How much do you know about the 19th Century?

I've been trying to figure out how much I really know about the various centuries ... and it ain't all that impressive really. Take the 19th Century ...

Start of Century ... Napoleonic Wars going on; Regency period when King George III (1760 - 1820) was insane

1804 - Peace in Europe; doesn't last very long

1805 - War in Europe again; Battle of Trafalgar

1812 - Napoleon invades Russia. Fails

1812 - 1814 "War of 1812". US tries to invade Canada. Fails. British march into Washington and burn it to the ground. War ends with signing of Treaty of Utrecht. Two weeks later, Americans defeat British at Battle of New Orleans. Lonnie Donegan doesn't sing about it just yet.

1814 - Napoleon Abdicates; exiled to Elba

1815 - Napoleon returns to France; Battle of Waterloo; Napoleon packed off to St Helena

1820 - 1830 Reign of George IV

1821 - Napoleon Dies

1825 - Stockton & Darlington Railway: the first public railway

1829 - Rainhill trials. George Stevenson's "Rocket" is best locomotive by far

1830 - Liverpool & Manchester railway: the first public railway worked exclusively by steam. Steady expansion of railways thereafter, providing the transport needed to drive the Inductrial Revolution

1830 - 1837 Reign of William IV

1837 - 1901 (just after end of 19th Century) Reign of Queen Victoria

1848 Some sort of war between US and Mexico. Don't really know all that much about it

1854 or thereabouts. Crimean war. Start of photo journalism and despatches from the front sent home by telegraph; birth of modern ideas of nursing care (Florence Nightingale). Charge of the Light Brigade

1862 (or was it 1861?) - 1865 American Civil War. Southern States secede from the Union; Northern states don't want to let them. Northern States have overwhelming advantages in terms of manpower and industrialisation, and eventually 9inevitably) prevail.

Towards the end of the century - Boer Wars in South Africa. Not really sure what they were about.

1898 - War between US and Spain. Battle of San Juan Hill in Cuba, and US takes Phillippines from Spanish

Some time or other - Corn Laws (which were to do with protectionism) very controversial in England. People got upset. Don't really know who, or how it was resolved

Some time or other - General Gordon went to fight the Mahdi and was killed in Khartoum

Some Time or Other - Indian Mutiny ... which wasn't really a mutiny

And ... that's about it!!!

Not really very impressive, is it?? And it just goes to show how very biased the teaching of history is. It's all wars!!!!

 

Bras invented.

:mickey:

 

Oh yeah ... and 1885, motor car invented

And some time towards the end of the century, telephone invented :mickey:

 

its been a long time since i've been in High school

 

confrontation in 1859 between the United States and the British Empire over the boundary between the US and British North America. The territory in dispute was the San Juan Islands, which lie between Vancouver Island and the North American mainland. The Pig War, so called because it was triggered by the shooting of a pig

 

Boar war, was much the same as America in theory.
The boars are from Dutch decent, and at the time they weren't to keen on the Brits ( not many were lol)
So they dragged thier heels and woukdnt agree on certain things the British were doing in Africa. So therefore it was a war. Not your normal fought war either , whether because it was Africa or maybe they just were fed up with rabble rousers, but they were brutal towards the boers. In fact the British were first to introduce the concept of concentration camps.
Systematically starved them to death . Even to this dAy the British are hated by them.
They just don't get the sympathy they prob should have, cause they weren't particulary nice people themselfs.

 

So, the Boar War was a sort of continuation of the Pig War, right?

Maybe it all had something to do with pork barrel politics.

 

History stumps me. Especially foreign history! I really hate European history. Middle East history is boring too, nothing but fighting. I do like Asian history and North American history. But don't know many dates/names/places!

 

That's pretty impressive. I have more of an overview than knowledge of specific events. I had an awesome professor that didn't give a damn about specifics. All our tests were composed of writing the historical impact of events.

So I can tell you how Napoleon helped shape the world today but I don't have a clue about his specific battles or the dates he was in power.

 

1888: Jack the Ripper.

 

You forgot to mention the wars in Italy that ended up creating the Italian Republic. You also forgot the Austrian/French-led imperialist war in Mexico.

Overall, as odd as it may seem, the 19th century was "relatively" calm, if you compare with the preceeding and the following ones.

 

how about the english opium wars

 

I did indeed.

And did I mention the Franco-Prussian was and the unification of Germany?

See ... it's all wars!!

 

Hang on ... wasn't the telephone invented in teh 19th century?

And innoculation against smallpox?

And pasteurisation?

Well, there are a few good things that weren't wars