# 1859 in the United States

Events from the year 1859 in the United States.

## Incumbents
### Federal government

* President: James Buchanan (D-Pennsylvania)
* Vice President: John C. Breckinridge (D-Kentucky)
* Chief Justice: Roger B. Taney (Maryland)
* Speaker of the House of Representatives: James Lawrence Orr (D-South Carolina)
* Congress: 35th (until March 4), 36th (starting March 4)
* Governors and lieutenant governors
* Governors
* Governor of Alabama: Andrew B. Moore (Democratic)
* Governor of Arkansas: Elias Nelson Conway (Democratic)
* Governor of California: John B. Weller (Democratic)
* Governor of Connecticut: William A. Buckingham (Republican)
* Governor of Delaware: Peter F. Causey (Know Nothing) (until January 18), William Burton (Democratic) (starting January 18)
* Governor of Florida: Madison S. Perry (Democratic)
* Governor of Georgia: Joseph E. Brown (Democratic)
* Governor of Illinois: William Henry Bissell (Republican)
* Governor of Indiana: Ashbel P. Willard (Democratic)
* Governor of Iowa: Ralph P. Lowe (Republican)
* Governor of Kentucky: Charles S. Morehead (Know Nothing) (until August 30), Beriah Magoffin (Democratic) (starting August 30)
* Governor of Louisiana: Robert C. Wickliffe (Democratic)
* Governor of Maine: Lot M. Morrill (Democratic)
* Governor of Maryland: Thomas H. Hicks (Know Nothing)/(Republican)
* Governor of Massachusetts: Nathaniel Prentice Banks (Republican)
* Governor of Michigan: Kinsley S. Bingham (Republican) (until January 5), Moses Wisner (Republican) (starting January 5)
* Governor of Minnesota: Henry H. Sibley (Democratic)
* Governor of Mississippi: William McWillie (Democratic) (until November 21), John J. Pettus (Democratic) (starting November 21)
* Governor of Missouri: Robert Marcellus Stewart (Democratic)
* Governor of New Hampshire: William Haile (Republican) (until June 2), Ichabod Goodwin (Republican) (starting June 2)
* Governor of New Jersey: William A. Newell (Republican)
* Governor of New York: Edwin D. Morgan (Republican) (starting January 1)
* Governor of North Carolina: Thomas Bragg (Democratic) (until January 1), John Willis Ellis (Democratic) (starting January 1)
* Governor of Ohio: Salmon P. Chase (Republican)
* Governor of Oregon: George Law Curry (Democratic) (until March 3), John Whiteaker (Democratic) (starting March 3)
* Governor of Pennsylvania: William F. Packer (Democratic)
* Governor of Rhode Island: Elisha Dyer (Republican) (until May 31), Thomas G. Turner (Republican) (starting May 31)
* Governor of South Carolina: William Henry Gist (Democratic)
* Governor of Tennessee: Isham G. Harris (Democratic)
* Governor of Texas: Hardin R. Runnels (Democratic) (until December 31), Sam Houston (Independent) (starting December 31)
* Governor of Vermont: Hiland Hall (Republican)
* Governor of Virginia: Henry A. Wise (Democratic)
* Governor of Wisconsin: Alexander W. Randall (Republican)
* Lieutenant governors
* Lieutenant Governor of California: John Walkup (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Connecticut: Julius Catlin (Republican)
* Lieutenant Governor of Illinois: John Wood (Republican)
* Lieutenant Governor of Indiana: Abram A. Hammond (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Iowa: Oran Faville (Republican)
* Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky:
* until month and day unknown: vacant
* month and day unknown: Linn Boyd (political party unknown)
* starting month and day unknown: vacant
* Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana: William F. Griffin (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts: Eliphalet Trask (political party unknown)
* Lieutenant Governor of Michigan: George Coe (Republican) (until January 5), Edmund B. Fairfield (Republican) (starting January 5)
* Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota: William Holcombe (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Missouri: Hancock Lee Jackson (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of New York: Robert Campbell (Republican) (starting January 1)
* Lieutenant Governor of Ohio: Martin Welker (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Rhode Island: Thomas G. Turner (political party unknown) (until May 31), Isaac Saunders (political party unknown) (starting May 31)
* Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina: M. E. Carn (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Texas: Francis R. Lubbock (Democratic) (until December 21), Edward Clark (Democratic) (starting December 21)
* Lieutenant Governor of Vermont: Burnham Martin (Republican)
* Lieutenant Governor of Virginia: William Lowther Jackson (Democratic)
* Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin: Erasmus D. Campbell (Democratic)

## Events
### January–March

* January 1 – Minting of Indian Head cent begins.
* January 10 – Lucy Cobb Institute opens in Athens, Georgia.
* January 28 – The city of Olympia is incorporated in the Territory of Washington.
* February 14 – Oregon is admitted as the 33rd U.S. state (see History of Oregon).
* February 27 – U.S. Congressman Daniel Sickles shoots dead Philip Barton Key for having an affair with his wife.
* March 2–3 – The Great Slave Auction, the largest single sale of slaves in U.S. history, with more than 400 people sold, takes place near Savannah, Georgia.
* March 21 – The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania issues the charter establishing the Zoological Society of Philadelphia, the first organization of its kind in the United States and founder of the nation's first zoo.

### April–June

* April 4 – Bryant's Minstrels premiere the minstrel song "Dixie" (probably written by Dan Emmett) at Mechanics' Hall in New York City as part of their blackface show.
* April 20 – Daniel E. Sickles, a New York Congressman, is acquitted of the murder of Philip Barton Key on grounds of temporary insanity. The case marked the first successful use of the "temporary insanity" legal defense.
* June 8 – The discovery of the Comstock Lode in the western Utah Territory (present-day Nevada) sets off a rush of prospectors to the area.
* June 15 – The so-called Pig War border dispute between the Americans and the British on the San Juan Islands begins with the shooting of the namesake pig; the episode is resolved in October without human bloodshed.

### July–September

* July – Pike's Peak Gold Rush begins in the Colorado Territory.
* July 1 – The first intercollegiate baseball game is played, between Amherst and Williams Colleges.
* August 1 – Andrew B. Moore is reelected the 16th governor of Alabama defeating William F. Samford.
* August 27 – Edwin Drake drills the first oil well in the United States, near Titusville, Pennsylvania, starting the Pennsylvanian oil rush.
* September – Joshua Abraham Norton proclaims himself "Emperor of the United States" in San Francisco.

### October–December

* October 16 – Militant abolitionist leader John Brown raids the Harpers Ferry Armory in Harper's Ferry, Virginia, in an unsuccessful bid to spark a general slave rebellion.
* October 18 – Troops under Colonel Robert E. Lee overpower John Brown at the Federal arsenal.
* November 1 – The current Cape Lookout, North Carolina, lighthouse is lighted for the first time (its first-order Fresnel lens can be seen for 19 miles).
* December 2 – John Brown is hanged at Charles Town, West Virginia for his October 16 raid on Harpers Ferry.

### Undated

* The Rancho Rincon de Los Esteros Land Grant is confirmed to Rafael Alvisa (part of modern-day Santa Clara County, California).
* The University of Michigan Law School is founded.

### Ongoing

* Bleeding Kansas (1854–1860)

## Births

* January 6 – Duncan U. Fletcher, U.S. Senator from Florida from 1909 to 1936 (died 1936)
* January 9 – Carrie Chapman Catt, women's suffrage leader (died 1947)
* January 12 – Henry Heitfeld, U.S. Senator from Idaho from 1897 to 1903 (died 1938)
* January 25 – Lillie Eginton Warren, educator (year of death unknown)
* January 29 – Virginie Amélie Avegno Gautreau, née Avegno, society beauty (died 1915 in France)
* February 6 – Elias Disney, farmer, father of Walt Disney (died 1941)
* February 22 – Samuel D. Nicholson, U.S. Senator from Colorado from 1921 to 1923 (died 1923)
* February 25 – John Burke, 24th Treasurer of the United States (died 1937)
* March 12 – Abraham H. Cannon, Mormon apostle (died 1896)
* March 21 – Abbie Pratt, golfer (died 1938 in France)
* April 12 – Junius George Groves, slave-born potato farmer (died 1925)
* May 12 – William Alden Smith, U.S. Senator from Michigan from 1907 to 1919 (died 1932)
* June 29 – Margaret Ashmore Sudduth, educator, editor and temperance advocate (died 1957)
* July 13 – Marion Manville Pope, author (died 1930)
* July 31 – Theobald Smith, bacteriologist (died 1934)
* August 15 – Charles Comiskey, baseball baseman, manager and owner (died 1931)
* August 28 – Matilda Howell, archer (died 1938)
* September 16 – Frank R. Gooding, U.S. Senator from Idaho from 1921 to 1928 (died 1928)
* September 17 – Billy The Kid, Old West gunfighter (died 1881)
* October 20 – John Dewey, educator born in Vermont (died 1952)
* November 1 – Charles Brantley Aycock, 50th Governor of North Carolina (died 1912)
* December 20 – Adaline Hohf Beery, songbook compiler (died 1929)

## Deaths

* January 28 – William H. Prescott, Hispanist historian (born 1796)
* January 29 – William Cranch Bond, astronomer (born 1789)
* February 25 – Edward A. Hannegan, U.S. Senator from Indiana from 1843 to 1849 (born 1807)
* February 27 – Philip Barton Key II, United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, murdered (born 1818)
* March 19 – Oliver H. Smith, U.S. Senator from Indiana from 1837 to 1843 (born 1794)
* March 30 – James Matthews Legaré, poet and inventor (born 1823)
* April 14 – George M. Bibb, U.S. Senator from Kentucky from 1811 to 1814 (born 1776)
* June 8 – Walter Hunt, inventor (born 1796)
* July 30 – Richard Rush, 8th United States Attorney General and 8th United States Secretary of the Treasury (born 1780)
* August 2 – Horace Mann, educator and abolitionist (born 1796)
* August 15 – Nathaniel Claiborne, politician (born 1777)
* September 2 – Delia Bacon, playwright and writer on the Shakespeare authorship question (born 1811)
* September 16 – David C. Broderick, U.S. Senator from California from 1857 to 1859 (born 1820)
* November 28 – Washington Irving, author (born 1783)
* November 29 – William Hale, soldier, politician and the first mayor of Peoria, Illinois (b. 1783)
* December 2 – John Brown, abolitionist, hanged (born 1800)