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Victoria becomes queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
Queen Victoria was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she used the additional title of Empress of India. Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn. She inherited the throne at the age of 18, after her father's three elder brothers had all died leaving no legitimate, surviving children. -
Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection is a work of scientific literature by Charles Darwin which is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Its full title was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Darwin's book introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations through a process of natural selection. -
The U.S. Civil War begins.
Civil war fought from 1861 to 1865 between the United States and several Southern slave states that had declared their secession and formed the Confederate States of America. The war had its origin in the fractious issue of slavery,and, after four years of bloody combat, the Confederacy was defeated, slavery was abolished, and the difficult Reconstruction process of restoring unity and guaranteeing rights to the freed slaves began. -
In France, Victor Hugo publishes Les Miserables.
Les Misérables is a melodramatic novel written from the premise that any man can rise above his circumstances to reach perfection. The plot of the novel is suspenseful from start to finish; it follows both Jean Valjean's and society's struggles with good and evil. Hugo began to think about Les Misérables as early as 1829. He observed the specific incident that triggers the novel's action on the streets of Paris in 1845. He incorporated personal memories of all kinds in the novel. -
Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation declares slavery illegal in Confederate
President Lincoln read the first draft of this document to his Cabinet members on July 22, 1862. After some changes, he issued the preliminary version on September 22, which specified that the final document would take effect January 1, 1863. Slaves in Confederate states which were not back in the Union by then would be free, but slaves in the Border States were not affected. The president knew the proclamation was a temporary measure and only Congress could abolish slavery. -
Lewis Carroll publishes Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland tells the story of a girl named Alice who falls down a rabbit-hole into a fantasy world populated by peculiar and anthropomorphic creatures.The tale is filled with allusions to Dodgson's friends (and enemies), and to the lessons that British schoolchildren were expected to memorize. The tale plays with logic and is considered to be one of the most characteristic examples of the genre of literary nonsense. -
Mohandas K. Gandhi is born in India.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, into a Hindu Modh family in Porbanadar, Gujarat, India. His father, named Karamchand Gandhi, was the Chief Minister of the city of Porbanadar. His mother, named Putlibai, was the fourth wife; the previous three wives died in childbirth. Gandhi was born into the vaishya. He was 13 years old when married Kasturbai Makhanji, through his parents arrangement. He was abstinent from meat, alcohol, and promiscuity. -
Thomas Edison invents the incandescent lamp.
Edison has always received the major credit for inventing the lightbulb, because of his development of the power lines and other equipment needed to establish the incandescent lamp in a practical lighting system. An incandescent lamp is any of various devices that produce light by heating a suitable material to a high temperature. When any solid or gas is heated, commonly by combustion or resistance to an electric current, it gives off light of a colour characteristic of the material. -
Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn appears.
The work is among the first in major American literature to be written throughout in vernacular English, characterized by local color regionalism. It is told in the first person by Huckleberry "Huck" Finn,The novel was set before the Civil War; roughly 1835–1845; Twain said the novel was set forty to fifty years before the time of its publication. The novel takes place in the Mississippi River town of St. Petersburg, Missouri; various locations along the river through Arkansas. -
L. Frank Baum publishes The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children’s book written in 1900 by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W.W. Denslow.The story chronicles the adventures of a girl named Dorothy in the land of Oz. It is one of the best-known stories in American popular culture and has been widely translated.
