1854

Centuries: 18th century - 19th century - 20th century

Decades: 1800s 1810s 1820s 1830s 1840s - 1850s - 1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s 1900s

Years: 1849 1850 1851 1852 1853 - 1854 - 1855 1856 1857 1858 1859

Events

January 13 - The accordion is patented by Anthony Faas.
February 11 - Major streets lit by coal gas for first time.
February 17 - The British recognize the independence of the Orange Free State.
February 28 - The United States Republican Party is organized in Ripon, Wisconsin.
March 20 - The Boston Public Library opens to the public.
March 28 - Crimean War: United Kingdom and France declare war on Russia, to begin the Crimean War.
March 31 - Commodore Matthew Perry of the U.S. Navy, signs the Treaty/Convention of Kanagawa with the Japanese government, opening the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade. (See History of Japan)
May 30 - The Kansas-Nebraska Act becomes law establishing the US territories of Nebraska and Kansas.
July 6 - In Jackson, Michigan, the first convention of the U.S. Republican Party is held.
July 13 - In the battle of Guaymas, Mexico, General Jose Maria Yanez stops the French invassion led by Count Gaston de Raousset Boulbon.
September 20 - Crimean War: At the Alma, the Franco-English alliance wins the first battle of the war.
October 17 - Newspaper The Age is founded in Melbourne, Australia.
October 25 - Crimean War: The Battle of Balaclava occurs, overall a victory for the allies, but it included the disastrous cavalry Charge of the Light Brigade, from which only 200 of 700 men survive.
November 5 - Crimean War: Russians lose again at the Battle of Inkerman.
Frederick Augustus Albert succeeds to the throne of Saxony.
Stockholm, Wisconsin is founded by immigrants from Karlskoga, Sweden (cf 1252).
Chemistry Professor Benjamin Silliman, of Yale University is the first to fractionate petroleum by distillation.
Abraham Pineo Gesner invents a process for extracting kerosene from coal.
Said Pasha succeeds his nephew Abbas as pasha of Egypt.
A Russian fort is established at the present site of Almaty.
Aurora, Ontario is first settled.
Spiegelthal excavates the tomb of Alyattes II.
The Ambrotype is introduced for photography.
Election of New York City mayor Fernando Wood begins the ascendancy of Tammany Hall.

Arts, Sciences, Literature and Philosophy

1854 in literature:
- Feuerbach's Essence of Christianity
- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Births

January 18 - Thomas Watson, telephone pioneer
February 17 - Friedrich Alfred Krupp, industrialist (+ 1902)
March 14 - Paul Ehrlich, physician, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1908 (+ 1915)
March 14 - Thomas R. Marshall, US vice-president (+ 1925)
March 15 - Emil Adolf von Behring, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1901
May 11 - Albion Woodbury Small, US sociologist
July 3 - Leos Janacek, Czech composer
July 12 - George Eastman, inventor of the Kodak camera
July 27 - Takahashi Korekiyo, Japanese prime minister (+ 1936)
August 2 - Milan I, king of Serbia
October 16 - Oscar Wilde, Irish writer
October 20 - Arthur Rimbaud, French poet
December 23 - Victoriano Huerta, Mexican president
December 24 - Thomas Stevens, world-circling bicyclist
Diamond Bessie - prostitute and murder victim (+ 1877)
Edward Harkness - US philanthropist (+ 1940)
C. W. Post - cereal manufacturer (+ 1914)

Deaths

March 13 - Thomas Noon Talfourd, English jurist
April 15 - Arthur Aikin, English chemist and mineralogist
July 7 - Georg Ohm, German physicist
September 8 - Angelo Mai, Italian cardinal and philologist
Abbas I, pasha of Egypt\n