1812
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1 January 1812 The new Civil Code goes into effect in the Austrian Empire.
After attempts at reconciliation by their mutual friend, Dr. Benjamin Rush, John Adams writes to Thomas Jefferson for the first time in eleven years. Their correspondence over their waning years will be among the most important in American political history.
At the approach of a royalist army, the Mexican Congress quits Zitácuaro for Sultepec.
2 January 1812 A royalist army fights its way into Zitácuaro, taking the town at heavy loss to the defenders. The town is then sacked and burned.
5 January 1812 French forces surrounding Valencia begin to bombard the city.
8 January 1812 The Spanish defenders of Valencia surrender to the surrounding French. At the same time, British and Portuguese troops surround the French in Ciudad Rodrigo.
Sigismond Fortuné François Thalberg is born in Pâquis near Geneva, the son of Joseph Thalberg and Fortunée Stein. It is possible that his parents are presently married to others.
Gioachino Rossini’s (19) farsa L’inganno felice to words of Foppa after Palomba is performed for the first time, in Teatro San Moisè, Venice. The work is very successful with critics and public.
9 January 1812 France reoccupies Swedish Pomerania.
10 January 1812 The first Mississippi steamboat, a side-wheeler named the New Orleans, reaches its namesake city. It left Pittsburgh, where it was built, on 20 October.
13 January 1812 The publication of Jan Ladislav Dussek’s (51) Two Duos for piano and harp C.257-258 is entered at Stationers’ Hall, London.
15 January 1812 Johannes Herbst dies in Salem, North Carolina aged 76 years, five months and 23 days.
16 January 1812 British Foreign Secretary Lord Wellesley resigns claiming Prime Minister Spencer Perceval is not prosecuting the war vigorously enough.
17 January 1812 After a successful performance in Leipzig, Carl Maria von Weber (25) and Heinrich Baermann leave the city following an invitation to Gotha.
19 January 1812 Allied (UK-Portugal-Spain) troops capture the French garrison at Ciudad Rodrigo, 85 km southwest of Salamanca.
22 January 1812 A third regency is set up in Spain to rule for King Fernando VII in opposition to the French.
23 January 1812 A third earthquake along the lower Mississippi River occurs in the vicinity of New Madrid, Missouri.
26 January 1812 France annexes Andorra.
5 February 1812 After some private performances and one public concert in Weimar, Carl Maria von Weber (25) and Heinrich Baermann arrive in Dresden.
6 February 1812 José García de León y Pizarro replaces Eusebio Bardají y Azara as First Secretary of State of the resistance government of Spain
7 February 1812 After three major earthquakes and numerous aftershocks in the last two months, a fourth earthquake, estimated at 8.0 on the Richter scale, hits New Madrid, Missouri and destroys most of the town.
9 February 1812 Incidental music for Kotzebue’s plays The Ruins of Athens and King Stephen by Ludwig van Beethoven (41) is performed for the first time, at the opening of the Pest Theatre.
11 February 1812 The first Vienna performance of the Piano Concerto no.5 “Emperor” by Ludwig van Beethoven (41) takes place, Carl Czerny (20) at the keyboard.
15 February 1812 Due to tensions between France and Russia, and his pending divorce proceedings, Adrien Boieldieu (36) writes to Tsar Alyeksandr from Paris that he must resign his position as Kapellmeister.
The United States claims the Oregon Territory.
17 February 1812 As they approach Cuautla, south of Mexico City, a royalist army is attacked from the rear by insurgent cavalry. They successfully repulse them.
18 February 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (25) and Heinrich Baermann perform a private recital for the royal family in Dresden. Their public performance in Dresden is not successful, as Weber’s music is compared to that of Louis Spohr (27) and found lacking.
19 February 1812 Royalists attack Cuautla making significant gains but are ultimately driven back with heavy losses.
20 February 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (25) arrives in Berlin on his concert tour with Heinrich Joseph Baermann and stays at the home of the parents of his fellow student Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (20).
24 February 1812 Prussia signs a treaty of alliance with France. The treaty also binds Prussia to allow the free passage of French troops and to provide 20,000 Prussian troops for use with France. Prussia also adheres to the Continental System.
27 February 1812 George Gordon, Lord Byron makes his maiden speech before the House of Lords. He supports the Luddites and denounces a bill providing for the death penalty in the case of rebellious workers.
2 March 1812 George Gordon, Lord Byron publishes his Ode to the Framers of the Frame Bill anonymously in the Morning Chronicle. It lambastes the authors of a bill before the Parliament which provides the death penalty for rebellious workers destroying property.
5 March 1812 Spanish forces lay siege to Cuautla, held by Mexican revolutionaries.
8 March 1812 Georg Joseph Vogler (62) and his student Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (20) depart Darmstadt for a journey to Munich.
10 March 1812 Lord Byron publishes the first two cantos of his Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. The sensation is immediate and widespread and establishes Byron in the mind of the public. He will later remark, “I awoke one morning and found myself famous.”
11 March 1812 The following decree is issued in Prussia: “Jews and their families presently residing in our States and in possession of general privileges, patents of naturalization, letters of protection, and concessions are considered inhabitants and citizens of Prussia.”
12 March 1812 The Spanish Cortes passes a liberal constitution in Cadiz. This will become the manifesto for Spanish liberals through a great part of the nineteenth century.
14 March 1812 Fearful of Russian expansion, Austria concludes a military alliance with France, agreeing to provide an army for Napoléon.
Cirio in Babilonia, ossia La caduta di Baldassare, a dramma con cori by Gioachino Rossini (20) to words of Aventi, is performed, probably for the first time, in the Teatro Comunale, Ferrara. It is a flop.
16 March 1812 Emperor Napoléon appoints his brother Joseph, King José I of Spain, as commander in chief of all the French armies in Iberia.
An allied (Great Britain-Portugal) army reaches the French-held fortress of Badajoz in Extremadura, Spain.
19 March 1812 The Spanish Constitution of 1812 is proclaimed and published in Cadiz. It is liberal and supports universal suffrage and a constitutional monarchy under King Fernando VII.
20 March 1812 Jan Ladislav Dussek dies of gout at either St. Germain-en-Laye or Paris, aged 52 years, one month and eight days. The place of burial is not now known.
22 March 1812 Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel dates the preface to the first part of his Wissenschaft der Logik in Nuremberg.
25 March 1812 Publication of the Twelve Dances for piano op.44 by Johann Nepomuk Hummel (33) is announced in the Wiener Zeitung.
Samuel Wesley (46) and his wife Charlotte Louisa Martin Wesley execute a deed of separation.
26 March 1812 An earthquake strikes Caracas, killing 20,000 people. In a strange coincidence, almost all deaths and destruction are confined to those areas supporting the revolution. Loyalist districts are untouched.
30 March 1812 The allied army surrounding Badajoz begins bombarding the fortress.
1 April 1812 Count Nikolay Ivanovich Saltykov replaces Prince Mikhail Barclay de Tolly as Chairman of the Committee of Ministers of Russia.
4 April 1812 US President James Madison signs a 90-day embargo on British trade.
Jean de Paris, an opéra comique by Adrien Boieldieu (36) to words of Saint-Just, is performed for the first time, at the Théâtre Feydeau, Paris, his first production since returning to Paris from St. Petersburg.
5 April 1812 An alliance between Russia and Sweden is signed in St. Petersburg. Russia promises 30,000 men to fight the French in Germany in return for the guarantee that Sweden will get Norway.
Royalists arrive at Huajuapan (Oaxaca, Mexico) and institute a siege of the rebel defenders.
6 April 1812 British and Portuguese troops capture the fortress and city of Badajoz, in Extremadura, from a combined garrison of French, Spanish and Hessians. The victors visit plunder, rape and murder on the citizens.
9 April 1812 09:30 José Antonio Aponte and other leaders of an uprising of Blacks in Cuba are hanged at La Punta near Havana. His head is placed in an iron cage and displayed in front of the house where he lived. The heads the other leaders are also displayed.
11 April 1812 About 100 Luddites attack Rawfold’s Mill in Liversedge, Yorkshire. Four men are killed by the local militia.
20 April 1812 Several thousand Luddites assemble in Middleton, near Manchester, and march on a cotton factory protesting the power looms. Guards fire into the crowd killing two and wounding 20, two mortally.
21 April 1812 Over 100 men armed with muskets and other weapons join the protesters at Middleton, near Manchester. They urge the guards at the cotton mill to give battle. The guards refuse.
Palestine, an oratorio by William Crotch (36) to words of Heber, is performed for the first time, in the Hanover Square Rooms, London. The capacity audience is so positive, the work will be repeated on 26 May.
22 April 1812 Friedrich replaces Viktor II as Prince of Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym.
23 April 1812 IN the face of royalist advances, the rebel congress of Venezuela grants dictatorial powers to Francisco de Miranda.
25 April 1812 Georg Joseph Vogler (62) and Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (20) arrive in Munich from Darmstadt.
28 April 1812 Yorkshire mill owner William Horsfall is murdered by Luddites.
30 April 1812 Louisiana becomes the 18th state of the United States.
2 May 1812 After a two-month siege, their stores completely depeleted, Mexican revolutionaries in Cuautla make a desperate break out attempt. In heavy fighting, many escape but their army is dispersed.
5 May 1812 Ludwig II replaces August Christian Friedrich as Duke of Anhalt-Köthen.
Dies Haus is zu verkaufen, a singspiel by Johann Nepomuk Hummel (33) to words of Klebe after Duval, is performed for the first time, at the Leopoldstadt Theater, Vienna.
9 May 1812 Napoléon leaves Paris for his invasion of Russia.
La scala di seta, a farsa comica by Gioachino Rossini (20) to words of Foppa after Planard, is performed for the first time, in Teatro San Moisè, Venice. It is one of three works performed tonight.
11 May 1812 British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval, walking through the lobby of the House of Commons, is confronted by John Bellingham who draws a pistol and shoots him point blank through the heart. Perceval dies immediately. Bellingham blames the Prime Minister’s policies for his own financial difficulties. Perceval is succeeded by Lord Liverpool.
12 May 1812 Ignacio de la Pezuela y Sánchez replaces José García de León y Pizarro as First Secretary of State of the resistance government of Spain.
16 May 1812 Emperor Napoléon and Empress Marie Louise of France arrive in Dresden accompanied by a torchlight parade. Also in attendance are the various German kings, Friedrich August I of Saxony, Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia, Maximilian I of Bavaria, Friedrich I of Württemberg, and Hieronymus Napoléon (Jérôme Bonaparte) of Westphalia.
18 May 1812 Amidst celebrations by night and military preparations by day, the Emperor and Empress of Austria arrive in Dresden.
John Bellingham is hanged in front of Newgate Prison for the murder of Prime Minister Spencer Perceval a week ago. Among the cheering crowd is George Gordon, Lord Byron.
Demetrio e Polibio, a dramma serio by Gioachino Rossini (20) to words of Viganò-Mombelli, is performed for the first time, in Teatro Valle, Rome.
22 May 1812 After a vote of no confidence, Lord Liverpool resigns as Prime Minister of Great Britain.
23 May 1812 Johann Nepomuk Hummel’s (33) pantomime Der Zauberkampf, oder Harlekin in seiner Heimat to words of Kees is performed for the first time, in Theater-an-der-Wien, Vienna.
26 May 1812 Luigi Cherubini (51) resigns as a member of the Jury of the Académie imperiale de musique.
28 May 1812 The Peace of Bucharest ends hostilities between Russia and the Ottoman Empire and sets the River Pruth (Prut) as their European boundary. Russia abandons claims to Moldavia and Wallachia but annexes Bessarabia. Amnesty and autonomy are provided for the Serbians but Serbia is still to be occupied by Turkey. This frees Tsar Alyeksandr to act against Napoléon.
29 May 1812 Emperor Napoléon takes leave of Empress Marie Louise in Dresden, where he has extracted promises of troops for his Russian campaign from the leaders of Europe, and heads east.
30 May 1812 Revolutionaries succeed in halting the royalist advance in Venezuela at Victoria.
1 June 1812 Humphry Davy dates the preface of his Elements of Chemical Philosophy.
4 June 1812 The United States House of Representatives votes 79-49 in favor of war against Great Britain.
5 June 1812 Grand Duet for the Organ by Samuel Wesley (46) is performed for the first time, at the Hanover Square Rooms, London by the composer and Vincent Novello.
7 June 1812 Emperor Napoléon arrives in Danzig (Gdansk) on his way to the front and inspects the supplies stored there.
8 June 1812 Prince Ferdinand Johann Nepomuk Kinsky agrees to pay Beethoven’s (41) stipend at the same value as before the revaluation of Austrian currency.
9 June 1812 Robert Banks Jenkinson, Earl of Liverpool is reappointed as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He resigned after a vote of no confidence in May.
10 June 1812 Napoléon departs Danzig (Gdansk) for the front.
16 June 1812 Great Britain agrees to revoke the Orders of Council which forbids American trade with European ports.
17 June 1812 Georg Joseph Vogler (63) and Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (20) travel to Nymphenburg to see the Queen of Bavaria. Vogler intercedes on behalf of his protégé to have his opera Jephtas Gelübde performed at the Court Theatre, and that the Queen may allow Meyerbeer to play in the Court Concert. The Queen says she will have to consult the King. Later, Meyerbeer is summoned to play in the evening. He is last in a line of performers and plays his Rondo in g minor at the piano. The Queen compliments him and asks about his compositions.
The United States Senate votes 19-13 in favor of war against Great Britain.
18 June 1812 Franz Schubert (15) begins instruction in counterpoint with Antonio Salieri (61) in Vienna.
Unaware that Great Britain rescinded its offending actions two days ago, and pursuant to the votes of the two houses of Congress, the United States declares war on the United Kingdom.
23 June 1812 Carlos Martínez de Irujo y Tacón, marques de Casa-Irujo replaces Ignacio de la Pezuela y Sánchez as First Secretary of State of the resistance government of Spain.
Emperor Napoléon arrives at the front at Alexota, Duchy of Warsaw (Aleksotas, Lithuania).
24 June 1812 The Grande Armée of 500,000 men begin to cross the River Nieman (Nemunas) into Russia near Kovno (Kaunas). Nationalities represented include Anhalt, Austria, Baden, Bavaria, Croatia, Dalmatia, Denmark, France, Hesse-Darmstadt, Holland, Illyria, Italy, Lippe, Mecklenburg, Poland, Portugal, Prussia, Saxony, Spain, Switzerland, Westphalia and Württemberg.
25 June 1812 A day after learning of the French invasion, Tsar Alyeksandr of Russia writes to Emperor Napoléon asking for peace and a withdrawal from Russian territory. Napoléon will have neither.
26 June 1812 The Polish Diet declares the independence of Poland. No other power, including Napoléon, will endorse this act.
27 June 1812 British forces capture Salamanca from the French.
28 June 1812 Allied troops enter Vilna (Vilnius), abandoned by the Russians.
The Polish Diet in Warsaw proclaims the reunion of Poland and Lithuania.
30 June 1812 Royalist prisoners rise up and overthrow their captors at Puerto Cabello. The two rebel commanders, Ramón Aymerich and Simón Bolívar manage to escape by sea.
1 July 1812 The US government doubles tariffs to help pay for the war.
2 July 1812 While in Prague, Ludwig van Beethoven (41) visits Prince Kinsky and is assured that his stipend at the new value will be coming soon. He receives an advance of 60 ducats.
5 July 1812 Ludwig van Beethoven (41) arrives in Teplitz (Teplice) via Prague to take the cure.
6 July 1812 Ludwig van Beethoven (41), in Teplitz, pens a letter to his “Immortal Beloved.” (now believed to be Antonie Brentano, a Viennese lady married to a Frankfurt businessman)
8 July 1812 Allied troops enter Minsk.
12 July 1812 United States forces invade Upper Canada near Detroit.
13 July 1812 The Portuguese army withdraws from Banda Oriental (Uruguay) and returns to Brazil.
14 July 1812 King Jerôme of Westphalia, angry at his older brother Napoléon, abandons the Grand Armée and returns to Kassel.
18 July 1812 The Alliance of Orebro combines Russia, Sweden and Great Britain.
19 July 1812 While taking the cure at Teplitz (Teplice), two giants of Romanticism, Ludwig van Beethoven (41) and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, meet for the first time. Of the meeting, Goethe will write on 2 September, “His talent amazed me; unfortunately he is an utterly untamed personality, who is not altogether in the wrong in holding the world to be detestable but surely does not make it any the more enjoyable for himself or others by his attitude.” Beethoven will write on 9 August, “Goethe delights far too much in the court atmosphere. Far more than is becoming a poet.”
22 July 1812 French forces are routed by the British and Portuguese south of Salamanca, opening the way to Madrid.
23 July 1812 Rebels make several attacks against the royalist army besieging Huajuapan (Oaxaca, Mexico). The royalists are defeated with heavy losses in men and weapons.
24 July 1812 Tsar Alyeksandr makes a public appeal in Moscow for assistance from every able-bodied Russian.
25 July 1812 Spain reasserts its power in Venezuela. Revolutionary leader Francisco de Miranda surrenders Caracas and his troops to the Spanish. Miranda is taken to Spain in irons where he will die in prison.
26 July 1812 Franz Schubert (15) sings as chorister in the Imperial Chapel for the last time. His voice has broken. He will now devote his energies to composing church music. He marks the occasion by writing in the alto score of Peter Winter’s Mass no.1 “Schubert, Franz, crowed for the last time, 26 July 1812.”
Fire destroys a good part of the city of Baden, southwest of Vienna.
27 July 1812 Beethoven (41) leaves Teplitz (Teplice). He will never see Goethe again.
28 July 1812 Allied forces advance on Vitebsk, 460 km west of Moscow, making for battle, but find the city evacuated.
6 August 1812 The allied (Great Britain-Portugal) army begins its march from Valladolid to Madrid.
Ludwig van Beethoven (41) performs a concert, along with Giovanni Battista Polledro, in Karlsbad (Karoly Vary) to benefit the victims of fire in Baden, 26 July.
8 August 1812 Russian Cossacks repel Allied cavalry near Inkovo.
The 30 ton paddle steamer Comet begins the first commercial steamboat service in Europe when it plies 39 km of the River Clyde between Glasgow, Greenock and Helensburgh. It was built by Henry Bell and John Wood.
10 August 1812 A rebel army enters Tehuacán de las Granadas, Mexico.
11 August 1812 A new rebel army recruited in New Orleans captures Nacogdoches, Texas.
12 August 1812 British, Portuguese and Spanish troops under Viscount Wellington enter Madrid.
13 August 1812 USS Essex defeats HMS Alert near Bermuda and captures a troop transport.
British forces begin bombarding Fort Detroit.
14 August 1812 Allied forces reach Krasnoye, 40 km southwest of Smolensk, and meet the first organized Russian resistance.
15 August 1812 A Mass in C by Giovanni Paisiello (72) is performed for the first time, in Paris.
16 August 1812 United States forces surrender Detroit to the British. The commanding general, William Hull, will be court martialed.
17 August 1812 Over the last two days, Russian and Allied forces have battled near Smolensk causing approximately 23,000 total casualties but no strategic result. Under cover of darkness, the Russians evacuate the city.
19 August 1812 USS Constitution destroys HMS Guerriere 2,000 km east of Boston. 22 people are killed.
22 August 1812 Swiss adventurer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt “discovers” the ancient city of Petra near Wadi Musa (Jordan).
25 August 1812 Following the reverses in western Spain, the French lift the siege of Cádiz and move north.
27 August 1812 French forces abandon Seville and move north.
Venezuelan rebel leader Simón Bolívar reaches safety in Curaçao.
29 August 1812 Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov takes command of the Russian army.
30 August 1812 Tsar Alyeksandr of Russia meets Swedish Crown Prince Karl Johan at Åbo (Turku) and they reaffirm the 5 April Treaty of St. Petersburg. The Tsar promises 35,000 men for the Swedish conquest of Norway.
A Russian expedition establishes a fortress 100 km north of San Francisco on the California coast, calling it Fort Ross.
31 August 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (25) leaves Berlin for Gotha.
5 September 1812 Allied forces reach the village of Borodino where the Russians have massed for the defense of Moscow. Some skirmishing begins.
6 September 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (25) arrives in Gotha from Leipzig and Berlin. He is alone, as Heinrich Baermann has given up the tour, leaving Weber in Berlin.
7 September 1812 Twelve hours of fighting between Russian and Allied troops at Borodino, west of Moscow, ends in complete stalemate, both sides too exhausted to continue. The day produces somewhere between 70,000 and 90,000 total casualties. More men are killed at Borodino than in any battle before World War I.
8 September 1812 Russian forces withdraw from Borodino.
10 September 1812 French soldiers pillage the town of Novospasskoye, home of Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (8).
11 September 1812 Sappho von Mitilene, a ballet by Johann Nepomuk Hummel (33) to a scenario by Viganò, is performed for the first time, at Theater-an-der-Wien, Vienna.
14 September 1812 Russian troops and citizenry abandon Moscow and retreat to the southwest. The Allied vanguard reaches the city around midnight.
15 September 1812 Napoléon takes up residence in the Kremlin as fires break out in the city, mostly set by Russian agents.
16 September 1812 The fires in Moscow are so intense that Napoléon and his staff evacuate to the Petrovskoye Palace outside the city.
Lowell Mason’s (20) first musical composition, the anthem Ordination, is performed for the first time, at the ordination of Dr. Ralph Sanger as pastor of the Unitarian Church in Dover, Massachusetts.
17 September 1812 Over the last three days, fire has destroyed three-quarters of Moscow as the Allied army loots the city.
18 September 1812 Napoléon and his staff move back into Moscow.
19 September 1812 British forces withdraw from Burgos.
22 September 1812 A Kyrie in C by Antonio Salieri (62) is performed for the first time, in Vienna.
The Spanish Cortes offers the post of commander in chief of its armed forces to Viscount Wellington.
24 September 1812 Russian forces cut Napoléon’s main supply line at Mozhaysk, 165 km west of Moscow.
The Principalities of Waldeck and Pyrmont are rejoined as the Principality of Waldeck-Pyrmont under Prince Georg.
Halting his retreat south, General Belgrano’s Argentine rebel army halts at Tucumán where they are attacked by the royalists pursuing them. The results of the battle are mixed with both sides claiming some successes.
25 September 1812 Belgrano’s army counterattacks at Tucumán. The royalists retire north.
26 September 1812 Gioachino Rossini’s (20) melodramma giocoso La pietra del paragone to words of Romanelli is performed for the first time, in Teatro alla Scala, Milan. The work proves an instant success.
27 September 1812 Pedro Gómez-Labrador Avelo replaces Carlos Martínez de Irujo y Tacón, marques de Casa-Irujo as First Secretary of State of the resistance government of Spain.
3 October 1812 La duchesse de la Vallière, a cantata by Louis Joseph Ferdinand Hérold (21) is performed for the first time, at the prize-giving ceremony for the Prix de Rome, in Paris. Hérold’s work won first prize.
4 October 1812 British and Portuguese troops attack the French garrison at Burgos.
5 October 1812 Napoléon sends out emissaries, searching for someone with whom he might conclude an armistice or peace.
Ludwig van Beethoven (41) arrives in Linz to try and break up an affair between his brother Johann and the sister-in-law of Johann’s tenant, Therese Obermayer. The dispute will dissolve into a physical brawl between the two brothers.
13 October 1812 United States forces capture Queenstown Heights, Upper Canada (Ontario) but are forced to retreat by a counterattack by British and colonials.
18 October 1812 On the same day that Napoléon resolves to retreat to Smolensk, Russian forces attack Allied cavalry near Vinkovo taking them completely by surprise. The French manage to escape.
The Brothers Grimm date the preface to the first volume of their Kinder- und Hausmärchen.
USS Wasp captures HMS Frolic 1,300 km off the Virginia coast.
19 October 1812 Allied forces begin to evacuate Moscow. Emperor Napoléon is the first to leave.
In two days of fighting, the Russians attack and drive back the Allies at Polotsk, 218 km northwest of Smolensk.
20 October 1812 Rebel Argentines lay siege to the royalist garrison at Montevideo.
21 October 1812 When the they learn of the advance of the French into La Mancha, the British and Portuguese raise the siege of Burgos and retreat towards Valladolid.
Samuel Wesley (46) writes to his mother in Brighton asking for money. Since she has recently come to his aid, he asks for half of his inheritance. See 4 November 1812.
23 October 1812 After the retreating Allies take control of Maloyaroslavets and a bridge over the River Lusha, Russian troops appear and drive them away.
Having escaped from a lunatic asylum in Paris where he has been held for the last four years, General Claude-François de Malet hatches a plan to seize power. He announces that Napoléon has died in Russia and convinces several senior guard officers of this. Together they arrest the minister of police and other officials. After personally killing the commander of the Paris garrison, General Pierre-Augustin Hulin, Malet is discovered for who he is and arrested. The plot collapses. 84 people are arrested.
24 October 1812 After a fierce battle for Maloyaroslavets, during which the town changed hands five times, the Russians are forced to withdraw, although they continue to fire on the Allies in the town.
Publication of Eight Piano Pieces op.37 by Johann Nepomuk Hummel (33) is announced in the Wiener Zeitung.
25 October 1812 USS United States defeats HMS Macedonian off the Azores.
French forces defeat the Spanish at Palencia, effectively giving them Valladolid.
29 October 1812 General Claude-François de Malet and 13 others are executed by firing squad in the Grenelle Plain for acts of treason committed 23 October. Most of those killed, including three generals, are unwitting dupes of Malet.
30 October 1812 British troops begin retreating out of New Castile, leaving Madrid undefended. Many British soldiers take out their frustrations on the Spanish populace, including the usual array of murders, rapes, and looting.
31 October 1812 Napoléon reaches Vyazma, 218 km west of Moscow where he pauses to assess the situation.
1 November 1812 Georg Joseph Vogler (63) plays the triorganon for the first time, at high mass in St. Michael’s Church in Munich. He recently completed construction of the instrument.
2 November 1812 Prince Ferdinand Johann Nepomuk Kinsky, an important patron of Ludwig van Beethoven (41), is thrown from his horse near Prague. He will die early tomorrow.
3 November 1812 Pursuing Russians succeed in surrounding the Allied rear guard. Eventually, they will be saved but with great cost to the Allies.
4 November 1812 Samuel Wesley (46) writes to his mother once again to inform her that if he does not receive £100 immediately, he will be sent to jail. See 21 October 1812.
7 November 1812 Allied troops in the north retreat to Chereya.
8 November 1812 Incensed by the behavior of his brother Ludwig (41), Johann van Beethoven marries Therese Obermayer. Ludwig returns to Vienna. See 25 October 1812.
9 November 1812 Napoléon and the Grande Armée reach Smolensk where they proceed to ransack the city. At the same time, Allied reinforcements are savagely attacked by Russians southwest of the city and are induced to surrender.
10 November 1812 Five weeks of voting in the British general elections conclude. The Tory Party of the Prime Minister, the Earl of Liverpool, is returned to power.
12 November 1812 Allied forces begin to retreat west from Smolensk.
14 November 1812 The Allies attack Russians at Smolyani but are forced to withdraw.
16 November 1812 Russian troops capture Minsk, the main Allied supply point.
Georg Joseph Vogler (63) gives the first public concert on his instrument, the triorganon, in St. Michael’s Church, Munich. It is a great success.
17 November 1812 Allied troops attack the Russians south of Krasnoye and send them reeling. Left for dead on the battlefield is 24-year-old Jean-Victor Poncelet. He will recover and next Spring, in a Russian prison camp, he will invent projective geometry.
20 November 1812 Russian troops cross from the west bank of the Berezina into Borisov, 73 km northeast of Minsk, and capture it from Polish defenders.
24 November 1812 L’occasione fa il ladro, a burletta per musica by Gioachino Rossini (20) to words of Prividali after Scribe, is performed for the first time, in Teatro San Moisè, Venice. The reaction of the public is tepid.
A rebel army assaults and overwhelms the royalist garrison at Oaxaca City, devastating the town. The leaders of the royalist army are summarily executed.
25 November 1812 After forcing the Russians off the west bank, Allied troops begin to cross the River Berezina at Studienka.
27 November 1812 Lowell Mason (20) leaves his home in Medfield, Massachusetts to move to Savannah, Georgia.
28 November 1812 Russian troops attack the remnants of the Allied force still east of the Berezina. Retreating to Studienka, the Allies fall into Russian hands, give battle, but are captured.
29 November 1812 The Allies complete their crossing of the Berezina. They blow up their bridges, leaving behind 15,000 camp followers and refugees, most of whom are killed by Cossacks.
Russians attack Plechenitzi on the Allied route of retreat but are fought off in a desperate action.
3 December 1812 At Molodesczo, Napoléon issues the 29th Bulletin. He tells France that there has been a disaster in Russia and a new army of 300,000 men will be needed.
5 December 1812 At Smorgon, 75 km east of Vilna (Vilnius), Napoléon informs his generals that he is abandoning the army and making for Paris. He leaves this evening.
9 December 1812 The exhausted Allied army reaches Vilna (Vilnius) which they proceed to plunder.
10 December 1812 Napoléon reaches Warsaw on his way back to Paris.
12 December 1812 Remnants of the Grande Armée cross the Nieman into Prussia at Kovno. Only 5,000 men remain in recognizable military units.
13 December 1812 Napoléon reaches Dresden on his way back to Paris.
16 December 1812 A cantata for “La Goguette” by Luigi Cherubini (52) is performed in Paris at a meeting of that singing society.
17 December 1812 The 29th Bulletin of 3 December is published in Paris.
The Piano Concerto no.2 J.155 by Carl Maria von Weber (26) is performed for the first time, in Gotha, the composer at the keyboard. Weber reports that everything “went excellently.”
18 December 1812 As Emperor Napoléon arrives in Paris, some of the last remaining members of the Grande Armée reach Bialystok from whence they safely cross into Austrian territory. Of the Allied troops who crossed the Vistula during the summer of 1812, only 93,000 remain by New Year, 1813. Napoléon’s Russian campaign has cost roughly 750,000 lives.
19 December 1812 Allied forces evacuate Riga.
20 December 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (26) leaves Gotha intending to undertake another concert tour.
23 December 1812 Jephtas Gelübde, an opera by Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (21) to words of Schreiber, is performed for the first time, in the Court Theatre, Munich. Although nervous and troubled leading up to today, the composer is greatly pleased by the outcome. However, it is not well received.
24 December 1812 Anhalt-Bernburg-Schaumburg-Hoym, having been separated from Anhalt-Bernburg in 1707, is rejoined to the Duchy.
Viscount Wellington arrives in Cádiz to accept command of the Spanish armies from the Cortes.
26 December 1812 Carl Maria von Weber (26) reaches Leipzig from Gotha.
Great Britain announces a blockade of Chesapeake Bay and Delaware Bay.
Tamerlano, a melodramma seria by Johann Simon Mayr (49) to words of Romanelli after Voltaire, is performed for the first time, in Teatro alla Scala, Milan.
29 December 1812 USS Constitution defeats HMS Java off the coast of Brazil. In the process, the Americans capture Lt. General Thomas Hislop, Governor of India.
The Violin Sonata op.96 by Ludwig van Beethoven (42) is performed for the first time, at the home of Prince Lobkowitz, Vienna. The performers are the violinist Jacques Pierre Joseph Rode and Archduke Rudolph.
30 December 1812 Russian troops surround Prussian forces who are among the allies evacuating Riga. The Prussians, in the “Convention of Tauroggen,” declare themselves neutral. Even though the act is unknown to King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia, it signals a change of heart among Germans.
Ludwig van Beethoven (42) petitions the estate of Prince Kinsky to be paid his stipend at the revalued rate the Prince agreed to before he died.
31 December 1812 Meyer Beer (Giacomo Meyerbeer) (21) plays the piano at a concert to benefit wounded Bavarian soldiers in Munich. His performance overwhelms the audience. At a dinner following, the assembled guests immediately burst into applause when he enters the room.
Besieged royalists attack out from Montevideo. After making gains they are thrown back at El Cerrito and limp back to the town.
©2004-2012 Paul Scharfenberger
7 July 2012
Last Updated (Saturday, 07 July 2012 04:45)