Introduction – 1847: The year it all began
January
New Year’s Day, 1847
Monday 4 January 1847 – The Comanche Warriors and the Free-Thinking Germans
January – Macau – The Birth of the Gaming Industry
February
Sunday 7 February 1847 – The Opium King and the Apostle of Temperance
Tuesday 9 February 1847 – An Alabaman reflects upon New Orleans
Friday 12 February 1847 – General Tom Thumb and the Prince of Humbugs
March
Monday 1 March 1847 – Lola Montez and the King of Bavaria
Friday 5 March 1847 – Stephen Collins Foster: ‘Oh! Susanna, don’t you cry for me’
Tuesday 9 March 1847 – Mary Anning: The Girl who liked Dinosaurs
Saturday 13 March 1847 – The Curse of Ignaz Semmelweis
Saturday 20 March 1847 – Pablo Fanque and Mr Kite
Tuesday 23 March 1847 – The Choctaw Nation and the Great Famine
April
Saturday 3 April 1847 – Frederick Douglass faces home
Sunday 4 April 1847 – The Don Pacifico Affair – An Episode in Gunboat Diplomacy
Thursday 15 April 1847 – The Bombardment of Tourane, Vietnam
Saturday 17 April 1847 – The Birth of Cartier
Thursday 22 April 1847 – The Rise and Fall of Khan Kenesary of Kazakhtsan
Wednesday 28 April 1847 – Captain Baxter and the Barnstable Boys
May
Tuesday 4 May 1847 – Felix Mendelssohn and the Swedish Nightingale
Saturday 8 May 1847 – ‘Oh Give Me But Employ’
June
Tuesday 1 June 1847 – Dr Fabre-Tonnerre’s Polynesian dictionary
Tuesday 8 June 1847 – Sultan Abdülmecid: A Tale of Pianos, Telegraphs, Etiquette and Hunger
Thursday 10 June 1847 – The Birth of the Chicago Tribune
Friday 11 June 1847 – Death in the Arctic: The Franklin Expedition
Wednesday 30 June 1847 – Thomas Gray and the Dred Scott Case
July
Saturday 24 July 1847 – Mormons on the March: Of Roadometers, Choirs and Baseball
Thursday 29 July 1847 – Edward Lear and the Two Sicilys
August
Monday 2 August 1847 – Herald and Pandora: A Chronicle of Panama belles, Irish Colonies and Giant Tortoises
September
Wednesday 1 September 1847 – Johann Gramp’s succulent vines
Monday 13 September – Mexico has Fallen, or How the USA Grew by a Third
Friday 17 September 1847 – The Tsar’s bizarre circus war
Wednesday 22 September 1847 – Royal Scandal in the House of Bourbon
Saturday 25 September 1847 – Extracts from the Norfolk News
Autumn: Anthony Trollope’s Epiphany
October
Saturday 2 October 1847 – A Messianic Earthquake
Tuesday 12 October 1847 – Werner Siemens and the gutta-percha tree
November
Tuesday 2 November 1847 – Captain Hanson Gregory, doughnut inventor
Thursday 4 November 1847 – Of Chloroform and Ether
Saturday 20 November 1847 – Abide with Me: Henry Lyte
Sunday 28 November 1847 – Murder in Roscommon – The Assassinations of the Rev. John Lloyd and Major McMahon
December
Friday 3 December 1847 – O Holy Night
Sunday 12 December 1847 – Camila O’Gorman and the Jesuit
Christmas Day, 1847 – Tom Smith – The King of Crackers
Christmas Day, 1847 – Richard Burton’s simian dictionary
Appendices
The new house at Lisnavagh
Literary Notes
Captain McClintock Bunbury’s Diary, 1847
Benjamin Benson – A Bermudan Evangelical in Ireland
Sultan Abdülmecid and the Relief of Drogheda
The Rebellion of Eset Kotibarov (1847–58)
Empress Maria of Russia – The Lady of Tears
Acknowledgements
Further Reading