Examples
of historical content cannot always be given as a series of discrete points, because history is
a continuous, uninterrupted flow with chains of interconnected events. During the hundred years
named in your question, the following is a brief narrative that inevitably will omit major
happenings, but hopefully not too many of significance.
The end of the Seven
Years' War left Britain and Spain in control of the North American continent with France
defeated. Various taxation schemes by the British imposed on the colonies caused massive
resentment and disorders which led the British to close the port of Boston and exacerbate the
situation. The War of Independence began in 1775; the following year the Americans declared
independence,and in 1778 formed an alliance with France. The French were eager to avenge their
loss to the British in the Seven Years' War, and in 1781 a combined French army under Rochambeau
and American army under Washington defeated the British decisively at Yorktown, Virginia. The
result of the Treaty of Paris in 1783 was that Britain and the major European powers formally
recognized the independence of the United States.
Nevertheless the British
Empire continued to thrive with its "possessions" in the West Indies, Canada, India
(at this point through the East India company; direct British control would not occur until the
middle of the nineteenth century) and soon, Australia.The French economy was in a difficult
situation due to the expenditures of this latest war. This led to a crisis and the meeting of
the States-General in 1789, the storming of the Bastille, and over the next four years, the
creation of a constitutional monarchy (1791),the abolition of the monarchy (1792) and
establishment of a republic, and the execution of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette the following
year. The French Revolution progressed through the Reign of Terror, the rule by the Directory,
and finally in 1799 the establishment of Napoleon as dictator. Over a period of 23 years (1792
to 1815) the other European powers fought against France. For a period Napoleon controlled
either directly, or by forced alliances and client states, nearly all of Continental Europe. His
power finally came apart in stages, beginning with his defeat by Russia in 1812 and by alliances
of the German states in 1813, leading to his first abdication and exile to the island of Elba in
1814. Napoleon returned to France the following year for one last attempt at reestablishing
power, but was defeated finally at Waterloo in 1815 by a coalition of British, Dutch, Belgian
and Prussian forces.
The European leaders made every effort to turn back the
clock and restore the status quo as it had existed before the Revolution,but too many changes
had occurred, and though the European powers were basically at peace with each other for the
next 40 years (until the Crimean conflict) internal disorders continued, culminating in the
Revolutions of 1848. Europe was changing and the old monarchical forms of government were being
weakened everywhere. In the meantime the United States was struggling with its own internal
problem,slavery.In the aftermath of the War of Independence the northern states passed abolition
laws,most of which took effect gradually, but the South remained entrenched in its system of
slavery. With the election of Lincoln in 1860 on a platform of absolute exclusion of slavery
from the territories of the U.S., the southern states seceded from the Union. The result was
Civil War, ending in Union victory in 1865.
Elsewhere in the world the major
events were:
The independence of the Latin American countries.
The independence of Greece in 1829, which was the most decisive event in the start of
the Ottoman Empire's breakup.
The Opium War in which British influence over,
and indirect control of, China began.
The Sepoy Rebellion which resulted in
direct British control of India after a century of control by the East India Company.
The Crimean War in the 1850's in which Britain and France were allied with the Ottoman
Empire against Russia.
The opening of Japanese ports to western shipping in
the 1850's and the start of westernizing influences in Japan and the Meiji period in which
Imperial control was reestablished.
Finally, enormous technological advances
occurred during the period with the invention of the steamboat, the railroad, gas lighting,
photography,the repeating firearm, the electric generator, the telegraph, and the first attempts
at laying the Transatlantic cable.
