Historical Events
- Feb 1 Oldest continuous writer of insurance in America - The Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York (MONY) opens
- May 22 1st wagon train with 700 - 1000 migrants, departs Independence, Missouri for Oregon
- Jul 19 The steamship SS Great Britain is launched, designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, is the first ocean-going craft with an iron hull or screw propeller and the largest vessel afloat in the world
- More Historical Events
1843 in Music
- Jan 2 Richard Wagner's opera "The Flying Dutchman" premieres in Dresden
Did You Know?
"A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens is published, 6,000 copies sold
On December 19, 1843
Famous People in 1843
World Leaders in 1843
Would You Believe?
An alligator falls from sky during a thunderstorm in Charleston, South Carolina
On July 2, 1843
Famous Weddings
- Feb 6 Frontiersman Kit Carson (33) weds Josefa Jaramillo (14) at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church
- Apr 23 Samuel Gridley Howe, American physician and educator, marries Julia Ward, American poet and author
- Jun 19 Philosopher Karl Marx (25) weds Jenny von Westphalen in Germany
More Weddings & Divorces
Articles and Photos
The General, The Schoolgirl, And The Famous One-Word Despatch
A magazine hailed General Charles Napier’s battlefield despatch as the finest since Roman times, but it was in fact the work of a clever schoolgirl.February 17The Day an Alligator Fell from the Sky
Newspaper cutting fom the Times-Picayune on the day an alligator fell from the skyJuly 2SS Great Britain
A painting of the launch of SS Great Britain, by Joseph WalterJuly 19