1888 in France

Events from the year 1888 in France.

Incumbents

Events

21 February – Vincent van Gogh moves to Arles where he will be very productive as a painter.
16 March – France annexes the Polynesian kingdom of Raiatea and Taha'a.
18 March – France annexes the Polynesian kingdom of Bora Bora.
8 April – The town of Mende, Lozère, becomes the first French administrative centre to have electric light installed.
July–August – Strike of laborers in Paris.
8 July – Inauguration of Fontinettes boat lift on the Canal de Neufossé.
12 July – Georges Ernest Boulanger and his supporters win seats in the Chamber of Deputies.
2 October – Census of foreign residents.
14 October – Louis Le Prince films the first motion picture, Roundhay Garden Scene, in Roundhay, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.
23 December – Having quarrelled with Gauguin, van Gogh cuts off the lower part of his own left ear, taking it to a brothel, and is removed to the hospital in Arles.
Jeweller and glass designer René Lalique establishes the Lalique luxury goods business in Paris.

Literature

Music

Births

January to March

8 January – Pierre Wertheimer, businessman and racehorse owner
9 January – Alfred Plé, rower and Olympic medallist
20 January – Georges Marrane, politician
4 February – Georges Girard, bacteriologist
20 February – Georges Bernanos, author
1 February – Henri Pequet, pilot, flier of first official airmail flight in 1911
28 February – Eugène Bigot, composer and conductor
7 March – Claude Roger-Marx, writer
17 March – Henri Gance, weightlifter and Olympic gold medallist
22 March – René Massigli, diplomat
28 March – Léon Noël, diplomat, politician and historian

April to June

1 April – Lucien Callamand, actor
2 April – Roger Ducret, fencer and Olympic gold medallist
14 May – Lucien Berland, entomologist and arachnologist
15 May – Jean Wahl, philosopher
27 May – Louis Durey, composer
5 June – Armand Annet, colonial governor

July to December

14 July – Jacques de Lacretelle, novelist
26 July – Marcel Jouhandeau, writer
31 July
* Léonce Crenier, Roman Catholic monk and theologian
* Jean Moreau, politician
8 August – César Vezzani, opera singer
12 September – Maurice Chevalier, actor and singer
16 September – Lucien Lamoureux, politician and Minister
24 September – Georges Jean Marie Darrieus, aeronautical engineer
30 September – Louis Lecoin, militant pacifist
6 October – Roland Garros, aviator and World War I fighter pilot
28 October – Stéphane Boudin, interior designer
9 November – Jean Monnet, architect of European Unity
23 November – Louis Antoine, mathematician
3 December – François Dupré, hotelier, art collector and horse breeder
16 December – Alphonse Juin, Marshal of France
26 December – Marius Canard, orientalist

Full date unknown

Georges Bénézé, philosopher
Camille Le Mercier d'Erm, poet, historian and Breton nationalist

Deaths

18 January – Auguste Nicolas, Roman Catholic apologetical writer
23 January – Eugène Marin Labiche, dramatist
13 February – Jean-Baptiste Lamy, first Archbishop of Santa Fe
20 February – François Perrier, general and geodesist
22 February – Jean-Delphin Alard, violinist
15 March – Léonard Morel-Ladeuil, goldsmith and sculptor
16 March – Hippolyte Carnot, statesman
29 March – Charles-Valentin Alkan, composer and pianist
1 April – Jules Émile Planchon, botanist
11 April – Louis-Frédéric Brugère, professor of apologetics and church history
14 July – Antoine Étex, sculptor, painter and architect
9 August – Charles Cros, poet and inventor
16 November – Arsène Darmesteter, philologist

Full date unknown

Pierre Bossan, architect
Émile Sagot, illustrator and lithographer