1899 in France

Events from the year 1899 in France.

Incumbents

Events

21 January – Actress Sarah Bernhardt, having taken over management of the Paris theatre which she renames the Théâtre Sarah-Bernhardt, opens in the title rôle of Victorien Sardou's La Tosca. On 20 May she premières a French adaptation of Shakespeare's Hamlet with herself in the title rôle, one of the first successful female actresses to tackle a male part.
18 February – Emile Loubet is elected president following the death of Felix Faure.
23 February – Paul Déroulède and Jules Guérin of the right-wing Ligue des Patriotes attempt to persuade General Georges-Gabriel de Pellieux to lead a coup d'état during the funeral of Félix Faure in order to overthrow President Loubet. General Pellieux refuses to participate. Later in the year, Déroulède and Guérin are indicted for conspiracy against the government and banished from France.
28 March – Alfred Martineau becomes the new French colonial governor of French Somaliland, the modern-day Republic of Djibouti.
16 April – Battle of Lougou, French victory in Niger.
4 June – Émile Loubet is assaulted at the Longchamp Racecourse while watching the annual Grand Steeplechase.
10 June – Composer Ernest Chausson dies when his bicycle crashes into a brick wall as he is riding down a hill. The death is ruled to be an accident, although later biographers speculate that Chausson committed suicide.
12 June – France's Prime Minister Charles Dupuy and his cabinet announce their resignations after losing a vote of confidence in the Chamber of Deputies.
20 June – Right-wing nationalist movement Action Française formed by Maurice Pujo and Henri Vaugeois.
22 June – Pierre Waldeck-Rousseau forms a new government to become Prime Minister of France.
17 July – The French Bretonnet-Braun mission is destroyed in the Battle of Togbao, in Chad, by the warlord Rabih az-Zubayr.
25 July – France's Minister of War levies out punishments against officers who participated in the Dreyfus affair, dismissing General Georges-Gabriel de Pellieux as Military Governor of Paris, and removing General Oscar de Négrier from the War Council.
14 August – Attorney Fernand Labori is wounded in an assassination attempt while serving as the defense lawyer for in the retrial of Captain Alfred Dreyfus.
24 August – Minister of Commerce, Alexandre Millerand, decrees a change in regulations to extend the right to workers' compensation to cover all profit-making establishments.
19 September – Alfred Dreyfus is pardoned.
28 October – Battle of Kouno, indecisive battle between French forces and a Muslim army led by Rabih az-Zubayr in Chad.
Automobile manufacturer Renault established by Louis Renault and his brothers Marcel and Fernand.
Henri Matisse paints Still Life with Compote, Apples and Oranges.
Camille Pissarro takes an apartment overlooking the Tuileries Garden in Paris and produces a series of paintings of the view.

Literature

Music

Claude Debussy - Chansons de Bilitis
Gabriel Fauré - Nocturne No. 7
Jules Massenet - Cendrillon
Maurice Ravel - Pavane pour une infante défunte
Camille Saint-Saëns
* 6 Études, Op. 111
* String Quartet No. 1, Op. 112

Sport

31 August – The Olympique de Marseille association football club is founded.
21 September – Henri François Béconnais sets the 1 km speed record in a Soncin automobile at Achères.

Births

January to March

6 January – Alphonse Castex, rugby union player
7 January – Francis Poulenc, composer
12 January – Pierre Bernac, baritone
15 January – Louis Guilloux, writer
20 January – Pierre Gandon, illustrator and engraver of postage stamps
23 January – Pierre Grany, athlete
7 February – René Crabos, rugby union player
15 February – Georges Auric, composer
21 February – Yvonne Vallée, actress
25 February – Bernadette Cattanéo, trade unionist, communist activist, newspaper editor
9 March – Jules Dewaquez, soccer player
25 March – Jacques Audiberti, playwright, poet and novelist
28 March – Bernard Delaire, last French naval veteran of the First World War

April to June

7 April – Robert Casadesus, pianist
11 April – Clément Dupont, rugby union player
8 May – Jacques Heim, fashion designer
14 May
* Pierre Victor Auger, physicist
* Pierre Petiteau, rugby union player
15 May – Jean-Étienne Valluy, general
17 May – Anita Conti, explorer, photographer and first French female oceanographer
24 May – Suzanne Lenglen, tennis player
20 June – Jean Moulin, prefect and Resistance leader

July to September

5 July
* Marcel Achard, playwright, screenwriter and author
*Marcel Arland, novelist, literary critic and journalist
7 July – Jean-Albert Grégoire, car pioneer
14 July – Marie-Hélène Cardot, French resistance leader and politician
19 July – Germaine Sablon, singer and actress
26 July – Édouard Bader, rugby union player
9 August – Armand Salacrou, dramatist
14 August – Adolphe Bousquet, rugby union player
28 August – Charles Boyer, actor
9 September – Brassaï, photographer, sculptor and filmmaker
14 September – Youenn Drezen, Breton nationalist writer and activist

October to December

1 October – Joseph Guillemot, athlete and Olympic gold medallist
5 October – Georges Bidault politician and resistance leader
8 October – Edmond Michelet, politician
24 October – Philippe Kieffer, Naval officer
30 October – Georges Capdeville, soccer referee
8 December
* Fernand Arnout, weightlifter and Olympic medallist
* François Borde, rugby union player
9 December – Jean de Brunhoff, writer and illustrator

Full date unknown

Marcel Fétique, bowmaker
Henri-Robert Petit, journalist, Collaborationist under the Vichy regime and far-right activist

Deaths

16 February – Félix Faure, President of France
16 May – Francisque Sarcey, journalist and drama critic
10 June – Ernest Chausson, composer
5 July – Hippolyte Lucas, entomologist
11 July – Charles Joseph Marty-Laveaux, literary scholar
14 July – Jean-François Klobb, colonial officer
20 July – Charlotte de Rothschild, socialite and painter
25 September – Francisque Bouillier, philosopher
28 November – Virginia Oldoini, Mistress of Napoleon III and significant figure in the early history of photography.

Full date unknown

Henri Delaborde, art critic and painter