On This Day

February 1873 in History

Events in History

  • Feb 11 Spanish Cortes fires king Amadeus I
  • Feb 12 US Congress passes the Coinage Act of 1873, abolishing bimetallism and placing the country on the gold standard
  • Feb 20 University of California gets its first Medical School (UC/San Francisco)
  • Feb 20 British Naval Officer John Moresby discovers the site of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea and claims it for Britain
  • Feb 27 Dutch socialist Samuel van Wooden demands law against child labor

Birthdays in History

  • Feb 1 Joseph Allard, Canadian fiddler (d. 1947)
  • Feb 1 John Barry, Irish recipient of the Victoria Cross (d. 1901)
  • Feb 2 Freiherr Konstantin von Neurath, German secretary of State (1932-38)
  • Feb 2 Johan P earl van Limburg Stirum, Dutch diplomat
  • Feb 3 Ernest B Allo, French theologist
  • Feb 11 Feodor Chaliapine, Russian author/novelist (Pages from My Life)
  • Feb 15 Hans von Euler-Chelpin, German-born Swedish biochemist who investigated the fermentation of sugar and enzymes (Nobel 1929), born in Augsburg, Kingdom of Bavaria (d. 1964)
  • Feb 22 Muhammad Iqbal, Dutch East Indies lawyer/poet/philosopher
  • Feb 23 Liang Qichao, Chinese scholar (d. 1929)
  • Feb 26 Ewoud van Everdingen, Dutch meteorologist

Deaths in History

  • Feb 1 Matthew Maury, American oceanographer, dies at 67
  • Feb 2 Edward Johnson, American Major General (Confederate Army), dies at 56
  • Feb 7 Sheridan Le Fanu, Irish writer (The House by the Churchyard), dies at 58
  • Feb 13 Petrus Abraham Samuel van Limburg Brouwer, Dutch politician and critic (Akbar), dies at 43
  • Feb 19 Vasil Levski, Bulgarian revolutionary, dies at 35