• French painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres.
• English prison reformer Elizabeth Fry.
• German mathematician August Leopold Crelle.
• Scottish mathematician and physicst Mary Somerville.
• German civil engineer and mathematics publisher August Crelle.
• German chemist Johann Döbereiner.
• Scottish poet William Laidlaw.
• Japanese arist Totoya Hokkei.
• Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz.

• Maria Theresa, Archduchess of Austria.
• English jurist and legal writer Sir William Blackstone.

• A hurricane desolates the Eastern Carribean, killing about 22,000 people.
• Bohemia and Hungary abolish serfdom.
• War of American Independence:
• Political Activity:
• (February 1) New York cedes all of its western land claims to Congress.
• (March 1) Pennsylvania passes a law to gradually abolish slavery in that state.
• Military Activity:
• (January 15) Major General Stirling crosses the frozen Arthur Kill with 3000 men onto Staten Island but is unable to attack because of the cold.
• (February 1) British forces under Major John Simcoe begin raids into New Jersey.
• (February 29) the Spanish under Bernardo de Galvez capture Fort Charlotte in West Florida, now Mobile, Alabama.
• (March) The Spanish governor of Louisiana, Antonio de Galvez, captures Fort Charlotte, now Mobile, Alabama, from the British.
• (May 2) British troops and Indian allies attack Cahokia, ans St. Louis.  George Rogers Clark rebuffs the Cahokia attack, and the British are unable to overcome St. Louis' defenses.
• (May 12) Charleston, South Carolina surrenders to the British.
• (June 17) British general Henry Clinton returns to New York City from the south.
• (June 24) Two settlements in Kentucky Ruddle's Fort and Martin's Fort, are takwen by British troops, loyalists and Indians. Those not killed outright are force-marched 600 miles to Detroit.
• (July 11) A French squadron arrives in Newport, Rhode Island.  On board is the Comte de Rochambeau leading 5000 French troops.
• (August 16) The Battle of Camden, South Carolina. General Horatio Gates' 4000 men march right into British and loyalist troops.  Gates retreats with 700 men left.
• (August 20) General Francis Marion rescues a Maryland regiment captured at Camden.
• (September 8) Lord Cornwallis invades North Carolina.
• (September 25) Benedict Arnold defects to the British, fleeing from West Point after learning that his contact, Major John Andre, has been captured, and that George Washington is about to arrive to inspect the defenses at West Point.
• (October 2) After the British refuse American offers to trade Major John Andre for Benedict Arnold, Andre is hanged as a spy.
• (October 7) The Battle of King's Mountain, North Carolina.  Hastily raised militia badly defeat a British force whose aim was to raise Loyalist militia.
• Denmark, Russia, and Sweden form a League of Armed Neutrality asserting that, in wartime,  neutral states may protect merchant ships with warships (and remain neutral).
• (June) Riots break out in London when Parliament masses a measure of toleration for Catholics
• José Gabriel Condorcanqui, called Tupac Amaru II, leads an Indian revolt against Spanish rule, which is quickly crushed.
• Japanese Emperor Go-Momozono comes of age, and takes "power" in his own right; his asunt Go-Sakuramachi loses her title of Empress Regent.
• (May 18) Smoke from forest fires blankets most of New England.
• Benjamin Franklin invents bifocal lenses. Where did he find the time?
• (October 27) There is a total eclipse of the Sun but an expedition sent by Harvard to view it miscalculates its location and sets up outside the path of totality.

1779 - 1780 - 1781