Events of 1868

Jan. 3: Meiji Emperor.

January–March

• January 3 – Meiji Emperor declares the "Meiji Restoration", his own restoration to full power, against the supporters of the Tokugawa Shogunate.

• January 5 – War of the Triple Alliance: Brazilian Army commander Luís Alves de Lima e Silva enters Asunción, Paraguay's capital. Some days later he declares the war is over. Nevertheless, Francisco Solano López, Paraguay's president, prepares guerrillas to fight in the countryside.

• January 6 – Asa Mercer and a number of new "Mercer Girls" sail from Massachusetts for the West Coast, arriving in Seattle on May 23.

• January 10 – Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu declares the emperor's declaration "illegal" and attacks Kyoto. Pro-Emperor forces drive his troops away. The Shogun surrenders in May.

• February 13 – The War Office sanctions the formation of what becomes the Army Post Office Corps.

• February 16 – In New York City the Jolly Corks organization is renamed the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks (BPOE).

• February 24 – The first parade to have floats occurs at Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Louisiana.

• February 24 – After Andrew Johnson tries to dismiss United States Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, he becomes the first President of the United States to be impeached by the United States House of Representatives. Johnson is later acquitted by the United States Senate.

• March 1 – The Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity is founded at the University of Virginia.

• March 5 – A court of impeachment is organized in the United States Senate to hear charges against President Andrew Johnson.

• March 23 – The University of California is founded in Oakland, California when the Organic Act is signed into California law.

• March 24 – The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company is formed.

• March 27 – The Lake Ontario Shore Railroad Company is organized in Oswego, New York.

April–June

• April 1 – The Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute is established in Hampton, Virginia.

• April 9 – Emperor Tewodros II of Ethiopia massacres at least 197, perhaps more, of his own people at Magdala. These were prisoners who had been, for the most part, incarcerated for very trivial offenses, and were killed for asking for bread and water.

• April 10 – Battle of Magdala: A British-Indian task force inflicts 700 deaths and a crushing defeat on the army of Emperor Tewodros II of Ethiopia; the British and Indians suffer 30 wounded, 2 of whom die subsequently.

• April 13 – The Napier Expedition ends with the suicide of Tewodros and the capture of Magdala by the British-Indian task force.

• May 16 – President Andrew Johnson is acquitted during his impeachment trial, by one vote in the United States Senate.

• May 26 – Fenian bomber Michael Barrett becomes the last person publicly hanged in Britain.

• May 30 – Memorial Day is observed in the United States for the first time (it was proclaimed on May 5 by General John A. Logan).

• May 31 – Thomas Spence declares himself president of the Republic of Manitoba; he soon alienates the locals.

• May 31 – The first popular bicycle race is held at Parc de Saint-Cloud, Paris.

• June 2 – The first Trades Union Congress is held in Manchester, England.

July–September

July 25: Wyoming territory.

• July 5 – Preacher William Booth establishes the Christian Mission, predecessor of the Salvation Army, in the East End of London.

• July 18 – The Navajo begin their long march home.

• July 25 – Wyoming becomes a United States territory.

• July 28 – The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution is adopted, guaranteeing African Americans full citizenship and all persons in the United States due process of law.

• August 18 – Helium is discovered by French astronomer Pierre Janssen (and independently by Joseph Norman Lockyer on August 20).

• August 20 – Abergele Train Disaster in Wales: An Irish Mail passenger train collides with 4 cargo trucks loaded with paraffin: 33 are killed (the first major train disaster in Britain).

• August 22 – The Yangzhou riot in China targets a station of the China Inland Mission, and nearly leads to war between Britain and China.

• September 18 – The University of the South holds its first convocation in Sewanee, Tennessee.

• September 23 – Rebels (some 400–600) in the town of Lares declare Puerto Rico independent; the local militia easily defeats them a week later.

• September – Queen Isabella II of Spain is effectively deposed and sent into exile; she formally abdicates June 25, 1870.

October–December

• October 1 – Chulalongkorn starts to rule in Siam.

• October 6 – The City of New York grants Mount Sinai Hospital a 99-year lease for a property on Lexington Avenue and 66th Street, for the sum of $1.00.

• October 10 – Carlos Manuel de Céspedes declares a revolt against Spanish rule in Cuba in an event known as El Grito de Yara, initiating a war that lasts ten years (Cuba ultimately loses the war at a cost of 400,000 lives and widespread destruction).

• October 28 – Thomas Edison applies for his first patent, the electric vote recorder.

• November 3 – U.S. presidential election, 1868: Ulysses S. Grant defeats Horatio Seymour in the election.

November 27: Battle of Washita River.

• November 2 – New Zealand officially adopts nationally observed standard time, and is perhaps the first country to do so.

• November 27 – Indian Wars – Battle of Washita River: In the early morning, United States Army Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer leads an attack on a band of Cheyenne living on reservation land with Chief Black Kettle, killing 103 Cheyenne.

• December 6 – War of the Triple Alliance – Battle of Itororó or Ytororó: Field-Marshall Luís Alves de Lima e Silva leads 13,000 Brazilian troops against a Paraguayan fortified position of 5,000 troops.

• December 25 – U.S. President Andrew Johnson grants unconditional pardon to all Civil War rebels.

Undated

• Thomas Henry Huxley discovers what he thinks is primordial matter and names it bathybius haecklii (he admits his mistake in 1871).

• The Académie Julian, a major art school in Paris, France that admits women, is established.

• The Dortmunder Actien Brauerei is founded in Germany.

• Brisbane Grammar School is founded, providing the opportunity for secondary education for the first time in the colony of Brisbane in Australia.

• Herrenhauser Brewery is established in Hanover, Germany.

• Maryland School for the Deaf is established.

• The Roman Catholic See of Tucson is established as the Apostolic Vicariate of Arizona in 1868, taking its territory from the former Diocese of Santa Fe. The Diocese of Tucson is canonically erected on May 8, 1897.

• After pursuing a policy of total war on the Plain Indians, General William Tecumseh Sherman brokers the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868).

• Political leaders behind the Japanese emperor issue in his name a 5-point charter that promises representative government.

• The population of Japan reaches c. 30 million.

• Croatian–Hungarian Agreement (, , ) was a pact signed in 1868, that governed Croatia's political status in the Hungarian-ruled part of Austria-Hungary. It had lasted until the end of World War I.

Births

January–June

• January 6 – Vittorio Monti, Italian Composer (d. 1922)

• January 9 – S.P.L. Sørensen, Danish chemist (d. 1939)

• January 11 – Cai Yuanpei, Chinese educator (d. 1940)

• January 31 – Theodore William Richards, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1928)

• February 5, – Maxine Elliott, actress, (d. 1940)

• February 10 – William Allen White, American journalist (d. 1944)

• February 23 – W. E. B. Du Bois, American civil rights leader (d. 1963)

• February 26 – Venceslau Brás, Brazilian president (d. 1966)

• March 14 – Emily Murphy, Canadian woman's rights activist (d. 1933)

• March 22 – Robert Millikan, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1953)

• March 25 – William Lockwood, English cricketer (d. 1932)

• March 28 – Maxim Gorky, Russian author (d. 1936)

• April 8 – Herbert Jennings, American zoologist (d. 1947)

• April 10 – George Arliss, English actor (d. 1946)

• April 25 – John Bevins Moisant, American aviator, (d. 1910)

• April 28 – Lucy Booth, the fifth daughter of William and Catherine Booth (d. 1953)

• May 6 – Nicholas II of Russia (d. 1918)

• May 6 – Gaston Leroux, French writer (d. 1927)

• May 29 – Abdul Mejid II, last Caliph of the Ottoman Empire (d. 1944)

• June 5 – James Connolly, Irish-Scots socialist (d. 1916)

• June 7 – Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Scottish architect (d. 1928)

• June 14 – Karl Landsteiner, Austrian biologist and physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1943)

• June 18 – Georges Lacombe, French artist (d. 1916)

July–December

• July 12 – Stefan George, German poet (d. 1933)

• July 14 – Gertrude Bell, English archaeologist, writer, spy, and administrator (d. 1926)

• August 23 – Edgar Lee Masters, American poet, biographer and dramatist. (d. 1950)

• August 26 – Charles Stewart, Premier of Alberta (d. 1946)

• September 1 – Henri Bourassa, Canadian politician and publisher (d. 1952)

• September 6 – Heinrich Häberlin, Swiss politician, member of the Federal Council (d. 1947)

• September 9 – Mary Hunter Austin, American writer of fiction and non-fiction (d. 1934)

• September 17 – James Alexander Calder, Canadian politician (d. 1956)

• October 18 – Ernst Didring, Swedish writer (d. 1931)

• November 7 – Delfim Moreira, Brazilian president (d. 1920)

• November 8 – Felix Hausdorff, German mathematician (d. 1942)

• November 9 – Marie Dressler, Canadian actress (d. 1934)

• November 14 – Arthur Hoey Davis, Australian author (d. 1935)

• November 22 – John Nance Garner, U.S. Vice President (d. 1967)

• December 9 – Fritz Haber, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1934)

• December 9 – Ivan Regen, Slovenian biologist (d. 1947)

• December 19 – Eleanor Hodgman Porter, American novelist (d. 1920)

• December 25 – Eugenie Besserer, Silent film actress (d. 1934)

Deaths

January–June

• February 8 – Lai Wenkwok, Chinese leader of the Taiping Rebellion and Nien Rebellion (b. 1827)

• February 11 – Léon Foucault, French astronomer (b. 1819)

• February 29 – King Ludwig I of Bavaria (b. 1786)

• March 4 – Jesse Chisholm, American pioneer (b. 1805)

• March 6 – Julia Dean Hayne, actress, (b. 1830)

• March 28 – James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, British military leader (b. 1797)

• April 3 – Franz Berwald, Swedish composer (b. 1796)

• April 7 – Thomas D'Arcy McGee, Canadian father of confederation (assassinated) (b. 1825)

• April 13 – Emperor Theodore or Tewodros II of Ethiopia (Abyssinia), by suicide (b. 1818)

• May 7 – Henry Peter Brougham, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain (b. 1778)

• May 10 – Henry Bennett, American politician (b. 1808)

• May 17 – Isami Kondo, Commander of the Shinsengumi (b. 1834)

• May 23 – Kit Carson, American trapper, scout, and Indian agent (b. 1809)

• June 1 – James Buchanan, 15th President of the United States (b. 1791)

• June 22 – Heber C. Kimball, Mormon church leader (b. 1801)

July–December

• July 6 – Sanosuke Harada, Shinsengumi Captain (b. 1840)

• July 19 – Soji Okita, Shinsengumi Captain (b. 1842 or 1844)

• September 19 – William Sprague, American minister and politician from Michigan (b. 1809)

• September 26 – August Ferdinand Möbius, German mathematician and astronomer (b. 1790)

• October 17 – Laura Secord, Canadian patriot (b. 1775)

• October 18 – Mongkut, Rama IV, King of Thailand (b. 1804)

• October 27 – Charles Thomas Longley, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1794)

• November 13 – Gioacchino Rossini, Italian composer (b. 1792)

• November 15 – James Mayer Rothschild, German-born banker (b. 1792)

• December 6 – August Schleicher, German linguist (b. 1821)