1821 in the United States
Events from the year 1821 in the United States.
Incumbents
Federal government">Federal government of the United States">Federal government
- President: James Monroe
- [Vice President of the United States|President of the United States|Vice President]: Daniel D. Tompkins
- Chief Justice: John Marshall
- Speaker of the House of Representatives:
- Congress: 16th, 17th
Governors
- Governor of Alabama: Thomas Bibb, Israel Pickens
- Governor of Connecticut: Oliver Wolcott Jr.
- Governor of Delaware: Jacob Stout, John Collins
- Governor of Georgia: John Clark
- Governor of Illinois: Shadrach Bond
- Governor of Indiana: Jonathan Jennings
- Governor of Kentucky: John Adair
- Governor of Louisiana: Thomas Bolling Robertson
- Governor of Maine:
- * until May 28:William King
- * May 28-December 5: William D. Williamson
- * starting December 5: Benjamin Ames
- Governor of Maryland: Samuel Sprigg
- Governor of Massachusetts: John Brooks
- Governor of Mississippi: George Poindexter
- Governor of Missouri: William Clark, Alexander McNair
- Governor of New Hampshire: Samuel Bell
- Governor of New Jersey: Isaac Halstead Williamson
- Governor of New York: DeWitt Clinton
- Governor of North Carolina: Jesse Franklin, Gabriel Holmes
- Governor of Ohio: Ethan Allen Brown
- Governor of Pennsylvania: Joseph Hiester
- Governor of Rhode Island: Nehemiah R. Knight, William C. Gibbs
- Governor of South Carolina: Thomas Bennett Jr.
- Governor of Tennessee: Joseph McMinn, William Carroll
- Governor of Vermont: Richard Skinner
- Governor of Virginia: Thomas Mann Randolph Jr.
Lieutenant governors
- Lieutenant Governor of Connecticut: Jonathan Ingersoll
- Lieutenant Governor of Illinois: Pierre Menard
- Lieutenant Governor of Indiana: Ratliff Boon
- Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky: William T. Barry
- Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts: William Phillips Jr.
- Lieutenant Governor of Mississippi: James Patton
- Lieutenant Governor of Missouri: William Henry Ashley
- Lieutenant Governor of New York: John Tayler
- Lieutenant Governor of Rhode Island: Edward Wilcox, Caleb Earle
- Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina: William Pinckney
- Lieutenant Governor of Vermont: William Cahoon
Events
- February 9 - The George Washington University is chartered as The Columbian College of the District of Columbia by President James Monroe.
- March 4 - James Monroe and Daniel D. Tompkins begin their second terms as President and Vice President of the United States.
- March 5 - James Monroe is sworn in for his second term as President of the United States. Daniel D. Tompkins is sworn in for his second term as Vice President of the United States.
- June 27 - The New Hampton School is founded in the state of New Hampshire.
- July 10 - The U.S. takes possession of its newly bought territory of Florida from Spain.
- August 4 - The Saturday Evening Post is published for the first time, as a weekly newspaper.
- August 10 - Missouri is admitted as the 24th U.S. state.
- September 3 - The 1821 Norfolk and Long Island hurricane strikes New York City.
- September 18 - Amherst College is founded in Massachusetts.
- November 9 - Israel Pickens is sworn in as the third governor of Alabama, replacing Thomas Bibb.
- November 16 - American Old West: The Santa Fe Trail is used for the first time by a White American, William Becknell.
- History of Liberia - The first groups of freed slaves from the U.S. arrive in modern-day Liberia and found Monrovia.
- Widener University is founded in Wilmington, Delaware, as The Bullock School for Boys.
Ongoing
Births
- January 2 – Napoleon LeBrun, architect
- January 8 – James Longstreet, one of the foremost Confederate generals of the American Civil War
- January 16 – John C. Breckinridge, 14th vice president of the United States from 1857 to 1861, U.S. Senator from Kentucky in 1861
- February 4 – Frederick Goddard Tuckerman, sonneteer
- February 19 – Francis Preston Blair Jr., U.S. Senator from Missouri from 1871 to 1873
- March 20 – Ned Buntline, publisher, dime novelist and publicist
- April 12
- * Samuel G. Arnold, U.S. Senator from Rhode Island from 1862 to 1863
- * Adonijah Welch, U.S. Senator from Florida from 1868 to 1869.
- April 15 – Joseph E. Brown, U.S. Senator from Georgia from 1880 to 1891
- July 6 – Edmund Pettus, U.S. Senator from Alabama from 1897 to 1907
- July 8 – Maria White Lowell, poet and abolitionist
- July 13 – Nathan Bedford Forrest, Confederate Civil War General, first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan
- September 22 – John Conness, Irish-born U.S. Senator from California from 1863 to 1869
- October 7 – Richard H. Anderson, United States Army officer during the Mexican–American War, Confederate general during the American Civil War
- October 10 – Wade Keyes, Acting Confederate States Attorney General in 1861 and 1863–1864
- October 22 – Collis P. Huntington, railroad promoter
- December 25 – Clara Barton, humanitarian and founder of the American branch of the Red Cross.
Deaths
- January 4 - Elizabeth Ann Seton, saint
- March 13 - Waightstill Avery, lawyer and soldier, fought a duel with Andrew Jackson
- October 11 - John Ross Key, commissioned officer in the Continental Army, judge, lawyer and father of Francis Scott Key
- October 24 - Elias Boudinot, President of the Continental Congress Full date unknown - Lucy Terry first known African American poet