Events
January–March January 23 – Prince Joseph of Austria marries Princess Maria Josepha of Bavaria in Vienna. January 29 – One week before his death, Mir Jafar, who had been enthroned as the Nawab of Bengal and ruler of the Bengali people with the support and protection of the British East India Company, abdicates in favor of his 18-year-old son, Najmuddin Ali Khan.Abdul Majed Khan, The Transition in Bengal, 1756-75: A Study of Saiyid Muhammad Reza Khan (Cambridge University Press, 2007) p69 February 8 Frederick the Great, the King of Prussia, issues a decree abolishing the historic punishments against unmarried women in Germany for "sex crimes", particularly the Hurenstrafen (literally "whore shaming") practices of public humiliation.Isabel V. Hull, Sexuality, State, and Civil Society in Germany, 1700-1815 (Cornell University Press, 1997) p127 Isaac Barré, a member of the British House of Commons for Wycombe and a veteran of the French and Indian War in the British American colonies, coins the term "Sons of Liberty" in a rebuttal to Charles Townshend's derisive description of the American colonists during the introduction of the proposed Stamp Act. Barré notes that "They fled from your tyranny to a then uncultivated and unhospitable country... And yet, actuated by the principles of true English liberty, they met all these hardships with pleasure, compared with those they suffered in their own country, from the hands of those who should have been their friends." American colonists adopt the term for their own organization after reading the accounts of Barré's speech.Jonathan Mercantini, The Stamp Act of 1765: A History in Documents (Broadview Press, 2017) p71 February 14 – Spain's five-member "special junta", appointed by Prime Minister Jerónimo Grimaldi, delivers its report regarding "ways to address the backwardness of Spain's commerce with its colonies and with foreign nations". The report provides detailed orders to be delivered to José de Gálvez, the visitador general in charge of New Spain.Stanley J. Stein and Barbara H. Stein, Apogee of Empire: Spain and New Spain in the Age of Charles III, 1759–1789 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003) p69 March 9 – After a public campaign by the writer Voltaire, judges in Paris posthumously exonerate Jean Calas of murdering his son. Calas had been tortured and executed in 1762 on the charge, though his son may have committed suicide. March 22 – Royal assent is given to the Duties in American Colonies Act 1765, historically referred to as the Stamp Act, imposing the first direct tax levied from Great Britain on the thirteen American colonies, effective November 1."Sunday's and Monday's Posts", in The Leeds Intelligencer, March 26, 1765, p3 The revenue measure (which requires the purchase of a stamp to be affixed for validation of all legal documents, but also to licensed newspapers and even playing cards and dice) is made to help defray the costs for British military operations in North America, including the French and Indian War.Richard Archer, As If an Enemy's Country: The British Occupation of Boston and the Origins of Revolution (Oxford University Press, 2010) pp20-21 March 24 – Great Britain passes the Quartering Act, requiring private households in the thirteen American colonies to house British soldiers if necessary.
April–June April 4 – At Fort Tombecbe, near what is now the town of Epes, Alabama, representatives of the British Empire and of the Choctaw Indian tribe in Mississippi sign a peace treaty in the wake of French cession of claims to the British. A boundary is fixed between land to be occupied by the Choctaws and for lands which British settlers can use; in addition, the British agree to provide a police official and a gunsmith at Fort Tombecbe for the Choctaws to use for trespassing complaints and for weapons repairs. By 1775, however, the Choctaws are outnumbered in Mississippi."Mississippi", by Kathrin Dodds, in Native America: A State-by-State Historical Encyclopedia, ed. by Daniel S. Murphree (ABC-CLIO, 2012) p611 April 5 – After completing the portion of the Mason–Dixon line marking the semi-circular boundary between Pennsylvania and Delaware, English surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon begin the two-and-a-half-year process of plotting out the 230-mile boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland along the latitude of 39°43′20″ N.Andro Linklater, The Fabric of America: How Our Borders and Boundaries Shaped the Country and Forged Our National Identity (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2009) p29 April 14 – Three days after getting the news that the Stamp Act has passed, American colonists invade the British Army arsenal near the New York City Hall and sabotage guns inside by spiking them.Edward Robb Ellis, The Epic of New York City: A Narrative History (Basic Books, 2011) April 26 – At Saint Petersburg, German engineer Christian Kratzenstein presents to the Russian Academy of Sciences a perfected version of the arithmetical machine originally invented by Gottfried Leibniz. Kratzenstein claims that his machine solves the problem with the Leibniz machine has with calculations above four digits, perfecting the flaw where the machine is "prone to err whenever it is necessary to make a number of 9999 move to 10000", but the machine is not developed further.Matthew L. Jones, Reckoning with Matter: Calculating Machines, Innovation, and Thinking about Thinking from Pascal to Babbage (University of Chicago Press, 2016) p133 May 18 – Not long after British rule has started over the formerly French colony of Quebec, an accidental fire destroys one quarter of the town of Montreal.William Henry Atherton, Montreal, 1535-1914: Under British rule, 1760-1914 (S. J. Clarke, 1914) p397 May 26 – During a stroll in the park "on a fine Sabbath afternoon" at Glasgow Green, Scottish engineer James Watt receives the inspiration that provides the breakthrough in his development of the steam engine; he recounts later that "The idea came into my mind, that as steam was an elastic body it would rush into a vacuum, and if a communication was made between the cylinder and an exhausted vessel, it would rush into it, and might be there condensed without cooling the cylinder... I had not walked further than the Golf-house when the whole thing was arranged in my mind."H. W. Dickinson, James Watt: Craftsman and Engineer (Cambridge University Press, 1936) pp36-37 June 21 – The Isle of Man is brought under British control, the Isle of Man Purchase Act (coming into force 10 May) confirming HM Treasury's purchase of the feudal rights of the Dukes of Atholl, as Lord of Mann over the island, and revesting them into the British Crown.
July–December July 10 – King George III dismisses George Grenville from the office of Prime Minister of Great Britain, and replaces him with another Whig Party statesman, Charles Watson-Wentworth, Lord Rockingham.Nicholas K. Robinson, Edmund Burke: A Life in Caricature (Yale University Press, 1996) p17 July 12 – On orders of Chief Pontiac, War Chief Wahpesah of the Kickapoo people releases British Indian Affairs negotiator George Croghan from 35 days of detention.Arrell M. Gibson, Kickapoos: Lords of the Middle Border (University of Oklahoma Press, 1975) At the same time, Pontiac authorizes a Shawnee Chief, Nanicksah, to sign a treaty with the British on behalf of the Great Lakes tribes, settling the French and Indian War."Nanicksah", in Native Peoples A to Z: A Reference Guide to Native Peoples of the Western Hemisphere, ed. by Donald Ricky (Native American Book Publishers, 2009) p1779 July 13 – Qianlong, the Emperor of China issues a decree that copper engravings be made to depict all of his victories in battle. In the interest of amity with the Chinese, King George III of Great Britain gives priority to the sale of British copper, and King Louis XV of France assents to the use of French artisans.John Wiley Spiers, How Small business Trades Worldwide (Writer's Showcase, 2001) p86 July 21 – Having eliminated all of his rivals for leadership of Persia, Karim Khan Zand returns in triumph to his home in Shiraz and makes it his capital then begins construction of citadels, mosques, schools and other buildings."Karim Khan Zand (ca. 1705-1779)" in The Ottoman Empire: A Historical Encyclopedia, by Mehrdad Kia (ABC-CLIO, 2017) p133 July 23 – Headed by Odawa Chief Pontiac and George Croghan, a party of Great Lakes tribesmen and British soldiers travel along the Wabash River and obtain the release of all white prisoners of war remaining in the Miami people and Odawa villages between Ouiatenon (near modern-day Granville, Indiana) and Detroit.Bert Anson, The Miami Indians (University of Oklahoma Press, 2000) p74 July 30 – At Yale College, eight students attack the residence of Yale's President Thomas Clap because of his promotion of "New Light" Calvinist doctrine; and "with Evil Intent" and "with Strong hand burst and take off the gates of the yard of the mansion house and Carry away and with Screaming and Shouting... throw into said House Numbers of large stones with Cattles Horns into the windows of said House."Robert Blair St. George, Conversing by Signs: Poetics of Implication in Colonial New England Culture (University of North Carolina Press, 2000) p246 The students plead guilty and pay nominal fines, and Clap resigns at the end of the 1765–66 school year. August 9 – Russian Empress Catherine II issues a decree authorizing the new way to produce vodka (by freezing).
August 14 – In protest of the Stamp Act, Bostonians attack the home of official Andrew Oliver. August 16 – The Treaty of Allahabad is signed. The Treaty marks the political and constitutional involvement and the beginning of Company rule in India. August 18 – Joseph II becomes Holy Roman Emperor. August 26 – In protest of the Stamp Act, Bostonians destroy the home of lieutenant governor Thomas Hutchinson. September 6 – Jean-Jacques Rousseau's house in Switzerland is stoned by a mob. September 21 – François Antoine announces he has killed the Beast of Gévaudan. October 17 – The Pennsylvania Gazette reports that a Mr. McCullough, the Distributor of Stamps for the Royal Colony of North Carolina, has resigned his post in protest at the Stamp Act. A Dr. Huston is appointed to the position. November 1 – The Stamp Act goes into effect in the thirteen American colonies. December 12 – The Pennsylvania Gazette reports that Dr. Huston, the recently instated Distributor of Stamps for the Royal Colony of North Carolina, has resigned his post in protest at the Stamp Act.
Date unknown The first chocolate factory in the Thirteen Colonies is established by Dr. James Baker at Dorchester, Massachusetts. It is believed that the first true restaurant opens in Paris, where a tavern-keeper named Boulanger sells cooked dishes at an all-night place on the Rue Bailleul. In Lisbon, the auto-da-fé parade (often an excuse for violence against Jews or Christian 'heretics') is abolished. Desai Atash Behram is established in Navsari, India. Catherine the Great establishes the first secondary education school for non-noble females in Russia: the Novodevichii Institute, for the daughters of commoners.
Births January 11 – Antoine Alexandre Barbier, French librarian (d. 1825) January 23 – Thomas Todd, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (d. 1826) February 1 – Charles Hatchett, English chemist (d. 1847) February 8 – Joseph Leopold Eybler, Austrian composer (d. 1846) February 22 – Meta Forkel-Liebeskind, German writer, scholar (d. 1853)
March 7 – Nicéphore Niépce, French inventor (d. 1833) March 27 – Franz Xaver von Baader, German philosopher, theologian (d. 1841) April 1 – Luigi Schiavonetti, Italian engraver (d. 1810) April 6 – Duke Charles Felix of Savoy (d. 1831) April 11 – Gertrudis Bocanegra, Mexican national heroine (d. 1817) April 26 – Emma, Lady Hamilton, English mistress of Horatio Nelson (d. 1815)