1831 Wikipedia Summary

Events

January–March

• January 1 – William Lloyd Garrison begins publishing The Liberator, an anti-slavery newspaper, in Boston, Massachusetts.
• January 10 – Japanese department store, Takashimaya in Kyoto established.
• February–March – Revolts in Modena, Parma and the Papal States are put down by Austrian troops.
• February 2 – Pope Gregory XVI succeeds Pope Pius VIII, as the 254th pope.
• February 5 – Dutch naval lieutenant Jan van Speyk blows up his own gunboat in Antwerp rather than strike his colours on the demand of supporters of the Belgian Revolution.
• February 7 – The Belgian Constitution of 1831 is approved by the National Congress.
• February 8 – Aimé Bonpland leaves Paraguay.
• February 14 – Battle of Debre Abbay: Ras Marye of Yejju marches into Tigray, and defeats and kills the warlord Sabagadis.
• February 20 – Battle of Olszynka Grochowska (Grochów): Polish rebel forces divide a Russian army.
• March 10 – The French Foreign Legion is founded.
• March 16 – Victor Hugo‘s historical romantic Gothic novel Notre-Dame de Paris, known in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, is published in Paris.
• March 29 – The Bosnian uprising (1831–32) against the Ottoman Empire begins.

April–June

• April 7 – Pedro I abdicates as Emperor of Brazil in favor of his 5-year-old son Pedro II, who will reign for almost 59 years.
• April 18
  • The University of Alabama is founded.
  • The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper is first published, as the Sydney Herald.
• April 27
  • Charles Albert becomes king of Sardinia after the death of King Charles Felix.
  • Ending of the First Anglo-Ashanti War (1823–1831).
• May 26 – Battle of Ostrołęka: The Poles fight another indecisive battle.
• May 31 – Auxiliary paddle steamer Sophia Jane arrives at Sydney from London, becoming the first steamboat to operate in the coastal waters of New South Wales.
• May–June – Merthyr Rising: Coal miners and others riot in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, for improved working conditions.
• June 1 – British Royal Navy officer James Clark Ross locates the position of the North Magnetic Pole, on the Boothia Peninsula.
• June 21 – The North Carolina State House and Canova‘s George Washington are destroyed by fire in Raleigh, North Carolina.

July–September

• July 13 – Russian imperial officials in Wallachia adopt Regulamentul Organic, introducing a period of unprecedented reforms that provide for Westernization of this region of Romania.
• July 15 – The volcanic Graham Island briefly emerges in the Mediterranean.
• July 21 – Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha is inaugurated as the first King of the Belgians, in Brussels.
• August 2 – The Dutch Ten Days’ Campaign against Belgium is halted by a French army.
• August 7 – American Baptist minister William Miller preaches his first sermon on the Second Advent of Christ in Dresden, New York, launching the Advent Movement in the United States.
• August 21 – Nat Turner’s slave rebellion in the United States breaks out in Southampton County, Virginia.
• August 29 – Michael Faraday demonstrates electromagnetic induction.
• September 6–8 – Battle of Warsaw: The Russians take the Polish capital and crush resistance.
• September 8 – Coronation of King William IV of the United Kingdom (he will reign until 1837).
• September 22 – The House of Commons of the United Kingdom passes the Great Reform Bill to expand the franchise, but this is later defeated in the House of Lords.
• September 26–28: The first national presidential nominating convention is held in the United States, by the Anti-Masonic Party, in Baltimore, Maryland.

October–December

• October 9 – Ioannis Kapodistrias, Greek head of state and founder of Greek independence, is assassinated in Nafplion.
• October 29 – The 1831 Bristol riots (“Queen Square riots”) in Bristol (England) begin, in connection with the Great Reform Bill controversy. Quelled by the authorities and the military on October 31, 100 city centre properties are destroyed, at least 120 are estimated to have been killed, 31 of the rioters will be sentenced to death and a colonel facing court-martial for failure to control the riot commits suicide.
• October 30 – In Southampton County, Virginia, escaped slave Nat Turner is captured and arrested for leading the bloodiest slave rebellion in United States history.
• November 7 – Slave trading is forbidden in Brazil.
• November 17 – Ecuador and Venezuela are separated from Gran Colombia.
• November 22 – First Canut Revolt: After a bloody battle with the military causing 600 casualties, rebellious silk workers seize Lyon, France.
• December 26 – Global financial services business Assicurazioni Generali is founded in Trieste (at this time in the Austrian Empire) as Imperial Regia Privilegiata Compagnia di Assicurazioni Generali Austro-Italiche.
• December 27
  • The Baptist War (Christmas Rebellion) begins in Jamaica, with the setting afire of the Kensington House in St James Parish, inspiring thousands of black slaves to revolt against their British masters. At its peak, more than 20,000 people will be involved, and more than 500 killed.
  • Charles Darwin embarks from Plymouth on his historic voyage aboard HMS Beagle.
• December 31 – Gramercy Park is deeded to New York City.

Date unknown

• Egyptian–Ottoman War (1831–1833): Muhammad Ali of Egypt‘s French-trained forces occupy Syria.
• Rifa’a al-Tahtawi returns from study in Paris to Egypt.
• Founding of:
  • Denison University in Granville, Ohio
  • Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut
  • New York University in New York City
  • Xavier University in Cincinnati (as “The Athenaeum”)
  • Wallinska skolan, the first secondary school for girls in the Swedish capital of Stockholm.