1804

Events

January–March

• January 1 – Haiti gains independence from France, becoming the first independent Black state in the New World.
• February 4 – The Sokoto Caliphate is founded in West Africa.
• February 14 – The First Serbian uprising begins the Serbian Revolution. By 1817, the Principality of Serbia will have proclaimed self-rule from the Ottoman Empire, the first nation-state in Europe to do so.
• February 15 – New Jersey becomes the last of the northern United States to abolish slavery.
• February 16 – First Barbary War: Stephen Decatur leads a raid to burn the pirate-held frigate at Tripoli to deny her further use by the captors.
• February 18 – Ohio University is chartered by the Ohio General Assembly.
• February 20 – Hobart is established in its permanent location in Van Diemen's Land as a British penal colony.
• February 21 – Cornishman Richard Trevithick's newly built Penydarren steam locomotive operates on the Merthyr Tramroad, between Penydarren in Merthyr Tydfil and Abercynon in South Wales, following several trials since February 13, the world's first locomotive to work on rails.
• February 22–April 22 – 1804 Haiti massacre, an ethnic cleansing with the goal of eradicating the white population on Haiti.
• March 4–March 5 – The Castle Hill convict rebellion breaks out in New South Wales, led by Irish convicts in Australia.
• March 7 – In Britain:
• * John Wedgwood founds the Royal Horticultural Society.
• * Thomas Charles is instrumental in founding the British and Foreign Bible Society.
• March 10 – Louisiana Purchase, Three Flags Day: In St. Louis, a formal ceremony is conducted to transfer ownership of Louisiana Territory from France to the United States.
• March 17 – Friedrich Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell is first performed at Weimar, under the direction of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
• March 21 – The Napoleonic Code is adopted as French civil law.

  April–June

• April 2 – Forty merchantmen are wrecked when a convoy led by British frigate runs aground off Portugal with considerable loss of life.
• April 4 – Samuel Taylor Coleridge sets sail on The Speedwell for the Mediterranean. In Malta, he obtains employment as a public official.
• April 5 – The High Possil meteorite, the first recorded meteorite to fall in Scotland in modern times, falls at High Possil.
• April 26 – Henry Addington resigns as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
• May 10 – William Pitt the Younger begins his second term as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
• May 14 – The Lewis and Clark Expedition departs from Camp Dubois and begins its historic journey by traveling up the Missouri River.
• May 18 – Napoleon Bonaparte is proclaimed Emperor of the French by the French Senate.
• May 21 – Père Lachaise Cemetery a cemetery in Paris, France, is opened.
• June 9 – Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 in E–flat is premiered in Vienna.
• June 15 – The Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified by New Hampshire, and arguably becomes effective.
• June 21 – Smithson Tennant announces the discovery of the elements iridium and osmium; three days later, William Hyde Wollaston reveals to the Royal Society that he is the formerly anonymous discoverer of palladium.

  July–September

• July 11 – Aaron Burr, Vice President of the United States, shoots former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton during a duel; Hamilton dies the next day.
• July 27 – The Twelfth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which reforms the way that candidates for President and Vice President are chosen, is ratified by Tennessee, removing doubt surrounding adoption.
• August 11 – In reaction to Napoleon being proclaimed emperor of France, Francis II assumes the title of a hereditary emperor of Austria in addition to his title as emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. This latter title will become obsolete two years later when the formation of the Confederation of the Rhine instigated by Napoleon signals the end of the Holy Roman Empire.
• August 20 – Lewis and Clark Expedition: The Corps of Discovery, whose purpose is to explore the Louisiana Purchase, suffers its only death when Sergeant Charles Floyd dies, apparently from acute appendicitis.
• September 1 – German astronomer K. L. Harding discovers the asteroid Juno.

  October–December

• October 5 – Action of 5 October 1804: War between Spain and the United Kingdom is triggered by the battle between four British warships and four Spanish frigates, all carrying treasure and merchandise. Captain Graham Moore of Indefatigable informs Spanish Admiral Jose Bustamante of his orders to detain the treasure-laden ships and, "not receiving a satisfactory answer, an Action commenced"; La Mercedes is sunk and the other three ships surrender.
• October 8 – Jean-Jacques Dessalines holds his coronation as Jean-Jacques I, Emperor of Haiti.
• November 3 – The Treaty of St. Louis is signed by Quashquame and William Henry Harrison; controversy surrounding the treaty eventually causes the Sauk people to ally with the British during the War of 1812, and is the main cause of the Black Hawk War of 1832.
• November 20 – Said bin Sultan, Sultan of Muscat and Oman, starts to rule.
• November 30 – The Democratic-Republican-controlled United States Senate begins an impeachment trial against Federalist-partisan Supreme Court of the United States Justice Samuel Chase, on charges of political bias.
• December 2 – Coronation of Napoleon I: At the cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris, Napoleon crowns himself as the first Emperor of the French in a thousand years. Witnessing this, Simón Bolívar dedicates himself to liberating Venezuela from Spanish rule.
• December 3 – Thomas Jefferson defeats Charles C. Pinckney in the United States presidential election.
• December 12 – Spain declares war on the United Kingdom.

  Date unknown

• The Nguyễn dynasty emperor Gia Long changes his country's official name from Đại Việt to Việt Nam.
• Morphine is first isolated from the opium poppy by the German pharmacist, Friedrich Sertürner.
• Matthew Flinders recommends that New Holland be renamed Australia.
• Shimizu-gumi, predecessor of Shimizu Corporation, a major construction company in Japan, is founded in Kanda region, Edo.
• World population reaches 1 billion people.

  Births

January–June

• January 1 – James Fannin, Texas revolutionary
• January 9
• * Louis d'Aurelle de Paladines, French general
• * Sydney Dacres, British admiral
• January 10 – Élie Frédéric Forey, French general, Marshal of France
• January 20 – Eugène Sue, French novelist
• January 21 – Eliza Roxcy Snow, American poet
• February 5 – J. L. Runeberg, Finnish national poet
• February 7 – John Deere, American industrialist
• February 13 – Claude-Étienne Minié, French army officer and weapon inventor
• February 29 – Carl von Rokitansky, Czech physician and pathologist
• March 8 – Alvan Clark, American telescope manufacturer
• March 14 – Johann Strauss Senior, Austrian composer
• March 17 – Jim Bridger, American trapper and explorer
• March 20 – Neal Dow, mayor of Portland, Maine and Father of Prohibition
• April 3 – Lucien Baudens, French military surgeon
• April 4 – Andrew Nicholl, Northern Irish painter
• April 18 – Robert Davidson, Scottish locomotive pioneer
• April 24 - Chō Kōran, Japanese poet, painter
• April 26 – Charles Goodyear, American politician
• May 4 – Margaretta Riley, British botanic
• May 13 – Per Gustaf Svinhufvud af Qvalstad, Swedo-Finnish treasurer of Tavastia province, manor host, and paternal grandfather of President P. E. Svinhufvud
• May 16 – Elizabeth Peabody, Transcendental activist, educator
• June 1
• * Mikhail Glinka, Russian composer
• * George Sand, French writer
• June 24 – Willard Richards, American religious leader

  July–December

• July 1 – George Sand, French novelist
• July 4 – Nathaniel Hawthorne, American writer
• July 6 – Jerónimo Carrión, 8th President of Ecuador
• July 14 – Ludwig von Benedek, Austrian general
• July 20 – Richard Owen, English anatomist, paleontologist, and zoologist
• July 23 – Jane Irwin Harrison, de facto First Lady of the United States
• July 28 – Ludwig Feuerbach, German philosopher
• September 5 – William Alexander Graham, United States Senator from North Carolina, Confederate States Senator
• September 8 – Eduard Mörike, German poet
• September 11 – Mercedes Marín del Solar, international Chilean poet and reform educator
• September 14
• * Louis Désiré Maigret, Roman Catholic bishop of Honolulu
• * John Gould, English ornithologist
• September 28 – Alpheus Felch, American governor and senator from Michigan
• October 18 – Mongkut, Rama IV, King of Siam
• October 24 – Wilhelm Eduard Weber, German physicist
• November 18 – Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora, Italian general and statesman
• November 23 – Franklin Pierce, 14th President of the United States
• December 7 – Noah Haynes Swayne, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
• December 10 – Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi, German mathematician
• December 13 – Joseph Howe, Canadian politician
• December 16 – Viktor Bunyakovsky, Ukrainian-Russian mathematician
• December 21 – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
• December 23 – Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve, French literary critic

  Date unknown

• Isaac Aaron, English-born physician, owner of the Australian Medical Journal and secretary of the Australian Medical Association
• James Fannin, colonel in Army of the Republic of Texas and slave trader
• Hortense Globensky-Prévost, Canadian heroine
• Anne Hill, British-Canadian dancer and actor
• Chō Kōran, Japanese poet and painter
• Eugénie Luce, French educator
• James Mackay, Scottish-born New Zealand politician