- Jan 1 Dutch East Indies Company dissolves
- Jan 2 Free African American community of Philadelphia petitions US Congress to abolish the slave trade
- Jan 5 1st Swedenborgian temple in US holds 1st service in Baltimore
- Jan 8 Austrians defeat French in Second Battle of Novi
- Jan 8 Wild Boy of Aveyron (approx.12) discovered in southern France after possibly 7 years in the wild, later christened Victor of Aveyron
- Jan 30 US population: 5,308,483; African American population 1,002,037 (18.9%)
- Mar 14 Luigi Chiaramonti crowned Pope Pius VII
- Mar 17 British warship Queen Charlotte catches fire; 700 die
- Mar 20 French army defeats Turks at Helipolis & advance to Cairo
Scientific Discovery
Mar 20 Alessandro Volta reports his discovery of the electric battery in a letter to Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society of London
Alessandro Volta
Joseph Banks
Event of Interest
May 11 French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck give a lecture first outlining his theories of evolution at the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle in Paris, France
Jean-Baptiste Lamarck
- May 14 Friedrich von Schiller's "Macbeth" premieres in Weimar
Assassination Attempt
May 15 King George III survives a second assassination attempt
George III
- May 15 Pope Pius VII calls on French bishops to return to Gospel principles
- Jun 7 David Thompson reaches the mouth of the Saskatchewan River in Manitoba
- Jun 14 Battle of Marengo (Alessandria): Bonaparte vs Austria
- Jun 29 Free mason lodge establishes in Alkmaar
- Jul 8 Dr Benjamin Waterhouse gives 1st cowpox vaccination in the US to his son to prevent smallpox
- Jul 9 Mt Vernon Gardens becomes site of 1st summer theater in US
- Jul 10 The British Indian Government establishes the Fort William College to promote Urdu, Hindi and other vernaculars of sub continent
- Aug 30 Gabriel Prosser leads a slave rebellion in Richmond, Virginia
- Sep 5 Malta surrenders to British after they blockade French troops
- Sep 7 Zion AME Church dedicated (NYC)
- Sep 13 Curacao in British hands (until Jan 1803)
- Oct 1 Spain cedes Louisiana to France in a secret treaty
- Oct 17 Dutch colony Curacao transfererd to Great Britain
Event of Interest
Nov 1 John Adams becomes the first US President to live in the White House
John Adams
Event of Interest
Nov 24 Naturalists Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland depart Caracas for Cuba where they met fellow botanist John Fraser
Alexander von Humboldt