1877 - Definition and Overview

Events

January - April

• January 1 - Queen Victoria proclaimed Empress of India by the Royal Titles Act, introduced by United Kingdom Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli.
• January 8 - Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry (Montana)
• January 20 - Ottoman Turkey rejects proposals of internal reform and Balkan provisions - Conference of Constantinople ends
• March 2 - U.S. presidential election, 1876: The United States declares Rutherford B. Hayes the winner of the election even though Samuel J. Tilden had won the popular vote on November 7, 1876
• March 4 - Emile Berliner invents the microphone.
• March 4 - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake debuts
• March 15 - The first Test cricket match, between England and Australia
• April 24 - Russia declares war of Turkey

May - August

• May 6 - Realizing that his people were weakened by cold and hunger, Chief Crazy Horse of the Oglala Sioux surrenders to United States troops in Nebraska.
• May 8 - At Gilmore's Gardens in New York City, the first Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show opens (ends May 11).
• May 10 - Romania declares itself independent from Turkey (recognized in 1881 after the end of the Romanian independence war).
• May 16 - Romania declares war on Turkey
• June 15 - Henry Ossian Flipper becomes the first African American cadet to graduate from the United States Military Academy.
• June 26 - Eruption of Mount Cotopaxi in Ecuador causes severe mudflows that wipe out surrounding cities and valleys - 1000 dead
• June 30 - British Mediterranean fleet is sent to Besika Bay
• July 9 - All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club begins its first lawn tennis tournament at Wimbledon.
• July 21 - A day after bloody rioting in Baltimore from Baltimore and Ohio Railroad workers and the deaths of 9 rail workers at the hands of the Maryland militia, workers in Pittsburgh stage a sympathy strike that is met with an assault by the state militia - Pittsburgh then erupts into widespread rioting.
• August 9 - Indian Wars: Battle of Big Hole - Near Big Hole River in Montana, a small band of Nez Percé Indians who refused government orders to move to a reservation, clash with the United States Army. The army lost 29 soldiers and Indians lost 89 warriors in a US Army win.
• August 12 - Asaph Hall discovers Deimos, outer moon of Mars.
• August 17 - Arizona blacksmith F.P. Cahill is fatally wounded by Billy the Kid. Cahill will die the next day, becoming the first person killed by the Kid.
• August 18 - Asaph Hall discovers Phobos, inner moon of Mars.

Septemeber - December

• September 5 - Indian Wars: Oglala Sioux chief Crazy Horse is bayoneted by a United States soldier after resisting confinement in a guardhouse at Fort Robinson in Nebraska.
• October 10 - Following the recovery of Lieutenant-Colonel George Armstrong Custer's body from where he fell during the Battle of Little Big Horn the previous year, Custer is given a funeral with full military honors and is laid to rest at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York.
• November 21 - Thomas Edison announces his invention of the phonograph, a machine that can record sound (this is considered to be Edison's first great invention) (Edison demonstrated the device for the first time on November 29).
• December 14 - Serbia restates its previous declaration of war against Turkey

Unknown date

• War between Russia and the Ottoman Empire (Russo-Turkish War), leading to the formation of Bulgaria in 1878. See Russian Foreign Affairs after the Crimean War.
• Nineteenth Century magazine founded.

Births

• February 17 - André Maginot, politician, Maginot Line (d. 1932)
• February 19 - Gabriele Münter, painter, member of Blaue Reiter (d. 1962)
• February 25 - Erich von Hornbostel, musicologist (d. 1935)
• March 2 - Consuelo Vanderbilt, Duchess of Marlborough (d. 1964)
• March 16 - Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Iran (d. 1944)
• March 18 - Edgar Cayce, psychic (d. 1945)
• June 14 - Jane Bathori, opera singer (d. 1970)
• July 2 - Hermann Hesse, writer (d. 1962)
• July 6 - Arnaud Massy, champion golfer (d. 1950)
• July 13 - Erik Scavenius, Danish prime minister (d. 1962)
• July 17 - Ernst von Dohnanyi, Hungarian conductor (d. 1960)
• August 7 - Ulrich Salchow, Swedish figure skater (d. 1949)
• September 6 - Buddy Bolden, jazz musician (d. 1930)
• November 9 - Allama Iqbal, philosopher-poet (d. 1938)
• November 26 - Alfred Cortot, Swiss pianist (d. 1962)
• December 3 - Richard Pearse, airplane pioneer (d. 1953)
• Alois Kayser, German missionary, working on Nauru (d. 1944)

Deaths

• January 4 - Cornelius Vanderbilt, entrepreneur
• January 21 - Diamond Bessie Moore, prostitute
• August 29 - Brigham Young, Mormon leader (b. 1801)
• September 2 - Constantine Kanaris - Greek politician
• September 5 - Crazy Horse, Chief of the Oglala Sioux.
• October 16 - Theodore Barrière, French dramatist