Events of 1852

• January 14 – President Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte proclaims a new constitution for the French Second Republic.

• January 15 – Nine men representing various Hebrew charitable organizations come together to form what will become the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.

• January 17 – The United Kingdom recognizes the independence of the Transvaal.

• February 3 – Battle of Caseros or Battle of Monte Caseros, Argentina: The Argentine provinces of Entre Rios and Corrientes allied with Brazil and members of Colorado Party of Uruguay, defeat Buenos Aires troops under Juan Manuel de Rosas.

• February 11 – The first British public toilet for women opens in Bedford Street, London.

• February 15 – The Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children, London, admits its first patient.

• February 16 – The Studebaker Brothers Wagon Company, precursor of the automobile manufacturer, is established.

• February 19 – The Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity is founded at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania.

• February 25 – The HMS Birkenhead sinks near Cape Town, South Africa. Only 193 of the 643 on board survive after troops stand firm on the deck so as not to flood the lifeboats containing women and children.

• March 1 – Archibald William Montgomerie, 13th Earl of Eglinton is appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

• March 2 – The first American experimental steam fire engine was tested.

• March 20 – Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe is published.

• April 1 – The Second Burmese War begins.

• April 18 – Taiping Rebellion: Taiping forces begin the siege of Guilin.

• May 19 – Taiping Rebellion: The siege of Guilin is lifted.

• June 12 – Taiping Rebellion: Taiping forces enter Hunan.

• July 1 – United States statesman Henry Clay is the first to receive the honor of lying in state in the United States Capitol rotunda.

• July 4 – Frederick Douglas delivers his famous speech "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" in Rochester, New York.

• August 3 – The first Boat Race between Yale and Harvard, the first American intercollegiate athletic event, is held.

• September 24 – French engineer Henri Giffard makes the first airship trip from Paris to Trappes.

• November 2 – U.S. presidential election, 1852: Democrat Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire defeats Whig Winfield Scott of Virginia.

• November 4 – Count Cavour becomes the Piedmontese prime minister.

• November 11 – The new Palace of Westminster opens in Britain.

• November 21/November 22 The New French Empire is confirmed by plebiscite: 7,824,000 for, 253,000 against.

• December 2 – Napoleon III becomes Emperor of the French.

• December 23 – Taiping Rebellion: The Taiping army takes Hanyang and begins the siege of Wuchang.

• December 29 – Taiping Rebellion: The Taiping army takes Hankou.

Undated

• The French replace semaphores with Morse telegraphs.

• Justin Perkins, an American Presbyterian missionary, produces the first translation of the Bible in Assyrian Neo-Aramaic, which is published with the parallel text of the Syriac Peshitta by the American Bible Society.

• The Devil's Island penal colony opens.

• In Hawaii sugar planters bring over the first Chinese laborers on 3 or 5 year contracts, giving them 3 dollars per month plus room and board for working a 12-hour day, 6 days a week.

• Loyola College is chartered in Baltimore, Maryland.

Ongoing events

• Taiping Rebellion (1851–1864)

Births

• January 8 – James Milton Carroll, Baptist pastor, leader, historian, and author (d. 1931)

• January 11 – Konstantin Fehrenbach, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1926)

• February 16 – Charles Taze Russell (Pastor Russell), prominent Protestant reformer and evangelist (d. 1916)

• March 1 – Théophile Delcassé, French statesman (d. 1923)

• April 1 – Edwin Austin Abbey, American painter (d. 1911)

• April 13 – F.W. Woolworth, American merchant and businessman (d. 1919)

• April 22 – Guillaume IV, Grand Duke of Luxembourg (d. 1912)

• May 1 – Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Spanish histologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1934)

• May 31 – Julius Richard Petri, German bacteriologist (d. 1921)

• June 25 – Antoni Gaudi, Spanish modernist architect (d. 1926)

• July 12 – Hipólito Yrigoyen, President of Argentina (d. 1933)

• August 23 – Clímaco Calderón, President of Colombia (d. 1913)

• August 30 – Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff, Dutch chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1911)

• September 12 – Herbert Henry Asquith, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1928)

• September 15 – Edward Bouchet, American physicist (d. 1918)

• September 28 – Henri Moissan, French chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1907)

• September 30 – Charles Villiers Stanford, Irish composer, resident in England (d. 1924)

• October 2 – William Ramsay, Scottish chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1916)

• October 9 – Hermann Emil Fischer, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1919)

• November 1 – Eugene W. Chafin, American politician (d. 1920)

• November 3 – Prince Mutsuhito of Japan, the future Emperor Meiji (d. 1912)

• November 11 – Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf, Austro-Hungarian field marshal (d. 1925)

• November 22 – Paul-Henri-Benjamin d'Estournelles de Constant, French diplomat, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1924)

• November 26 – Yamamoto Gonnohyōe, the 16th and 22nd Prime Minister of Japan, an admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy

• December 15 – Henri Becquerel, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1908)

• December 19 – Albert Abraham Michelson, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1931)

Deaths

• January 1 – John George Children, British chemist, mineralogist and zoologist (b. 1777)

• January 6 – Louis Braille, French teacher of the blind and inventor of braille (b. 1809)

• May 3 – Sara Coleridge, English author and translator (b. 1802)

• March 4 – Nikolai Gogol, Russian writer (b. 1809)

• April 17 – Étienne Maurice Gérard, Marshal of France and Prime Minister of France (b. 1773)

• June 7 – José Joaquín Estudillo, second alcalde of Yerba Buena (b. 1800)

• June 29 – Henry Clay, American statesman (b. 1777)

• July 20 – José Antonio Estudillo, early California settler (b. 1805)

• July 22 – Auguste Marmont, French marshal (b. 1774)

• September 4 – William MacGillivray, Scottish naturalist and ornithologist (b. 1796)

• September 14

• *Augustus Pugin, English architect (b. 1812)

• *Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, British general and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1769)

• September 20 – Philander Chase, American founder of Kenyon College (b. 1775)

• October 13 – John Lloyd Stephens, American traveler, diplomat and Mayanist archaeologist (b. 1805)

• October 24 – Daniel Webster, American statesman (b. 1782)

• October 25 – John C. Clark, American politician (b. 1793)

• October 26 – Vincenzo Gioberti, Italian philosopher (b. 1801)

• November 2 – Pyotr Kotlyarevsky, Russian military hero (b. 1782)

• November 27 – Augusta Ada King (née Byron), Countess of Lovelace, early English computer pioneer (b. 1815)

• November 29 – Nicolae Bălcescu, Wallachian revolutionary (b. 1819)

• November 30 – Junius Brutus Booth, English-born actor (b. 1796)

• December 16 – Andries Hendrik Potgieter, Voortrekker leader (b. 1792)