1895January 5 – Dreyfus affair: French officer Alfred Dreyfus is stripped of his army rank, and sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil's Island. January 12 – The National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty is founded in England by Octavia Hill, Robert Hunter and Canon Hardwicke Rawnsley. January 13 – First Italo-Ethiopian War: Battle of Coatit – Italian forces defeat the Ethiopians. January 17 – Félix Faure is elected President of the French Republic, after the resignation of Jean Casimir-Perier.
December 2536 – Forces of Emperor Guangwu of the Eastern Han, under the command of Wu Han, conquer the separatist Chengjia empire, reuniting China. 274 – A temple to Sol Invictus is dedicated in Rome by Emperor Aurelian. 333 – Roman Emperor Constantine the Great elevates his youngest son Constans to the rank of Caesar. 336 – First documentary sign of Christmas celebration in Rome. 350 – Vetranio meets Constantius II at Naissus (Serbia) and is forced to abdicate his imperial title. Constantius allows him to live as a private citizen on a state pension.
1894January 4 – A military alliance is established between the French Third Republic and the Russian Empire. January 7 – William Kennedy Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film in the United States. January 9 – New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard, in Lexington, Massachusetts. February 12 French anarchist Émile Henry sets off a bomb in a Paris café, killing one person and wounding twenty.
1891January 1 A strike of 500 Hungarian steel workers occurs; 3,000 men are out of work as a consequence. Germany takes formal possession of its new African territories. January 4 – The Earl of Zetland issues a declaration regarding the famine in the western counties of Ireland. January 5 The Australian shearers' strike, that leads indirectly to the foundation of the Australian Labor Party, begins. A fight between the United States and Indians breaks out near Pine Ridge agency.
1900As of March 1 (O.S. February 17), when the Julian calendar acknowledged a leap day and the Gregorian calendar did not, the Julian calendar fell one day further behind, bringing the difference to 13 days until February 28 (O.S. February 15), 2100. The year 1900 also marked the Year of the Rat on the Chinese calendar. January 1900 January 2 – U.S. Secretary of State John Hay announces the Open Door Policy, to promote American trade with China. January 3 – The United States Census estimates the country's population to be about 70 million people.
1888In Germany, 1888 is known as the Year of the Three Emperors. Currently, it is the year that, when written in Roman numerals, has the most digits (13). The next year that also has 13 digits is the year 2388. The record will be surpassed as late as 2888, which has 14 digits. January 3 – The 91-centimeter telescope at Lick Observatory in California is first used. January 12 – The Schoolhouse Blizzard hits Dakota Territory, the states of Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas, leaving 235 dead, many of them children on their way home from school.
1899January 1 Spanish rule ends in Cuba, concluding 400 years of the Spanish Empire in the Americas. Queens and Staten Island become administratively part of New York City. January 2 Bolivia sets up a customs office in Puerto Alonso, leading to the Brazilian settlers there to declare the Republic of Acre in a revolt against Bolivian authorities. The first part of the Jakarta Kota–Anyer Kidul railway on the island of Java is opened between Batavia Zuid (Jakarta Kota) and Tangerang.
1918This year is noted for the end of the First World War, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, as well as for the Spanish flu pandemic that killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix. January 1918 January – 1918 flu pandemic: The "Spanish flu" (influenza) is first observed in Haskell County, Kansas. January 4 – The Finnish Declaration of Independence is recognized by Soviet Russia, Sweden, Germany and France. January 9 – Battle of Bear Valley: U.
1905As the second year of the massive Russo-Japanese War begins, more than 100,000 die in the largest world battles of that era, and the war chaos leads to the 1905 Russian Revolution against Nicholas II of Russia (Shostakovich's 11th Symphony is subtitled The Year 1905 to commemorate this) and the start of Revolution in the Kingdom of Poland. Canada and the U.S. expand west, with the Alberta and Saskatchewan provinces and the founding of Las Vegas.
1884January 4 – The Fabian Society is founded in London. January 5 – Gilbert and Sullivan's Princess Ida premières at the Savoy Theatre, London. January 18 – William Price attempts to cremate his dead baby son, Iesu Grist, in Wales. Later tried and acquitted on the grounds that cremation is not contrary to English law, he is thus able to carry out the ceremony (the first in the United Kingdom in modern times) on March 14, setting a legal precedent. February 1 – A New English Dictionary on historical principles, part 1 (edited by James A.
