1819 in France
Events from the year 1819 in France.
Incumbents
Events
- 6 April-21 June - French slave ship Le Rodeur sails from Bonny in West Africa to Guadeloupe in the West Indies; in the course of the transatlantic voyage all onboard become blind, and slaves are thrown overboard as a consequence.
- May: enactment of the Serre laws, which governed press freedom for much of the nineteenth century
- 12 May – Trial begins in Paris of Marie André Cantillon and Joseph Stanislas Marinet accused of involvement in the plot to assassinate the Duke of Wellington the previous February. Both men are ultimately acquitted.
- 25 August – An Exposition promoting French industry opens at the Louvre, attracting over a hundred thousand visitors over the next month.
Arts and literature
- Théodore Géricault's painting The Raft of the Medusa is first exhibited at Salon of 1819 in Paris.
Births
January to June
- 10 January - Pierre Édouard Frère, painter
- 31 January - Jean-Augustin Barral, agronomist
- 7 February - Augustin Marie Morvan, physician, politician and writer
- 15 February - Louis Figuier, scientist and writer
- 1 March - François-Marie-Benjamin Richard, Archbishop of Paris
- 6 March - Émile Blanchard, zoologist and entomologist
- 4 April - Louis Gustave Vapereau, writer and lexicographer
- 19 April - Marie Firmin Bocourt, zoologist and artist
- 29 May - Louis, duc de Decazes, statesman
- 10 June - Gustave Courbet, painter
- 28 June - Henri Harpignies, painter
July to September
- 2 July - Charles-Louis Hanon, piano pedagogue and composer
- 3 July - Théodore Gouvy, composer
- 22 July - Ernest Cosson, botanist
- 14 August - Agenor, duc de Gramont, diplomat and statesman
- 26 August - Louis Adolphe Cochery, politician and journalist
- 15 September - Jules Etienne Pasdeloup, conductor
- 17 September - Jeanne Sylvanie Arnould-Plessy, actress
- 18 September - Léon Foucault, physicist
- 20 September - Théodore Chassériau, painter
- 21 September - Princess Louise Marie Thérèse of France, Petite-Fille de France
- 23 September - Hippolyte Fizeau, physicist
- 28 September - Aimé Millet, sculptor
October to December
- 19 October - Ardant du Picq, Colonel and military theorist
- 19 November
- *Émile Deschanel, author and politician
- *Auguste Vacquerie, journalist and man of letters
- 22 December - Pierre Ossian Bonnet, mathematician
Full date unknown
- Nicolas Édouard Delabarre-Duparcq, military critic and historian
- Jules Eugène Lenepveu, painter
Deaths
January to June
- 10 January - Claude de Beauharnais, politician
- 12 January - André Morellet, economist and writer
- 25 January - Théodore-Pierre Bertin, writer, introduced modern shorthand to France
- 26 January - Médéric Louis Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry, historian and lawyer
- 16 February - Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes, painter
- 17 February - Philippe Louis de Noailles, politician
- 11 March - Michel-Louis-Étienne Regnaud de Saint-Jean d'Angély, politician
- 18 April - Georges Antoine Chabot, jurist and statesman
- 29 May - Jean Jacques Étienne Lucas, Navy officer and hero of the Battle of Trafalgar
- 3 June - Jacques Nicolas Billaud-Varenne, Revolutionary figure
July to December
- 6 July - Sophie Blanchard, balloonist, first woman killed in an aviation accident
- 18 July - Barthélemy Faujas de Saint-Fond, geologist and traveller
- 1 August - Pierre-Adrien Pâris, architect, painter and designer
- 29 October - François Guillaume Ducray-Duminil, novelist
- 24 December - Jean-Mathieu-Philibert Sérurier, Marshal of France
Full date unknown
- Charles-Honoré Lannuier, cabinetmaker in America