1800 - Political Events

Political Events

The Convention of El Arish concluded by General Bonaparte with the Ottoman Turks January 24 provides for French withdrawal from Egypt (see 1799). Admiral George Keith Elphinstone, 54, Viscount Keith, rejects terms of the treaty; the Royal Navy's H.M.S. Queen Charlotte catches fire March 17, killing 700 people. General Kléber defeats the Turks at Heliopolis March 20 with a force of 10,000 men that is outnumbered six to one, but Kléber is assassinated by a Syrian fanatic at Cairo June 14 at age 47 and succeeded by General Abdullah Jacques Menou, a French convert to Islam (see 1801).

General Bonaparte advances through the St. Bernard Pass in the Alps with 40,000 men in May, taking just 6 days to accomplish what no army has done since Hannibal's Carthaginians made the alpine crossing in 218 B.C. (Bonaparte himself makes the journey in 1 day on a mule), but an Austrian army under the command of General Peter Ott defeats a French army under a General Thureau May 20 at Montebello in Italy.

Austrian troops starve Genoa into surrender June 4 after a 6-week siege in which General Masséna has bolstered the defenders' spirits and given Bonaparte time to get behind the enemy lines. Bonaparte wins a narrow victory June 14 at the Battle of Marengo, defeating Baron Michael Friedrich Benedikt von Melas, 71, and sustaining only about 6,000 casualties (dead and wounded) to the Austrians' 12,000. General Macdonald has won Napoleon's admiration by crossing the Splügen Pass from Switzerland into Lombardy, and Jean-Baptiste Bessières, 31, gains respect for his command of the consular guards, having fought with distinction at Abukir in Egypt last year as commander of Napoleon's escort. Melas signs a truce giving the French all Austrian fortresses west of the Mincio and south of the Po, and the Austrians evacuate most of northern Italy.

General Moreau takes Munich in July and goes on to gain a decisive victory over the archduke John three miles east of Munich December 3 in the Battle of Hohenlinden, even though the Austrians have about 70,000 men (50 infantry battalions, 140 cavalry squadrons) with 150 guns as compared to about 60,000 men in the French ranks (45 infantry battalions, 100 cavalry squadrons) with 100 guns. The French take 11,000 prisoners and capture 87 guns after killing or wounding 6,000 of the enemy, but cavalry officer Karl Philipp Schwarzenberg, 29, distinguishes himself by covering the Austrian withdrawal; French losses total 5,000 killed and wounded (see Treaty of Lunéville, 1801).

Paris authorities thwart a Jacobin conspiracy to assassinate the dictator Bonaparte.

An Anglo-Irish legislative union comes into effect August 1 following passage of an Act of Union that abolishes the Irish Pariament (see 1798), but many Irishmen press for Catholic emancipation and independence from Britain (see Catholic Association, 1823).

Former Hessian mercenary commander Wilhelm, freiherr von Knyphausen, dies at Kassel in Hesse-Kassel December 7 at age 84.

Russia's Czar Paul I issues a manifesto December 18 declaring the unilateral annexation of Kartalina-Kakhetia (eastern Georgia), abrogating the 1783 Treaty of Georgievsk (see 1801).

The Afghan king Zaman Shah's brother Mahmud, governor of Herat, receives men, money, and encouragement from Persia's Fath Ali Shah, takes Kandahar, and advances on Kabul (see 1793). Zaman Shah hurries home from India but is captured and handed over to Mahmud, who has him blinded and imprisoned.

Osei "The Whale" Bonshu assumes the Ashanti throne in West Africa and begins a reign as Asanthane (see 1712). The gold-encrusted throne has been received "from heaven" by fetish prophet Okomfo Anokye to create the sacred empire of the Ashanti (see 1822).

President Adams dismisses his secretary of state Timothy Pickering May 12. Now 54, Pickering will become chief justice of the Massachusetts Court of Common Pleas in 1802 and will serve as a congressman from Massachusetts from 1813 to 1817.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase and Judge Peters hold a second trial of John Fries at Philadelphia and sentence him to death on grounds of treason (see 1799). President Adams pardons Fries, and political opponents demand that Chase, now 59, be impeached (see 1805). Former associate justice John Rutledge dies at Charleston July 18 at age 60, having been insane in his final years.

U.S. Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth helps to conclude a new treaty with France that averts a war but resigns from the high court for reasons of health and returns from Paris to his native Connecticut (see Marshall, 1801).

Congress creates the Indiana Territory out of the western part of the Northwest Territory in the Division Act of May 7.

Spain returns the Louisiana Territory to France October 1, having received it by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. A secret agreement in the Treaty of San Ildefonso signed in 1796 has obliged her to give it back; France guarantees not to transfer the territory to any power other than Spain (but see Louisiana Purchase, 1803).

Former Continental Army major general Artemas Ward dies at his native Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, October 28 at age 72.

Thomas Jefferson wins 73 electoral votes in the presidential election, as compared to 65 for President Adams and 64 for Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina. New York lawyer Aaron Burr, now 44, also wins 73 electoral votes in a contest marked by unprecedented vitriol on both sides (Federalist newspapers have said that electing Jefferson would cause "teaching of murder, robbery, rape, adultery, and incest"), and the Federalists force the election into the House of Representatives in an effort to keep Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party out of power and make Burr president (see 1801).

Washington, D.C., succeeds New York as the U.S. capital, 123 federal government clerks have been moved to the new city during the summer, and Congress convenes at Washington for the first time November 17.