Explore 785 historical events from 1850–1859.
Robert Stevenson was a Scottish civil engineer, and designer and builder of lighthouses. His works include the Bell Rock Lighthouse.
Robert Stevenson, Scottish engineer (born 1772)
Johann August Wilhelm Neander was a German theologian and church historian.
August Neander, German historian and theologian (born 1789)
Sarah Margaret Fuller, sometimes referred to as Margaret Fuller Ossoli, was an American journalist, editor, critic, translator, and women's rights advocate associated with the Amer…
Margaret Fuller, American journalist and critic (born 1810)
Edward Walsh was an Irish poet, the son of a sergeant in the Cork militia, and was born in Derry City, where his father's regiment had been sent for training. His parents were nat…
Edward Walsh, Irish poet (born 1805)
Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. The novel sequence La Comédie humaine, described as a panorama of post-Napoleonic French life, is generally viewed as his mag…
Honoré de Balzac, French novelist and playwright (born 1799)
José Francisco de San Martín y Matorras, nicknamed "the Liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru", was an Argentine general and the primary leader of the southern and central parts o…
José de San Martín, Argentinian general and politician, 1st President of Peru (born 1778)
Nikolaus Lenau was the pen name of Nikolaus Franz Niembsch Edler von Strehlenau, a German-language Austrian poet.
Nikolaus Lenau, Romanian-Austrian poet and author (born 1802)
Louis Philippe I, nicknamed the Citizen King, was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, the penultimate monarch of France, the last French monarch to bear the title "King", and the…
Louis Philippe I of France (born 1773)
José Gervasio Artigas Arnal was a soldier and statesman who is regarded as a national hero in Uruguay and the Father of the Nation.
José Gervasio Artigas, Uruguayan general and politician (born 1764)
David Keith Ballow was the government medical officer in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia and the first doctor to establish a private practice in Brisbane.
David Keith Ballow, Scottish-Australian doctor (born 1804)
Sarah Biffin, also known as Sarah Biffen, Sarah Beffin or by her married name Mrs E. M. Wright, was an English painter born in Somerset.
Sarah Biffen, English painter (born 1784)
The American League of Colored Laborers (ALCL) was a short-lived labor union established in New York City in 1850. It is notable for being the first union created for African Ameri…
The American League of Colored Laborers, one of the first labor unions for African Americans, was established in New Yor
William Cranch Bond was an American astronomer, and the first director of Harvard College Observatory.
William Cranch Bond and John Adams Whipple took a daguerreotype of Vega, the first astrophotograph of a star other…
Zachary Taylor was the 12th president of the United States, serving from 1849 until his death in 1850. Before his presidency, Taylor was a career officer in the United States Army,…
Following Zachary Taylor's death, Millard Fillmore (pictured) became president of the United States, the last member…
The Great Northern Railway (GNR) was a British railway company incorporated in 1846 with the object of building a line from London to York. It quickly saw that seizing control of t…
The first section of the Great Northern Railway, now the southern section of the East Coast Main Line, opened between…
The United States Congress is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a bicameral legislature, including a lower body, the U.S. House of Repres…
The United States Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, decreeing that all escaped slaves be brought back to their…
The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 …
The inaugural National Women's Rights Convention, presided over by American activist Paulina Wright Davis (pictured),…