1844

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	18th century 19th century 20th century
Decades:	1820s 1830s 1840s 1850s 1860s
Years:	1841 1842 1843 1844 1845 1846 1847

1844 in various calendars

Gregorian calendar	1844 MDCCCXLIV
Ab urbe condita	2597
Armenian calendar	1293 ԹՎ ՌՄՂԳ
Assyrian calendar	6594
Baháʼí calendar	0–1
Balinese saka calendar	1765–1766
Bengali calendar	1251
Berber calendar	2794
British Regnal year	7 Vict. 1 – 8 Vict. 1
Buddhist calendar	2388
Burmese calendar	1206
Byzantine calendar	7352–7353
Chinese calendar	癸卯年 (Water Rabbit) 4541 or 4334     — to — 甲辰年 (Wood Dragon) 4542 or 4335
Coptic calendar	1560–1561
Discordian calendar	3010
Ethiopian calendar	1836–1837
Hebrew calendar	5604–5605
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1900–1901
- Shaka Samvat	1765–1766
- Kali Yuga	4944–4945
Holocene calendar	11844
Igbo calendar	844–845
Iranian calendar	1222–1223
Islamic calendar	1259–1260
Japanese calendar	Tenpō 15 / Kōka 1 (弘化元年)
Javanese calendar	1771–1772
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 12 days
Korean calendar	4177
Minguo calendar	68 before ROC 民前68年
Nanakshahi calendar	376
Thai solar calendar	2386–2387
Tibetan calendar	阴水兔年 (female Water-Rabbit) 1970 or 1589 or 817     — to — 阳木龙年 (male Wood-Dragon) 1971 or 1590 or 818

Year 1844 (MDCCCXLIV) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar and a leap year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar.

Events

January–March

• January 15 – The University of Notre Dame receives its charter from Indiana.
• February 27 – The Dominican Republic gains independence from Haiti.

February 28: USS Princeton deaths.

• February 28 – A gun on the USS Princeton explodes while the boat is on a Potomac River cruise, killing 2 United States Cabinet members and several others.
• March 8 – King Oscar I ascends to the throne of Sweden-Norway.
• March 12 – The Columbus and Xenia Railroad, the first railroad planned to be built in Ohio, is chartered.
• March 21 – The Bahá'í calendar begins.
• March 23 – Edict of Toleration, allowing Jews to settle in the Holy Land.

April–June

• April – The Fleet Prison for debtors in London is closed.
• May 1 – Hong Kong Police Force, the world's second, Asia's first modern police force is established.
• May 23 – Persian Prophet The Báb privately announces his revelation to Mullá Husayn, just after sunset, founding the Bábí Faith (later revolving to the Bahá'í Faith as the Báb intended) in Shiraz, Persia (now Iran). Contemporaneously, on this day in nearby Tehran, was the birth of `Abdu'l-Bahá; the eldest Son of Bahá'u'lláh, Prophet-Founder of the Bahá'í Faith, the inception of which, the Báb's proclaimed His own mission was to herald. `Abdu'l-Bahá Himself was later proclaimed by Bahá'u'lláh to be His own successor, thus being the third "central figure" of the Bahá'í Faith.

• May 24 – The first electrical telegram is sent over the telegraph by Samuel F. B. Morse from the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. to the B&O Railroad "outer depot" in Baltimore, Maryland, saying "What hath God wrought".
• June–July – The Great Flood of 1844 hits the Missouri River and Mississippi River.
• June 6 – George Williams founds the Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) in London.

June 15: Charles Goodyear.

• June 15 – Charles Goodyear receives a patent for vulcanization, a process to strengthen rubber.
• June 22 – Influential North American fraternity Delta Kappa Epsilon is founded at Yale University.
• June 27 – Joseph Smith, Jr., founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, and his brother Hyrum, are killed in Carthage Jail, Carthage, Illinois. John Taylor, future president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is severely injured but survives.

July–September

July 3: Great Auk.

• July 3
  • The United States signs The Sino-American Treaty of Wanghia with the Chinese Government (the first diplomatic agreement between China and the United States in history).
  • The last pair of Great Auks are killed on the island of Eldey.
• August 8 – During a meeting held in Nauvoo, the Quorum of the Twelve, headed by Brigham Young, is chosen as the leading body of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
• August 14 – Abd al-Qadir al-Jaza'iri is defeated at Isly in Morocco; the sultan of Morocco soon repudiates his ally.
• August 28 – Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx meet in Paris, France.
• September 25–September 27 – The first ever international cricket match is played in New York City, United States v Canadian Provinces.

October–December

• October 22 – This second date, predicted by the Millerites for the Second Coming of Jesus, leads to the Great Disappointment.
• October 23 – The Báb publicly proclaimed to be the promised one of Islam (the Qá'im, or Mahdi). He is also considered to be simultaneously the return of Elijah, John the Baptist, and the "Ushídar-Máh" referred to in the Zoroastrian scriptures. He announces to the world the coming of "He whom God shall make manifest". He is considered the forerunner of Bahá'u'lláh – the founder of the Bahá'í Faith – whose claims include being the return of Jesus.
• November 3 – Giuseppe Verdi's I due Foscari debuts at Teatro Argentina, Rome.
• November 6 – The Dominican Republic drafts its first Constitution.
• December 4 – U.S. presidential election, 1844: James K. Polk defeats Henry Clay .
• December 21 – The Rochdale Pioneers commence business at their cooperative in Rochdale, England.

Date unknown

• Swedish chemistry professor Gustaf Erik Pasch invents the safety match.
• Carlos Antonio López becomes dictator of Paraguay.
• The anonymously written Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation is published and paves the way for the acceptance of Darwin's book The Origin of Species.
• The Free Church Institution is established by Reverend Alexander Duff in Calcutta, India. This is later merged with the General Assembly's Institution to form the Scottish Church College, one of the pioneering institutions that ushers in the Bengal Renaissance.
• Annual British iron production reaches 3 million tons.

Births

January–June

• January 9 – Julián Gayarre, Spanish opera singer (d. 1890)
• February 17 – Aaron Montgomery Ward, American department store founder (d. 1913)
• February 20
  • Ludwig Boltzmann, Austrian physicist (d. 1906)
  • Joshua Slocum, Canadian seaman and adventurer (d. 1909)
• February 21 – Charles-Marie Widor, French organist and composer (d. 1937)
• March 10 – Pablo de Sarasate, Spanish violinist (d. 1908)
• March 18 – Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Russian composer (d. 1908)
• March 25 – Adolf Engler, German botanist (d. 1930)
• March 30 – Paul Verlaine, French poet (d. 1896)
• April 16 – Anatole France, French writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1924)
• May 17 – Julius Wellhausen, German biblical scholar (d. 1918)
• May 21 – Henri Rousseau, French artist (d. 1910)
• May 22 – Mary Cassatt, American artist (d. 1926)
• May 23 – `Abdu'l-Bahá, Persian Bahá'í religious leader (d. 1921)
• June 3 – Garret A. Hobart, 24th Vice President of the United States (d. 1899)

July–December

• July 11 – King Peter I of Serbia (d. 1921)
• July 22 – William Archibald Spooner, British scholar and Anglican priest (d. 1930)
• July 28 – Gerard Manley Hopkins, English poet (d. 1889)
• July 30 – Robert Jones Burdette, American minister and sentimental humorist (d. 1914)
• August 5 – Ilya Repin, Russian painter and sculptor (d. 1930)
• August 6 – Prince Alfred of the United Kingdom, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (d. 1900)
• August 17 – Menelik II, Emperor of Ethiopia (d. 1913)
• August 22 – George Washington DeLong, American naval officer and explorer (d. 1881)
• August 23 – Hamilton Disston, American land developer (d. 1896)
• August 29 – Edward Carpenter, English Socialist poet (d. 1929)
• August 30 – Emily Ruete, princess of Zanzibar (d. 1924)
• September 16 – Claude-Paul Taffanel, French flutist and composer (d. 1908)
• September 20 – William H. Illingworth, American photographer (d. 1893)
• October 5 – Francis William Reitz, 5th State President of the Orange Free State (d. 1934)
• October 15 – Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher (d. 1900)
• October 22 – Louis Riel, Canadian leader (d. 1885)
• October 23
  • Sarah Bernhardt French actress (d. 1923)
  • Robert Bridges, English poet (d. 1930)
• October 24 – Karl Lueger, Vienna's mayor (d. 1910)
• October 27 – Klas Pontus Arnoldson, Swedish writer and pacifist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1916)
• November 2 – Mehmed V, Ottoman Sultan (d. 1918)
• November 10 – Henry Eyster Jacobs, American Lutheran theologian (d. 1932)
• November 13 – Andrew Harper, Scottish-Australian biblical scholar and teacher (d. 1936)
• November 23 – Karl Benz, German automotive pioneer (d. 1929)
• December 1 – Alexandra of Denmark, queen of Edward VII of England (d. 1925)
• December 8 – Émile Reynaud, French science teacher and animation pioneer (d. 1918)

Date unknown

• probable – Abdor Rahman Khan, Emir of Kabul, Emir of Kandahar, Emir of Afghanistan (d. 1901)

Deaths

January–June

• January 25 – Jean-Baptiste Drouet, Count d'Erlon, French marshal (b. 1765)
• January 27 – Charles Nodier, French writer (b. 1780)
• January 29 – Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (b. 1784)
• February 15 – Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1757)
• February 27 – Nicholas Biddle, president of the Second Bank of the United States (b. 1786)
• March 8 – King Charles XIV John of Sweden, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, French Napoleonic general (b. 1763)
• March 20 – Claude Pierre Pajol, French military leader (b. 1772)
• April 13 – Mamiya Rinzō, Japanese explorer of Sakhalin (b. 1775)
• May 18 – Richard McCarty, American politician (b. 1780)
• June 13 – Thomas Charles Hope, Scottish chemist and discoverer of Strontium (b. 1766)
• June 15 – Thomas Campbell, Scottish poet (b. 1777)
• June 27
  • Hyrum Smith, American religious leader (b. 1800)
  • Joseph Smith, Jr., American prophet, founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormonism) (b. 1805)

July–December

• July 11 – Evgeny Baratynsky, Russian poet and philosopher (b. 1800)
• July 27 – John Dalton, English chemist and physicist (b. 1766)
• July 28 – Joseph Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon I and King of Naples and Spain (b. 1768)
• July 29 – Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart, Austrian composer (b. 1791)
• November 29 – Princess Sophia of Gloucester (b. 1773)
• December 2 – Eustachy Erazm Sanguszko, Polish military leader (b. 1768)