Blackbirding in the Pacific
Tens of thousands of islanders tricked onto plantations
From 1863 recruiters brought people from Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and other archipelagos to Queensland's sugar plantations. Some signed contracts they did not understand; others were lured aboard or kidnapped outright, hence the slang "blackbirding". Some 62,000 islanders were taken to Queensland. After 1901 the new Australian federation deported most of them.
Wikipedia (English) · 19th century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- 1845–1852 Great Famine in Ireland — 18 years earlier
- 1859 Darwin's On the Origin of Species — 4 years earlier
- 1861 Unification of Italy — 2 years earlier
- 1870–1871 Franco-Prussian War — 7 years later
- 1886 Benz's first automobile — 23 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1853–1856 Crimean War — 10 years earlier
- 1861 Emancipation of the serfs in Russia — 2 years earlier
- 1867 Alaska Purchase — 4 years later
- 1869 Tolstoy's War and Peace — 6 years later
- 1877 Premiere of Swan Lake — 14 years later
Middle East
- 1839 The Edict of Gülhane opens the Tanzimat — 24 years earlier
- 1839–1842 First Anglo-Afghan War — 24 years earlier
- 1876–1878 The first Ottoman constitution — 13 years later
Africa
- 1847 Liberia declares independence — 16 years earlier
- 1869 Opening of the Suez Canal — 6 years later
- 1879 Battle of Isandlwana — 16 years later
- 1885 The Mahdists take Khartoum — 22 years later
- 1885–1908 The Congo Free State — 22 years later
Asia
- 1853–1854 Commodore Perry's Black Ships — 10 years earlier
- 1868 Meiji Restoration — 5 years later
- 1876–1878 Great Famine in India — 13 years later
- 1883 Eruption of Krakatoa — 20 years later
- 1885 Founding of the Indian National Congress — 22 years later
Americas
- 1861–1865 American Civil War — 2 years earlier
- 1863 Emancipation Proclamation — same year
- 1864–1870 Paraguayan War — 1 year later
- 1876 Invention of the telephone — 13 years later
- 1879 Edison's incandescent lamp — 16 years later
Alive at the time
- Charles Darwin (aged 54)
- Abraham Lincoln (aged 54)
- Karl Marx (aged 45)
- Queen Victoria (aged 44)
- Fyodor Dostoevsky (aged 42)
- Leo Tolstoy (aged 35)
- Dmitri Mendeleev (aged 29)
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (aged 23)
- Thomas Edison (aged 16)
- Vincent van Gogh (aged 10)