The Pastry War
France blockades Mexico over a looted pastry shop
A French pastry chef, Remontel, complained to his king that Mexican officers had looted his shop and demanded 60,000 pesos, though it was worth under 1,000. In 1838 France, adding other claims, billed Mexico 600,000 pesos and blockaded its ports. The war took the baker's name.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 19th century
Did you know
Mexico's General Santa Anna buried his own leg with full military honours. He lost it in 1838 in the Pastry War, to French grapeshot near Veracruz. Share →
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- 1814–1815 Congress of Vienna — 24 years earlier
- 1833 Abolition of slavery in the British Empire — 5 years earlier
- 1839 Birth of photography: the daguerreotype — 1 year later
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- 1861 Unification of Italy — 23 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1853–1856 Crimean War — 15 years later
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Africa
- c. 1835–1846 The Great Trek — 3 years earlier
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Asia
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- c. 1831 Hokusai's Great Wave off Kanagawa — 7 years earlier
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- 1850–1864 Taiping Rebellion — 12 years later
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Oceania
- 1851 The Australian gold rushes — 13 years later
Alive at the time
- Charles Darwin (aged 29)
- Abraham Lincoln (aged 29)
- Karl Marx (aged 20)
- Queen Victoria (aged 19)
- Fyodor Dostoevsky (aged 17)
- Leo Tolstoy (aged 10)
- Dmitri Mendeleev (aged 4)
- Katsushika Hokusai (aged 78)
- Andrew Jackson (aged 71)
- Muhammad Ali of Egypt (aged 69)