Millennium: 2nd millennium
Centuries: 18th century – 19th century – 20th century
Decades: 1810s  1820s  1830s  – 1840s –  1850s  1860s  1870s
Years: 1845 1846 1847 – 1848 – 1849 1850 1851
1848 in topic:
Subjects:     Archaeology – Architecture –
Art – Literature (Poetry) – Music – Science
Sports – Rail Transport
Countries:     Australia – Canada – France – Germany – Ireland – Mexico – Netherlands – New Zealand – Norway – South Africa – Spain – UK – USA
Leaders:   State leaders – Colonial governors
Category: Establishments – Disestablishments
Births – Deaths – Works

Year 1848 (MDCCCXLVIII) was a leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Thursday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar).

1848 is historically famous for the wave of revolutions that significantly altered the political and philosophical landscape and had major ramifications throughout the rest of the century.

Events of 1848

January–March

• January 3 – Joseph Jenkins Roberts is sworn in as the first president of the independent African Republic of Liberia.
• January 12 – The Palermo rising erupts in Sicily, against the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
• January 24 – California Gold Rush: James W. Marshall finds gold at Sutter's Mill, in Coloma, California.
• January 31 – The Washington Monument is established.
• January 31 – John C. Fremont court-martialed on grounds of mutiny and disobeying orders.
• February 2 – Mexican–American War: The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed, ending the war and ceding to the United States virtually all of what is today the southwest of that country.
• March 15 – The start of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848.
• March 24 – The First Schleswig War begins.

April–June

• April 10
  • A Chartist 'Monster Rally' is held in Kennington Park London, headed by Feargus O'Connor. A petition demanding the franchise is presented to parliament.
  • A bridge collapses in Great Yarmouth, England, leaving 250 dead.
• May 1 – Phi Gamma Delta is founded.
• May 15 – Radicals invade the French Chamber of deputies.
• May 18 – The first German National Assembly (Nationalversammlung) opens in Frankfurt, Germany.
• May 19 – The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the Mexican-American War, is ratified by the Mexican government. (cf. February 2, above.)
• May 29 – Wisconsin is admitted as the 30th U.S. state.
• June 17 – The Austrian army bombards Prague and crushes a working class revolt.
• June 22 – The French government dissolves the national workshops in Paris, giving the workers the choice of joining the army or going to workshops in the provinces.

July–September

• July 19 – Women's rights – Seneca Falls Convention: The 2-day Women's Rights Convention opens in Seneca Falls, New York and the "Bloomers" are introduced at the feminist convention.
• July 26 – Matale Rebellion against British rule in Sri Lanka.
• July 29 – Irish Potato Famine – Tipperary Revolt: In Tipperary, an unsuccessful nationalist revolt against British rule is put-down by a government police force.
• August 17 – Yucatán officially unites with Mexico.
• August 19 – California Gold Rush: The New York Herald breaks the news to the East Coast of the United States that there is a gold rush in California (although the rush started in January).
• August 28 – Mathieu Luis becomes the first black member to join the French Parliament as a representative of Guadaloupe.
• September 12 – One of the successes of the Revolutions of 1848, the Swiss Federal Constitution, patterned on the US Constitution, enters into force, creating a federal republic and one of the first modern democratic states in Europe.
• September 13 – Vermont railroad worker Phineas Gage incredibly survives a 3-foot-plus iron rod being driven through his head.

October–December

• October 28 – In Catalonia, Spain, the Barcelona–Mataró railroad route (the first to be constructed in all the Iberian Peninsula) is inaugurated.
• November 1 – In Boston, Massachusetts, the first medical school for women, The Boston Female Medical School (which later merges with Boston University School of Medicine), opens.
• November 3 – A greatly revised Dutch constitution is proclaimed.
• November 4 – France ratifies a new constitution. The Second Republic of France is set up, ending the state of temporary government lasting since the Revolution of 1848.
• November 7 – U.S. presidential election, 1848: Whig Zachary Taylor of Louisiana defeats Democrat Lewis Cass of Michigan in the first US presidential election held in every state on the same day.
• December 2 – Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria abdicates in favor of his nephew, Franz Josef I.
• December 10 – Prince Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte is elected first president of the French Second Republic.
• December 18 – Punta Arenas, the first mayor settlement in the Strait of Magellan, is founded.
• December 20 – President Bonaparte takes his Oath of Office in front of the French National Assembly.
• December 20 – Slavery is abolished in Réunion. This day is celebrated every year since 1981.
• December 26 – Phi Delta Theta Fraternity is founded.

Undated

• The Revolutions of 1848, a series of widespread but mostly failed struggles for more liberal governments, break out from Brazil to Hungary.
• A cholera epidemic in New York kills 5,000.
• The Associated Press founded in New York.
• Queen's College for women is founded in London.
• The Boston Public Library is founded by an act of the Great and General Court of Massachusetts.
• The Shaker song Simple Gifts is written by Joseph Brackett in Alfred, Maine.
• The Illinois and Michigan Canal is completed.
• The Independent Republic of Yucatán joins Mexico in exchange for Mexican help in suppressing a revolt by the indigenous Maya population.
• John Bird Sumner becomes archbishop of Canterbury.
• British, Dutch, and German governments lay claim to New Guinea.
• Admiral Nevelskoi explores Strait of Tartary.
• Dunedin, New Zealand is founded by Scots settlers.
• The University of Ottawa is founded.
• The University of Mississippi is founded.
• The University of Wisconsin–Madison is founded.
• Geneva College in Pennsylvania is founded.
• Elizabeth Gaskell publishes Mary Barton anonymously.
• Richard Wagner begins writing the libretto that will become Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung).
• Rhodes College is founded.
• Prince Klemens von Metternich ends his work as Austrian foreign minister.
• Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish the Communist Manifesto.
• The potato crop fails in Ireland.
• Great Britain's first public health law, which creates a national health board and gives cities broad authority to build modern sanitary systems, is passed.

Ongoing events

• Mexican-American War (1846–1848)
• Irish Potato Famine (1845–1849)
• First Schleswig War (1848–1851)

Births

1848 in other calendars Gregorian calendar 1848
MDCCCXLVIII
Ab urbe condita 2601
Armenian calendar 1297
ԹՎ ՌՄՂԷ
Bahá'í calendar 4 – 5
Bengali calendar 1255
Berber calendar 2798
Buddhist calendar 2392
Burmese calendar 1210
Byzantine calendar 7356 – 7357
Chinese calendar 丁未年十一月廿五日
(4484/4544-11-25)