1792 Explained

Year 1792 (MDCCXCII) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a leap year starting on Thursday of the 11-day slower Julian calendar).

Events

January–March

January 9 - The Treaty of Jassy ends Russia's war with the Ottoman Empire over Crimea.
February 20 - The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by President George Washington.

March 1 - Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor, the last emperor, takes office.
March 16 - King Gustav III of Sweden is shot in the back by Jacob Johan Anckarström at a midnight masquerade at the Royal Opera in Stockholm; he lives until March 29, and is succeeded by Gustav IV Adolf.
March 20 - A new capital of North Carolina and county seat of the newly formed Wake County is established after North Carolina State Senator and surveyor William Christmas submits his design for the city. A few months later the capital is officially named Raleigh in honor of Sir Walter Raleigh.

April-June

April - France goes to war against Austria and Prussia.
April 2 - The Coinage Act is passed establishing the United States Mint.
April 5 - United States President George Washington vetoes a bill designed to apportion representatives among U.S. states. This is the first time the presidential veto is used in the United States.
April 20 - France declares war against Austria.
April 21 - Tiradentes, prime figure in the Inconfidência Mineira plot, is executed in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
April 24 - The guillotine is first used experimentally in France.
April 25
- Highwayman Nicolas J. Pelletier becomes the first person executed by guillotine.
- La Marseillaise, the French national anthem, is composed by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle.
May 11 - Captain Robert Gray becomes the first white man to enter the Columbia River.
May 17 - The Buttonwood Agreement is signed, beginning the New York Stock Exchange.
May 18 - War in defence of the constitution: Russia invades Poland.
May 21 - An old lava dome collapses in Kyūshū, Japan when Mount Unzen volcano erupts; the resulting avalanche and tsunami kills about 14,300 people.
June 1 - Kentucky becomes the 15th state of The United States of America
June 4 - Captain George Vancouver claims Puget Sound for Great Britain.
June 13 - Vancouver becomes the first European to enter Burrard Inlet.

July–September

August 10 - French Revolution: The Tuileries Palace is stormed, and Louis XVI of France is arrested and taken into custody.
September - George Macartney, 1st Earl Macartney sails from Portsmouth to China.
September 2 - During what becomes known as the September Massacres of the French Revolution, rampaging mobs slaughter 3 Roman Catholic Church bishops and more than 200 priests.
September 11 - Six men steal some of the former French Crown jewels from a warehouse where the revolutionary government had stored them.
September 20 - Battle of Valmy: French revolutionary army defeats Prussians under the Duke of Brunswick after 7-hour artillery duel.
September 21 - The French Convention abolishes the monarchy and establishes the First Republic.
September 22 - The Era of the historical French Republican Calendar begins.

October–December

October 12 - The first Columbus Day celebration in the USA is held in New York, 300 years after his arrival in the New World.
October 13 - Foundation of Washington, DC: The cornerstone of the United States Executive Mansion, known as the White House after 1818, is laid.
October 29 - Mount Hood (Oregon) is named after the British naval officer Samuel Hood by Lt. William E. Broughton, who spots the mountain near the mouth of the Willamette River.
December 3 - George Washington is re-elected President of the United States.
December 26 - The trial of Louis XVI of France begins.

Undated

The Baptist Missionary Society is founded in Kettering, England.
Dominique-Jean Larrey, chief surgeon of the Grand Armee of France, creates the first ambulance wagons specifically designed as ambulances.
Tipu Sultan invades Kerala in India, but is repulsed.
Franz Xaver, Baron Von Zach, an astronomer, publishes The Tables of the Sun, an essential early work for navigation.
Claude Chappe successfully demonstrates the first semaphore line, between Paris and Lille.
William Murdoch begins experimenting with gas lighting.
George Anschutz constructs the first blast furnace in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Thomas Holcroft produces the play Road to Ruin in London.
Barthelemy Catherine Joubert, later general, becomes sub-lieutenant.
Johann Georg Albrechtberger becomes Kapellmeister in Vienna.
The State Street Corporation is founded.
Shiloh Meeting House, predecessor of Shiloh United Methodist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, is founded.
Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman is published.

The first written examinations in Europe are held at Cambridge University, England.

Ongoing events

Births

January-June

January 12 - Johann Arfvedson, Swedish chemist (d. 1841)
February 10 - Captain Frederick Marryat, British author (d. 1848)
February 17 - Karl Ernst von Baer, German naturalist (d. 1876)
February 29 - Gioacchino Rossini, Italian composer (d. 1868)
March 3 - Johann Karl Ludwig Gieseler, German church historian (d. 1854)
March 4 - Samuel Slocum, American inventor (d. 1861)
March 7 - John Herschel, English mathematician and astronomer (d. 1871)
April 1 - Karl Gottlob Zumpt, German scholar (d. 1894)
April 23 - John Thomas Romney Robinson, Irish astronomer and physicist (d. 1882)
April 25 - John Keble, British poet (d. 1866)
May 13 - Pope Pius IX (d. 1878)
May 15 - James Mayer Rothschild, German-born banker (d. 1868)
May 17 - Anne Isabella Milbanke, English wife of George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron
May 18 - Margaret Ann Neve, supercentenarian (d. 1903)
May 21 - Gaspard-Gustave Coriolis, French engineer and scientist (d. 1843)
June 15 - John Pascoe Fawkner, pioneer and newspaper publisher in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (d. 1869)
June 16 - John Linnell, British painter (d. 1882)

July-December

July 7 - William Henry Smith, British businessman (d. 1865)
July 10 - George M. Dallas, U.S. Senator and Vice President of the United States (d. 1864)
June 21 - Ferdinand Christian Baur, German theologian (d. 1860)
August 4 - Percy Bysshe Shelley, British poet (d. 1822)
August 13 - Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, queen of William IV of the United Kingdom (d. 1849)
August 18 - John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1878)
September 19 - William Backhouse Astor, Sr., American business tycoon (d. 1875)
September 26 - William Hobson, first Governor of New Zealand (d. 1842)
October 29 - Thomas Livingstone Mitchell, Explorer and Surveyor-General of New South Wales, Australia (d. 1855)
November 11 - Mary Anne Evans, wife of Benjamin Disraeli (d. 1872)
November 28 - Victor Cousin, French philosopher (d. 1867)
December 1 - Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky, Russian mathematician (d. 1856)
December 6 - William II of the Netherlands (d. 1849)
date unknown - Matteo Carcassi, Italian musician and composer (d. 1853)

Deaths

January-June

February 15- John Witherspoon
February 23 - Sir Joshua Reynolds, British painter (b. 1723)
March 1 - Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1747)
March 3 - Robert Adam, British architect (b. 1728)
March 10 - John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1713)
March 29 - King Gustav III of Sweden (assassinated) (b. 1746)
April 3
- George Pocock, British admiral (b. 1706)
- John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, English statesman (b. 1718)
April 4 - James Sykes, American politician (b. 1725)
April 14 - Maximilian Hell, Slovakian astronomer (b. 1720)
April 23 - Karl Friedrich Bahrdt, German theologian and adventurer (b. 1741)
April 30 - John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, English statesman (b. 1718)
May 10 - John Stevens, American delegate to the Continental Congress
May 12 - Charles Simon Favart, French dramatist (b. 1710)
May 24 - George Brydges Rodney, 1st Baron Rodney, British naval officer (b. 1718)
June 4 - John Burgoyne, British general (b. 1723)

July-December

July 3 - Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick (b. 1721)
July 18 - John Paul Jones, American naval captain (b. 1747)
July 29 - René Nicolas Charles Augustin de Maupeou, Chancellor of France (b. 1714)
August 5 - Frederick North, Lord North, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1732)
August 25 - Jacques Cazotte, French writer (b. 1719)
September 3 - Princesse de Lamballe, French friend of Marie Antoinette (murdered)
September 8 - Charles d'Abancourt, French statesman (b. 1758)
September 18 - August Gottlieb Spangenberg, German religious leader (b. 1704)
September 25 - Adam Gottlob Moltke, Danish statesman (b. 1710)
October 7 - George Mason, American patriot (b. 1725)
October 22 - Guillaume Le Gentil, French astronomer (b. 1725)
October 28
- Paul Möhring, German physician and scientist (b. 1710)
- John Smeaton, English civil engineer (b. 1724)
December 15 - Joseph Martin Kraus, Swedish composer (b. 1756)
date unknown - Muhammad ibn Abd-al-Wahhab, Arabic preacher (b. 1703)