Historical Events in 1851

Feb 6 Robert Schumann's 3rd Symphony "Rhenisch" premieres in Dusseldorf

Feb 11 Inaugural 1st-class cricket match in Australia; Tasmania v Victoria in Launceston; Tasmania wins by 3 wickets
Feb 12 Edward Hargraves and three other men discover gold at Ophir, New South Wales, beginning Australia's first gold rush [1]
Feb 15 Black abolitionists invade Boston courtroom rescuing a fugitive slave
Feb 26 13th Grand National: Terry Abbott wins aboard Irish stallion Abd-El-Kader at 7/1; first dual winner and first to win back-to-back
Mar 3 Congress authorizes smallest US silver coin (3 cent piece)

Mar 6 Dion Boucicault's play "Love in a Maze" premieres in London

Mar 11 Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Rigoletto" premieres in Venice

Mar 25 Yosemite Valley discovery made public by Major James D. Savage and Captain John Boling after being shown by Indian guides in California
Apr 15 Earl G Andressy sentenced to death in Hungary
Apr 23 Canada issues its 1st postage stamps
May 1 First public flushing toilets the 'Monkey Closets' unveiled by George Jennings as part of The Great Exhibition at Hyde Park, London, costing one penny
May 1 Great Exhibition opens in the Crystal Palace, at Hyde Park, London
May 3 Sixth major fire in San Francisco destroys 1500-2000 buildings
May 6 Dr John Gorrie patents a "refrigeration machine"
May 6 Linus Yale Jr. patents the Yale cylinder lock
May 6 New slave regulations go into effect in Suriname
May 6 San Francisco Chamber of Commerce starts
May 15 King Mongkut [Rama IV or Phra Chomklao Chaoyuhua] crowned in Siam (Thailand)
May 18 Amsterdam-Nieuwediep telegraph connection linked

May 29 Sojourner Truth addresses 1st Black Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio

Jun 2 1st US alcohol prohibition law enacted (Maine)
Jun 3 1st baseball uniforms worn when the NY Knickerbockers wear a uniform of straw hats, white shirts and blue long trousers

Jun 5 Anti-slavery novel "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe first published in serial form in "The National Era"

Jun 9 San Francisco Committee of Vigilance forms (1st time)
Jun 15 Jacob Fussell, Baltimore dairyman, sets up 1st ice-cream factory
Jun 22 Fire destroys part of San Francisco, including City Hall and Jenny Lind Theatre, city's seventh fire in 2 years
Jun 30 Battle of Viervoet: Basotho forces led by Moshoeshoe defeat the British over the British imposed Walden line
Jul 13 John F Loudon discovers tin on East Indian Island of Billiton
Jul 23 Treaty of Traverse des Sioux signed by Sioux Indians and US

Jul 24 The long hated Window Tax is abolished in the United Kingdom

Jul 28 Total solar eclipse captured on a daguerreotype photograph
Jul 29 Annibale de Gasparis discovers asteroid 15 Eunomia
Aug 12 American inventor Isaac Singer patents the sewing machine
Aug 22 100 Guineas Cup is raced around Isle of Wight; US schooner 'America' beats British cutter 'Aurora' by 24 minutes; first competition for the America's Cup yachting trophy
Aug 22 Gold fields discovered in Australia
Sep 15 Saint Joseph's University is founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Sep 18 New York Times starts publishing (2 cents a copy)
Sep 22 City of Des Moines, Iowa incorporated as Fort Des Moines
Oct 1 1st Hawaiian stamps issued
Oct 2 The pasilalinic-sympathetic compass(a contraption built to test the pseudo-scientific hypothesis that snails create a permanent telepathic link when they mate) is demonstrated but proves to be a fake.
Oct 24 William Lassell discovers Ariel & Umbriel, satellites of Uranus
Oct 30 Alfred de Musset's "Bettine" premieres in Paris
Nov 9 Kentucky marshals abduct abolitionist minister Calvin Fairbank from Jeffersonville, Indiana, and take him to Kentucky to stand trial for helping a slave escape.
Nov 11 Alvan Clark patents telescope
Nov 13 1st meeting of anti-revolutionary "Netherlands & Orange"
Nov 13 Telegraph connection between London-Paris linked
Nov 13 The Denny Party lands at Alki Point, the first settlers of what would become Seattle, Washington

Nov 14 "Moby-Dick" by Herman Melville first published by Harper and Brothers in the US

Nov 22 Opera "La Perle Du Brésil" is produced (Paris)
Dec 2 French President Charles Louis Bonaparte in a Coup d'etat overthrows the Second Republic establishing himself as Emperor.
Dec 4 President Louis Napoleon Boaparte's forces crush an attempted coup d'etat in France
Dec 9 1st Young Men's Christian Association in North America set up in Montreal
Dec 22 The first freight train is operated in Roorkee, India.
Dec 24 Fire devastates US Library of Congress in Washington, destroys 35,000 volumes
Dec 29 1st American Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) chapter opened in Boston, Massachusetts