Significant Events
- Jan 25 American naval expedition under Charles Wilkes is first to identify Antarctica as a new continent
- Feb 16 American Charles Wilkes discovers Shackleton Ice Shelf, Antarctica
- May 6 World's first adhesive postage stamp, the "Penny Black", is first used in Great Britain
- Jun 20 Samuel Morse patents his telegraph
- Jul 23 Union Act passed by British Parliament, uniting Upper & Lower Canada
- Dec 15 Napoleon Bonaparte receives a French state funeral in Paris 19 years after his death
Did You Know?
"Penny Black", the world's first adhesive postage stamp issued by Great Britain
On May 1, 1840
World Leaders in 1840
Martin Van Buren
8th US President
William Lamb
British Prime Minister
Famous People in 1840
Charles Dickens
Novelist
Auguste Rodin
Claude Monet
Crazy Horse
John Philip Holland
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Thomas NastFamous Weddings
- Feb 1 Novelist Alexandre Dumas (37) weds actress Ida Ferrier
- Feb 10 British Queen Victoria (20) marries her cousin Albert (20) of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, later the Prince Consort at St James' Palace
- May 1 Women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton (24) weds fellow abolitionist Henry Brewster Stanton (34)
- Sep 6 Publisher James Gordon Bennett (45) weds Henrietta Agnes Crean in NYC, New York
- Sep 12 Composer Robert Schumann marries Clara Wieck
Karl Ferdinand von Graefe