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 of 1792
January - June
★
January 9 -
Treaty of Jassy ends
Russian war with
Ottoman Empire over
Crimea.
★
February 20 - The
Postal Service Act, establishing the
United States Post Office Department, is signed by President
George Washington.
★
March 16 - King
Gustav III of Sweden shot in the back by
Jacob Johan Anckarström at a midnight
masquerade at the Royal Opera in Stockholm; he lives until March 29, to be 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 - 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 vetos a bill designed to apportion representatives among
U.S. states. This is the first time the presidential veto has been used in the
United States.
★
April 20 -
France declares war against the
Austria.
★
April 21 -
Tiradentes, prime figure in the
Inconfidência Mineira plot, is executed in
Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil.
★
April 24 - First experimental use of the
guillotine 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 -
Buttonwood Agreement is signed, beginnings of
New York Stock Exchange
★
May 21 - Old lava dome collapses in
Kyūshū,
Japan when
Mount Unzen volcano erupts: resulting
avalanche and
tsunami kills about 14,300 people.
★
June 1 -
Kentucky is admitted as the 15th
U.S. state and as one of its first orders of business ratifies all twelve articles of the
Bill of Rights, including
one that is technically still pending for consideration.
★
June 4 - Captain
George Vancouver claims
Puget Sound for
Great Britain.
July - December
★
August 10 -
French Revolution: Storming of the
Tuileries Palace -
Louis XVI of France is arrested and taken into custody.
★
September 2 - During what became known as the
September Massacres of the
French Revolution, rampaging mobs slaughtered three
Roman Catholic Church bishops and more than two hundred
priests.
★
September 11 - Six men steal some of the former French Crown jewels from a warehouse where the revolutionary government used to store them.
★
September 20 -
Battle of Valmy - French revolutionary army defeats Prussians under Duke of Brunswick after 7-hour artillery duel.
★
September 21 - French convention abolishes the monarchy and establishes the
First Republic.
★
September 22 - Beginning of the
Era of the historical
French Republican Calendar.
★
October 12 - First celebration of
Columbus Day in the
USA held in
New York; 300 years after.
★
October 13 - Foundation of
Washington, DC. The cornerstone of the
United States Executive Mansion, known as the
White House since
1818, is laid.
★
October 29 -
Mount Hood (
Oregon) is named after the British naval officer
Samuel Hood by Lt. William E. Broughton, who spotted the mountain near the mouth of the
Willamette River.
★
December 3 -
George Washington is re-elected
President of the United States.
★
December 26 - Trial of
Louis XVI of France begins.
Undated
★
Baptist Missionary Society is founded in
Kettering,
England.
★
Dominique-Jean Larrey, chief surgeon of the Grand Armee of France, created the first ambulance wagons specifically designed as ambulances.
★
Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor, last emperor, takes office.
★
Russia invades
Poland:
War in defence of the constitution.
★ King
John VI takes over from his insane mother in
Portugal.
★
Tipu Sultan invades
Kerala in
India, but is repulsed.
★
George Vancouver explores
Puget Sound, becomes first European to see
Mount Rainier.
★
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 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.
★
State Street Corporation is founded.
★ Shiloh Meeting House, predecessor of Shiloh United Methodist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia is founded.
Ongoing events
★
French Revolution (
1789-
1799).
★
French Revolutionary Wars (1792-
1802).
Births
★
January 12 -
Johann Arfvedson, Swedish chemist (d.
1841)
★
February 10 - Captain
Frederick Marryat, British author (d.
1848)
★
February 13-
John Williams, American scholar (d.
1846)
★
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 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 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)
: ''See also .''
Deaths
★
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.
1841)
★
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 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)
: ''See also .''