1871

Events

January–March

• January 3 – Franco-Prussian War: Battle of Bapaume – Prussians win a strategic victory.
• January 18 – Proclamation of the German Empire: The member states of the North German Confederation and the south German states unite into a single nation state, known as the German Empire. The King of Prussia is declared the first German Emperor as Wilhelm I of Germany, in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles. The Constitution of the German Confederation comes into effect. It abolishes all restrictions on Jewish marriage, choice of occupation, place of residence, and property ownership, but exclusion from government employment and discrimination in social relations remain in effect.
• January 21 – Battle of Dijon: Giuseppe Garibaldi's group of French and Italian volunteer troops, in support of the French Third Republic, win a battle against the Prussians.
• February 8 – 1871 French legislative election elects the first legislature of the French Third Republic; monarchists favourable to peace with the German Empire gain a large majority. The National Assembly meets in Bordeaux.
• February 9 – The United States Commission on Fish and Fisheries is founded.
• February 21 – The District of Columbia Organic Act of 1871 is signed into law by U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant.
• February 24 – The Danish Women's Society is founded to promote women's rights in Denmark; on December 15 it adopts the style Dansk Kvindesamfund.
• March 3 – The first American civil service reform legislation is signed into law by U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant, creating the United States Civil Service Commission.
• March 16 – Mokrani Revolt breaks out in French Algeria against colonial rule.
• March 18 – Origin of the Paris Commune: Troops of the regular French Army, sent by Adolphe Thiers, Chef du pouvoir executive de la République française, to seize cannons stored on the hill of Montmartre, fraternise with civilians and the National Guard, and two army generals are killed. Regular troops are evacuated to Versailles.
• March 21
• * Otto von Bismarck becomes the first Chancellor of the German Empire.
• * John Campbell, Marquess of Lorne marries Princess Louise, a daughter of Queen Victoria, at Windsor; she is the first legitimate daughter of a British monarch to marry a subject since 1515.
• March 22
• * In North Carolina, William Holden becomes the first governor of a U.S. state to be removed from office by impeachment.
• * The Marseille Commune is established in southern France.
• * The United States Army issues an order for the abandonment of Fort Kearny, Nebraska.
• March 26 – The Paris Commune is formally established in France.
• March 27 – The first Rugby Union International results in a 1–0 win, by Scotland over England.
• March 29
• * The first Surgeon General of the United States is appointed.
• * The Royal Albert Hall in London is opened by Queen Victoria; it incorporates a grand organ by Henry Willis & Sons, the world's largest at this time.

  April–June

• April – The Stockholms Handelsbank is founded.
• April 4 – The New Jersey Detective Agency is chartered, and the New Jersey State Detectives are initiated.
• April 10 – In Brooklyn, New York, P. T. Barnum opens his three-ring circus, hailing it as "The Greatest Show on Earth".
• April 20 – U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant signs the Civil Rights Act of 1871.
• April 24 – Murder of Jane Clouson, a servant girl, in Eltham, England; her probable murderer is acquitted.
• May 4 – The first supposedly Major League Baseball game is played in America.
• May 8 – The first Major League Baseball home run is hit by Ezra Sutton, of the Cleveland Forest Citys.
• May 10 – The Treaty of Frankfurt is signed, confirming the frontiers between Germany and France. The provinces of Alsace and Lorraine are transferred from France to Germany.
• May 11 – The first trial in the Tichborne case begins, in the London Court of Common Pleas.
• May 21
• * French government troops enter Paris to overthrow the Commune, beginning "Bloody Week", leading to the deaths of over 20,000 Parisians and the arrests of over 38,000 more.
• * The first rack railway in Europe, the Vitznau–Rigi Railway on Mount Rigi in Switzerland, is opened.
• May 27 – French government troops massacre 147 Communards from Belleville, at Père-Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.
• May 28 – Paris Commune falls to French government forces.
• June 1 – Bombardment of the Selee River Forts: Koreans attack two United States Navy warships.
• June 10 – United States expedition to Korea: Captain McLane Tilton leads 109 members of the United States Marine Corps in a punitive naval attack on the Han River forts on Ganghwa Island in Korea, resulting in 250 Koreans dying and diplomatic failure to "open up" Korea.
• June 17– The Parsons Sun newspaper in Parsons, Kansas is founded by Milton W. Reynolds and Leslie J. Perry, though the latter left after the first issue was published.
• June 18 – The Universities Tests Act 1871 removes restrictions which have previously limited access to Oxford, Cambridge and Durham universities to members of the Church of England.
• June 27 – The Meiji government officially adopts the yen as Japan's modern unit of currency. Coins which have been made in advance with the date 1870 are released into circulation.
• June 29 – Trade unions are legalized in the United Kingdom by the Trade Union Act 1871.

  July–September

• July 13 – The first cat show is held at the Crystal Palace of London.
• July 20
• * British Columbia joins the confederation of Canada.
• * C. W. Alcock proposes that "a Challenge Cup should be established in connection with the Association", giving birth to the FA Cup for Association football in England.
• July 21–August 26 – The first ever photographs of Yellowstone National Park region are taken by photographer William Henry Jackson, during the Hayden Geological Survey of 1871.
• July 22 – The foundation stone of the first Tay Bridge is laid; the bridge collapses as a train crosses in a storm eight years later.
• July 28 – The Annie becomes the first boat ever launched on Yellowstone Lake, in the Yellowstone National Park region.
• August 7 – Banco de Concepcion, predecessor of Itaú Unibanco, a major financial services provider in South America, is founded in Chile.
• August 9 – One of the few known major hurricanes to strike Hawaii causes significant damage on the islands of Hawaii and Maui.
• August 29 – The abolition of the han system is carried out in Japan.
• August 31 – Adolphe Thiers becomes President of the French Republic.
• September 2 – Whaling disaster of 1871: The Comet, a brig used by whalers, becomes the first of 33 ships to be crushed in the Arctic ice by an early freeze. Remarkably, all 1,219 people on the abandoned ships are rescued without a single loss of life.
• September 3 – New York City residents, tired of the corruption of the Tammany Hall political machine and "Boss" William M. Tweed, its "Grand Sachem", meet to form the 'Committee of Seventy' to reform local politics.
• September 25 – West Chester University is charted as West Chester Normal School

  October–December

• October 5 – The Società degli Spettroscopisti Italiani is established in Rome, the first scientific organisation in the world dedicated to astrophysics.
• October 8
• * The Peshtigo fire begins and destroys the town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin, and kills as many as 2,500 people, becoming the deadliest wildfire in United States history.
• * The Great Chicago Fire breaks out in Chicago, Illinois and burns for 2 days, killing 300 people, destroying 17,500 buildings and leaving 100,000 people homeless.
• * Continental AG is founded as Continental-Caoutchouc und Gutta-Percha Compagnie in Hanover, Germany.
• October 11 – Heinrich Schliemann begins the excavation of Troy in the Ottoman Empire.
• October 12 – The Criminal Tribes Act is enacted by the British Raj in India, naming over 160 communities as "Denotified Tribes", allegedly habitually criminal.
• October 20 – The Royal Regiment of Artillery forms the first regular Canadian army units, when they create two batteries of garrison artillery, which later become the Royal Canadian Artillery.
• October 24 – Chinese massacre of 1871: In Los Angeles' Chinatown, 19 Chinese immigrants are killed by a mob of 500 men.
• October 26 – Liberian President Edward James Roye is deposed in a coup d'état.
• October 27
• * British forces march into the Klipdrift Republic and annex the territory as Griqualand West Colony.
• * Henri, Count of Chambord, refuses to be crowned "King Henry V of France" until France abandons its tricolor, and returns to the old Bourbon flag.
• * Boss Tweed of Tammany Hall is arrested for bribery, ending his grip on New York City.
• c. November – The South Improvement Company is formed in Pennsylvania by John D. Rockefeller and a group of major United States railroad interests, in an early effort to organize and control the American petroleum industry.
• November 5 – Wickenburg Massacre: Six men travelling by stagecoach, in the Arizona Territory, are reportedly murdered by Yavapai people.
• November 7 – The London–Australia telegraph cable is brought ashore at Darwin.
• November 10 – Henry Morton Stanley, Welsh-born correspondent for the New York Herald, locates missing Scottish explorer and missionary Dr. David Livingstone in Ujiji, near Lake Tanganyika, and greets him by saying, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?".
• November 17
• * The National Rifle Association of America is granted a charter by the state of New York.
• * George Biddell Airy presents his discovery that astronomical aberration is independent of the local medium.
• December 10 – German chancellor Otto von Bismarck tries to ban Catholics from the political stage by introducing harsh laws concerning the separation of church and state.
• December 15 – The Deseret Telegraph Company office in Pipe Spring begins service with a message keyed by Ella Stewart. It is the first telegraph sent from Arizona Territory.
• December 19 – The city of Birmingham, Alabama, is incorporated with the merger of three existing towns.
• December 24 – The opera Aida opens in Cairo, Egypt.
• December 25 – Reading F.C. is formed as an Association football club in England.
• December 26 – Thespis, the first of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, premières in London. It does modestly well, but the two composers will not collaborate again for four years.