1854 Calendar

January 5, 1854 – The San Francisco steamer sinks, killing 300 people.

February 28, 1854 – The Republican Party of the United States is organized in Ripon, Wisconsin.

March 1, 1854 – German psychologist Friedrich Eduard Beneke disappears; two years later his remains are found in a canal near Charlottenburg.

March 31, 1854 – Commodore Matthew Perry signs the Treaty of Kanagawa with the Japanese government, opening the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade.

April 1, 1854 – Hard Times begins serialisation in Charles Dickens’ magazine, Household Words.

June 10, 1854 – The first class of the United States Naval Academy students graduate.

August 4, 1854 – The Hinomaru is established as the official flag to be flown from Japanese ships.

October 6, 1854 – The Great fire of Newcastle and Gateshead starts shortly after midnight, leading to 53 deaths and hundreds injured.

October 21, 1854 – Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses are sent to the Crimean War.

December 3, 1854 – Eureka Stockade: In what is claimed by many to be the birth of Australian democracy, more than 20 gold miners at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia are killed by state troopers in an uprising over mining licences.

January 9, 1854 – Jennie Jerome, American socialite and mother of Winston Churchill (d. 1921)

March 21, 1854 – Alick Bannerman, Australian cricketer (d. 1924)

April 22, 1854 – Henri La Fontaine, Belgian lawyer, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1943)

May 11, 1854 – Jack Blackham, Australian cricketer (d. 1932)

June 26, 1854 – Robert Laird Borden, Canadian politician (d. 1937)

July 3, 1854 – Leoš Janáček, Czech composer (d. 1928)

August 26, 1854 – Arnold Fothergill, England cricketer (d. 1932)

September 1, 1854 – Engelbert Humperdinck, German composer (d. 1921)

October 27, 1854 – Sir William Smith, Scottish founder of the Boys’ Brigade (d. 1914)

November 17, 1854 – Hubert Lyautey, French general (d. 1934)