
** Robert Schumann, German composer and pianist
* August 29 - Mary Anne Schimmelpenninck, British Christian writer (b. 1778)
* August 30 - Gilbert Abbott à Beckett, English writer (b. 1811)
* October 19
** William Sprague III, American politician from Rhode Island (b. 1799)
** Said bin Sultan, Sultan of Muscat and Oman
* December 20 - Francesco Bentivegna, Italian revolutionary (b. 1820)
*"date unknown" - Chiba Shusaku Narimasa, swordsman (b. 1794)