1856

Centuries:	18th century · 19th century · 20th century
Decades:	1820s 1830s 1840s 1850s 1860s 1870s 1880s
Years:	1853 1854 1855 1856 1857 1858 1859

1856 in various calendars

Gregorian calendar	1856 MDCCCLVI
Ab urbe condita	2609
Armenian calendar	1305 ԹՎ ՌՅԵ
Assyrian calendar	6606
Baháʼí calendar	12–13
Balinese saka calendar	1777–1778
Bengali calendar	1263
Berber calendar	2806
British Regnal year	19 Vict. 1 – 20 Vict. 1
Buddhist calendar	2400
Burmese calendar	1218
Byzantine calendar	7364–7365
Chinese calendar	乙卯年 (Wood Rabbit) 4553 or 4346     — to — 丙辰年 (Fire Dragon) 4554 or 4347
Coptic calendar	1572–1573
Discordian calendar	3022
Ethiopian calendar	1848–1849
Hebrew calendar	5616–5617
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1912–1913
- Shaka Samvat	1777–1778
- Kali Yuga	4956–4957
Holocene calendar	11856
Igbo calendar	856–857
Iranian calendar	1234–1235
Islamic calendar	1272–1273
Japanese calendar	Ansei 3 (安政３年)
Javanese calendar	1784–1785
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 12 days
Korean calendar	4189
Minguo calendar	56 before ROC 民前56年
Nanakshahi calendar	388
Thai solar calendar	2398–2399
Tibetan calendar	阴木兔年 (female Wood-Rabbit) 1982 or 1601 or 829     — to — 阳火龙年 (male Fire-Dragon) 1983 or 1602 or 830

1856 in various calendars

Gregorian calendar	1856 MDCCCLVI
Ab urbe condita	2609
Armenian calendar	1305 ԹՎ ՌՅԵ
Assyrian calendar	6606
Baháʼí calendar	12–13
Balinese saka calendar	1777–1778
Bengali calendar	1263
Berber calendar	2806
British Regnal year	19 Vict. 1 – 20 Vict. 1
Buddhist calendar	2400
Burmese calendar	1218
Byzantine calendar	7364–7365
Chinese calendar	乙卯年 (Wood Rabbit) 4553 or 4346     — to — 丙辰年 (Fire Dragon) 4554 or 4347
Coptic calendar	1572–1573
Discordian calendar	3022
Ethiopian calendar	1848–1849
Hebrew calendar	5616–5617
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1912–1913
- Shaka Samvat	1777–1778
- Kali Yuga	4956–4957
Holocene calendar	11856
Igbo calendar	856–857
Iranian calendar	1234–1235
Islamic calendar	1272–1273
Japanese calendar	Ansei 3 (安政３年)
Javanese calendar	1784–1785
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 12 days
Korean calendar	4189
Minguo calendar	56 before ROC 民前56年
Nanakshahi calendar	388
Thai solar calendar	2398–2399
Tibetan calendar	阴木兔年 (female Wood-Rabbit) 1982 or 1601 or 829     — to — 阳火龙年 (male Fire-Dragon) 1983 or 1602 or 830

1856 was a leap year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar).

Events

January

• January - The first free public school west of the Mississippi River was established in Tipton, Iowa.
• January 8 - Borax is discovered (John Veatch).
• January 24 - U.S. President Franklin Pierce declares the new Free-State Topeka government in Bleeding Kansas to be in rebellion.
• January 29 - Queen Victoria institutes the Victoria Cross

February

• February - The only month in recorded history to not have a full moon.
• February - The Tintic War in Utah.
• February 1 - Auburn University is first chartered as the East Alabama Male College.
• February 18 - The American Party (Know-Nothings) convene in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to nominate their first Presidential candidate, former President Millard Fillmore.

March

• March 5 - Fire destroys Covent Garden Theatre
• March 9 - National Fraternity Sigma Alpha Epsilon is founded at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, AL.
• March 20 - Costa Rican troops rout Walker's soldiers
• March 30 - The Treaty of Paris (1856) is signed, ending the Crimean War

April

• April 7 - Foundation of Nelson College, Nelson, New Zealand
• April 10 - Theta Chi Fraternity founded at Norwich University

May

• May 16 - the Vigilance Committee founded in San Francisco, California. It lynches two gangsters, arrests most Democratic Party officials and disbands itself on August 18
• May 21 - Lawrence, Kansas is captured and burned by proslavery forces (the "Sacking of Lawrence").
• May 22 - Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the hall of the United States Senate for a speech Sumner had made attacking Southerners who sympathized with the pro-slavery violence in Kansas ("Bleeding Kansas"). Sumner was unable to return to duty for three years while he recovered. Brooks became a hero across the South.
• May 24 - The Pottawatomie Massacre - group of followers of radical abolitionist John Brown kill five homesteaders in Franklin County, Kansas

June

• June 9 - 500 Mormons leave Iowa City, Iowa and head west for Salt Lake City, Utah carrying all their possessions in two-wheeled handcarts.

July

• July 17 - The Great Train Wreck of 1856 was the worst railroad calamity in the world to date, occurring near Philadelphia, PA, USA.
• July 29 - Composer Robert Schumann dies.
• July 31 - Christchurch, New Zealand chartered as a city.

August

• August 10 - Hurricane destroys Last Island, Louisiana - 400 dead. The whole island was broken up into several smaller islands by the storm.
• August 30 - Battle of Osawatomie between proslavery and antislavery forces in Bleeding Kansas.

November

• November 1 - Anglo-Persian War: War Is declared between Great Britain and Persia.
• November 4 - U.S. presidential election, 1856: Democrat James Buchanan defeats former President Millard Fillmore, representing a coalition of "Know-Nothings" and Whigs, and John C. Frémont of the fledgling Republican Party to become the 15th President of the United States.
• November 17 - American Old West: On the Sonoita River in present-day southern Arizona, the United States Army establishes Fort Buchanan in order to help control new land acquired in the Gadsden Purchase.
• November 21 - Niagara University founded in Niagara Falls, New York.

December

• December 9 - Bushehr surrenders to the British.

Unknown dates

• British Country and Borough Police Act extends London police model to all of England and Wales
• Western Union founded
• Kate Warner, the first female private detective, begins to work for the Pinkerton Detective Agency
• Pre-human remains found in the Neanderthal valley in Germany
• Gregor Mendel starts his research on genetics.
• National Portrait Gallery in London opened.
• Sale of Land starts suburb of Ashgrove, Queensland.
• The first session concludes at Saint Paul's School, the prestigious New England Prep School in Concord, NH.
• Founding year of St. Paul's School, Camp, Belgaum.

Births

• January 11 - Christian Sinding, Norwegian composer (d. 1941)
• January 12 - John Singer Sargent, American-born artist (d. 1925)
• February 2 - Frederick William Vanderbilt, American railway magnate (d. 1938)
• February 14 - Frank Harris, Irish author and editor (d. 1931)
• March 8 - Bramwell Booth, Salvation Army general (d. 1929)
• March 8 - Tom Roberts, Australian artist (d. 1931)
• March 9 - Eddie Foy, American singer, dancer, and vaudeville performer (d. 1928)
• March 16 - Napoléon Eugène Louis John Joseph, Prince Imperial, son of French Emperor Napoleon III (d. 1879)
• March 20 - Sir John Lavery, Irish artist (d. 1941)
• March 20 - Frederick Winslow Taylor, American inventor and efficiency expert (d. 1915)
• April 5 - Booker T. Washington, American educator (d. 1915)
• April 12 - William Martin Conway, British art critic and mountaineer (d. 1937)
• April 24 - Henri Philippe Pétain, French soldier and statesman (d. 1951)
• April 27 - Tongzhi Emperor, Emperor of China (d. 1875)
• May 6 - Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychiatrist (d. 1939)
• May 6 - Robert Peary, American Arctic explorer (d. 1920)
• May 15 - L. Frank Baum, American author (d. 1919)
• June 14 - Andrey Markov, Russian mathematician (d. 1922)
• July 2 - Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Indian political activist (d. 1920)
• July 10 - Nikola Tesla, Serbian inventor (d. 1943)
• July 26 - George Bernard Shaw, Irish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1950)
• August 10 - William Willett, inventor of Daylight Saving Time (d. 1915)
• August 13 - Alfred Deakin, second Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1919)
• August 15 - Ivan Franko, Ukrainian poet, critic, journalist and political activist (d. 1916)
• September 1 - Sergei Winogradsky, Russian scientist (d. 1953)
• September 18 - Wilhelm von Gloeden, German photographer (d. 1931)
• November 3 - Jim McCormick, baseball player (d. 1918)
• November 13 - Louis Brandeis, U.S. Supreme Court Justice (d. 1941)
• November 22 - Heber J. Grant, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d. 1945)
• November 24 - Bat Masterson, American lawman (d. 1921)
• November 29 - Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1921)
• December 13 - Svetozar Boroević, Austrian field marshal (d. 1920)
• December 18 - J.J. Thomson, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1940)
• December 22 - Frank B. Kellogg, United States Secretary of State, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1937)
• December 25 - Hans von Bartels, German painter (d. 1913)
• December 25 - Sir Samuel William Knaggs, British civil servant in the West Indies (d. 1924)
• December 28 - Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1924)

Deaths

• January 16 - Thaddeus William Harris, American naturalist (b. 1795)
• January 31 - Khedrup Gyatso, eleventh Dalai Lama (b. 1838)
• February 17 - Heinrich Heine, German writer (b. 1797)
• May 3 - Adolphe Charles Adam, French composer (b. 1803)
• July 9 - Amedeo Avogadro, Italian chemist (b. 1776)
• July 29 - Robert Schumann , German pianist
• August 29 - Mary Anne Schimmelpenninck, British Christian writer (b. 1778)
• August 30 - Gilbert Abbott à Beckett, English writer (b. 1811)