The 19th century began on January 1, 1801, and ended on December 31, 1900.
2
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1answer
217 views
How did the Filipinos lose the Philippine-American War? [closed]
The Americans were fighting a war thousands of miles away from their country, against the Filipinos who just won a war of independence against Spain. Change the Filipinos to Vietnamese and Spain to ...
5
votes
0answers
118 views
Who owned the ship Ensayo, and what were they doing near Baja California in 1842?
According to Plummer's The Shogun's Reluctant Ambassadors, in 1842, sea drifters from the Eijū-maru were picked up and by the Ensayo, a "Spanish pirate ship" with a Philippine crew. It was "carrying ...
1
vote
1answer
167 views
Can someone help me ID this insignia?
Charles Miller - fought with US Army at battle at Wounded Knee - this photographer took images during and after the Battle. Anyone recognize the insignia? He later became a Mason? Could it be from ...
10
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2answers
2k views
Time span of a decade
Wikipedia says that
The 21st century began on January 1, 2001 and will end on December 31, 2100.
The first decade of 21st century is the 2000s. Here Wikipedia says that
The 2000s was a decade ...
0
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0answers
26 views
Are there records of foreign leather brands in New England?
Throughout the 1800s New England was a major center of shoemaking, importing raw whole hides from Mexico and South America. Cattle raised in those regions were marked with hot brands. Their hides were ...
5
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2answers
116 views
Regional dominance of Sitka library
The Russian-American Company's directors were in St. Petersburg while its Chief Manager lived and worked in Sitka. The library there held "more than 1,200 books, valued at some 7,500 rubles. More than ...
2
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0answers
65 views
Charles Darwin's dog in 1858
What would have been the breed and name of Charles Darwin's dog at Down House in 1858?
The black and white retriever (Bob) which appears in a photo dated 1863, the Pomeranian (Snow) or someone else?
2
votes
2answers
218 views
Are there any surviving military textbooks from the Napoleonic era?
Napoleon attended school for military officers, so it stands to reason they would have some books around which they based their curriculum. Are there any complete and publicly available recordings of ...
4
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0answers
34 views
California rancho budget
This question is a source request for real or estimated annual account ledgers for ranchos in Mexican California.
Not much cash was used, so records are sparse. Most goods on the rancho were produced ...
6
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2answers
156 views
For steam trains, what kind of deaerator was used, if any?
Deaerators are things that remove dissolved gasses in water. Dissolved O2 and CO2 in water will result in boiler corrosion.
So I'm wondering how this was done back in the old days of steam trains, ...
22
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1answer
509 views
Was there a European response to the trail of tears?
This question is pretty straightforward. While looking into Victorian British beliefs about Americans and American history I began to wonder about European attitudes toward American Indians; and more ...
16
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3answers
590 views
How profitable was India for the British Empire in the 1800s?
I recently read Imperial Twilight, an excellent history of the opium wars. The author claims several times that while the British trade with China was very lucrative, India was by contrast "...
1
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0answers
54 views
What was the family relationship between British neo-Nazi politician John Tyndall and the 19th century physicist of the same name?
John Tyndall was a neo-Nazi British politician who chaired the National Front and who was the chairman of the British National Party from 1982 to 1999. According to his obituary in the Daily Telegraph,...
4
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0answers
66 views
Guadalupe Victoria's imprisonment
In 1821 Agustín Iturbide formed a ruling junta for newly independent Mexico that excluded his prominent fellow revolutionary officers. Near the end of 1821, Iturbide imprisoned several that may have ...
3
votes
1answer
166 views
How did steppe-nomad military tactics change in response to widespread firearms in the 18th/19th centuries?
Please forgive my ignorance of the cultures extant in the Eurasian steppe at this time, but I was wondering how the military tactics of steppe-cultures changed in response to the massed musket tactics ...
16
votes
1answer
326 views
How many British navy officers were from lower classes at the end of 18th century?
Helping my daughter with a presentation about Cook, I looked for English sources about his biography and was surprised to read that he was a son of a farmer hand - practically, the bottom of the lower ...
1
vote
0answers
61 views
Who were the earliest Californian university students?
In California's Spanish and Mexican eras there was not much formal education. The nearest university was that of Guadalajara, founded in 1792. The Híjar-Padrés colony of 1834 brought teachers who ...
2
votes
1answer
89 views
Travel route from UK to Boma (Congo territory) in the 1880s
I’m researching for a possible story on the Congo in the 1880s. I’m having a hard time establishing the route and time spent going from a port in England to Boma in the former unclaimed Congo ...
1
vote
1answer
88 views
Travelling to Germany in the 19th Century from London [duplicate]
The time period I'm working with is the 1890s, and try as I might I'm really struggling to find the details I need, specifically how long it would take to travel from London to Leipzig at that time.
...
10
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0answers
196 views
Was there self-censorship in private correspondence in the early 19th Century?
I've been reading collections of letters and journals (generally relating to the Napoleonic Wars) published in the first half of the 19th century. Often these contain words that have been partially ...
1
vote
1answer
240 views
Why was whale oil used instead of petroleum?
I just watched “In the Heart of the Sea” about Moby-Dick and Herman Melville. It seems a lot of labour and danger to kill whales to get oil for light and heating.
Wikipedia says petroleum was known ...
29
votes
1answer
4k views
What happened to these buildings near the Seine?
I was looking at these before after images and was concerned what happened to these beautiful buildings near the Seine in Paris. Were they destroyed in a war? Has there been any attempt to reconstruct ...
1
vote
0answers
65 views
Where did United States colleges rank internationally during the 19th century?
I have read that the USA was far behind Europe until maybe the 1930s. But just what were the limitations of US colleges prior to that?
EDIT: I realize there was unlikely to have been any published ...
2
votes
2answers
240 views
In what sense was marriage in 19th century Europe “expensive”?
I am reading Ibsen's play "Ghosts" (for fun), written in 1881, and in one of the scenes a conversation takes place between young Oswald, who had been living in Paris and Rome, and a conservative ...
1
vote
1answer
171 views
Is there any record of the premature obituary of Alfred Nobel?
It’s widely shared that Alfred Nobel, who posthumously founded the Nobel Prizes, had read a premature obituary about himself castigating him for his role in producing and trafficking deadly products, ...
5
votes
1answer
233 views
Was there a military practice of reloading while marching/running, in Europe or America during the 18th and 19th centuries?
This reenactor does a fine job of reloading a flintlock rifle while running. He is attempting to recreate something from the Indian Wars in America, in the 1770s. My question is about the historical ...
4
votes
3answers
300 views
Did armored cavalry have an advantage over unarmored cavalry in 18th/19th century?
Armor was being phased out during the 1500's as muskets capable of penetrating armor proliferated. By the 18th century, hardly any units on the European battlefields wore armor. Except for one - the ...
3
votes
2answers
285 views
How accurate was rocket artillery in the 18th and 19th centuries?
In the 1700s and 1800s, how accurate was rocket artillery in Europe (or Asia, if you prefer to speak of her)? Its accuracy is frequently made a joke, that rockets couldn't be relied on to hit their ...
5
votes
1answer
872 views
Handheld music player in the 1890s?
Perusing this gallery of candid photos from 1890s Oslo, Norway, by Carl Størmer (1872-1957), again I found such a curious image, yet was unable to verify the existence of any portable music player ...
-1
votes
1answer
382 views
Fatality Rate, in Andrew Carnegie's Steel Mills?
Between 1885 and 1900, what percentage of Andrew Carnegie's steel workers died on the job annually?
the Economist.
Fatal accidents in the steel mills, he calculates, accounted for 20% of all male ...
7
votes
1answer
215 views
How were ethnographic maps in the 19th century made?
Ethnographic maps are visual representations of the ethnic make up of particular regions. Usually multicultural regions which are controlled by an empire.
Here are some examples of ethnographic maps:...
0
votes
1answer
428 views
How public was sex in 1800s America?
In 1800s era one-room houses, how public was sex? Would parents try to find a place away from the kids or was it acceptable to simply do it in front of everyone? In what era did the idea of sex being ...
5
votes
1answer
169 views
How was 19th century ship tonnage reported?
I see the following in historical ship records: burthen 1050 75/95 tons. What does the "75/95" mean? I don't see anywhere else on the web where this question is answered.
4
votes
1answer
202 views
Why didn't France do a better job of “politically” protecting franc-tireurs during the Franco_Prussian War?
After France lost the battle of Sedan, some of the best defenses of French territory were conducted by franc-tireurs, or what we would call snipers, operating "American Revolution" style, civilians ...
1
vote
1answer
53 views
Why did Thomas Larkin write his biographical sketches?
Thomas Larkin, wealthy merchant of Monterey, California in the 1840s, was the consul of the United States. He was also a secret agent for President Buchanan who sent to Washington 78 microbiographies ...
4
votes
1answer
128 views
What did the Russian ambassador to Japan do during his trip to London?
The Nadezhda stopped September 28th, 1803 in Falmouth, Cornwall to obtain salt meat [Voyage Round the World in the Years 1803, 1804, 1805, & 1806, pp. 35]. Imperial ambassador to Japan Nikolai ...
2
votes
2answers
131 views
What was the sentiment regarding government control of railroads in Gilded-Age America?
I know this is a bit of a broad question, but what did leading thinkers and the American public think about government control of railroads as they were coming into widespread use post-Reconstruction? ...
7
votes
3answers
336 views
When did mature redwood trees become possible to harvest?
The Coast Redwood and the Giant Sequoia are related, massive, long-living softwood trees growing on the west coast of North America. Their wood is straight, resistant to pests, and easily splittable, ...
4
votes
1answer
77 views
What was Captain Vozdvit's real name?
The Russian-American Company and the Russian Imperial Navy, deeply connected shipbuilding and seafaring organizations, both employed lots of foreign captains.
In Richard A. Pierce's translation, K.T. ...
2
votes
0answers
63 views
Early criminal exile in Kamchatka
Exile in Siberia was a well-known punishment for criminals in Imperial (and Soviet) Russia. Exiles, who could be common criminals or political prisoners, were forced to walk in irons to their new job ...
29
votes
1answer
3k views
Anyone know what this stone building is?
It's located next to a beach and below a small hill. It has three sides and a large metal grid on top, on each of the three sides is an arch which tapers down toward a small opening on the ground. I ...
4
votes
0answers
110 views
How was city cleaning financed and organized in the late 19th century?
This answer about usage of horses contains a brief description of the situation of New York. Are there examples where city cleaning was done by firms or was the communal government responsible for ...
23
votes
2answers
4k views
What was life like for an adult Victorian chimney sweep?
What was life like for an adult Victorian chimney sweep?
I'm looking into my family history at the moment and my great-great-grandfather is listed on an 1881 census as a chimney sweep. I thought this ...
7
votes
3answers
2k views
How deadly was the Wild West?
I was passing through a few old "Wild West" towns in Wyoming and Montana and learning about the deadly history of the towns.
Surprisingly, I learned the Wild West period was only 30 years from 1865-...
33
votes
4answers
8k views
Did this “sledge rigged like a sloop” vehicle ever exist, or was it an invention of Jules Verne?
In Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days, the main character Phileas Fogg misses his train in the American north and ends up hitching a ride on a curious invention, as described here:
There ...
12
votes
1answer
552 views
Why was there little nonwhite migration to Europe in the 19th century?
Migration
This may sound like a strange question, but hear me out.
The 19th century was an age of massive population migration, perhaps the most significant in history according to this economic ...
4
votes
4answers
353 views
In the 19th century, what brought on a general election in the United Kingdom?
A quick scan of a list of British governments in the 19th century quickly reveals that, while terms of office were limited to seven years, most parliaments did not last so long. Instead the ...
3
votes
1answer
181 views
How did 19th century European nations arbitrate the process of colonization among themselves?
Background: During the 19th century the great powers of Europe colonized, and informally dominated, large portions areas of Asia, Africa, and (to a lesser extent) Central and South America. Often, as ...
10
votes
2answers
290 views
Who was a “gentleman” in USA in the times of Tom Sawyer?
Reading american books about that time, (mostly Mark Twain), I often met the term "gentleman". But what did it require to be "gentleman" these times in America? Were there some official definitions of ...
5
votes
3answers
875 views
How did the Crimean war change British society?
Background: My summer reading goal is to get a handle on Europe from 1850-1914, with a strong focus on the British Empire, and within that a focus on England. So far, I've seen multiple historians ...
