1881

January–March

• January 1–24 – Siege of Geok Tepe: Russian troops under General Mikhail Skobelev defeat the Turkomans.
• January 13 – War of the Pacific – Battle of San Juan and Chorrillos: The Chilean army defeats Peruivan forces.
• January 15 – War of the Pacific – Battle of Miraflores: The Chileans take Lima, capital of Peru, after defeating its second line of defense in Miraflores.
• January 24 – William Edward Forster, chief secretary for Ireland, introduces his Coercion Bill, which temporarily suspends habeas corpus so that those people suspected of committing an offence can be detained without trial; it goes through a long debate before it is accepted February 2.
• January 25 – Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell form the Oriental Telephone Company.
• February 4 – Linnington Manor burns to the ground; only William Linnington remains unharmed.
• February 13 – The first issue of the feminist newspaper La Citoyenne is published by Hubertine Auclert.
• February 16 – The Canadian Pacific Railway is incorporated.^[1]
• February 18 – Carlos Finlay introduces his discovery of the transmission of Yellow Fever by mosquitoes Aedes aegypti, in the Fifth International Sanitary Conference held in Washington D.C..
• February 19 – Kansas becomes the first U.S. state to prohibit all alcoholic beverages.
• February 25 – Phoenix, Arizona is incorporated.
• March 1 – The Cunard Line's SS Servia, the first steel transatlantic liner, is launched at Clydebank in Scotland.^[2]
• March 4 – James A. Garfield is sworn in, as the 20th President of the United States.
• March 12 – Andrew Watson makes his Scotland debut, as the world's first black international football player.
• March 13 – Alexander II of Russia is killed near his palace, when a bomb is thrown at him, an act falsely blamed upon Russian Jews. He is succeeded by his son, Alexander III.
• March 23 – The First Boer War comes to an end.
• March 26 (March 14 Old Style) – The Principality of Romania is proclaimed the Kingdom of Romania.

April–June

• April 11 – Spelman College is established in Atlanta, Georgia.
• April 14 – The Four Dead in Five Seconds Gunfight erupts in El Paso, Texas.
• April 15 – Temuco, Chile is founded.
• April 15 – Anti-Semitic pogroms in Southern Russia begin.
• April 21 – The University of Connecticut is founded as the Storrs Agricultural School.
• April 25 – Caulfield Grammar School is founded in Melbourne, Australia.
• April 28 – Billy the Kid escapes from his 2 jailers at the Lincoln County Jail in Mesilla, New Mexico, killing James Bell and Robert Ollinger, before stealing a horse and riding out of town.
• May 12 – In North Africa, Tunisia becomes a French protectorate by the Treaty of Bardo.
• May 13 – The Pacific island of Rotuma cedes to Great Britain, becoming a dependency of the Colony of Fiji.

World's first regular electric tram service started in Berlin

• May 16 – The world's first regular electric tram service is started in Berlin, by Siemens & Halske.
• May 21
  • The American Red Cross is established by Clara Barton.
  • The United States Tennis Association is established by a small group of tennis club members; the first U.S. Tennis Championships are played this year.
• May 22 (May 10 Old Style) – Prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen is crowned King of Romania.
• June 12 – The USS Jeannette is crushed in an Arctic Ocean ice pack.
• June 18 – The League of the Three Emperors is resurrected.
• June 20 – The current Cincinnati Reds baseball team plays its first game.
• June 26 – War of the Pacific – Battle of Sangrar: Peruvian and Chilean forces battle to a draw.

July–September

• July 1 – General Order 70, the culmination of the Cardwell–Childers reforms of the British Army's organization, comes into effect.
• July 2 – Assassination of James A. Garfield: United States President James A. Garfield is shot by lawyer Charles J. Guiteau in Washington, D.C. The wound becomes infected, killing Garfield on September 19.
• July 4 – Tuskegee Institute opens in Alabama.
• July 7 – The first episode of Carlo Collodi's The Adventures of Pinocchio is published in Italy.
• July 14 – Billy the Kid is shot and killed by Pat Garrett, outside Fort Sumner, New Mexico.
• July 20 – American Indian Wars: Sioux chief Sitting Bull leads the last of his people in surrender to United States troops at Fort Buford in Montana.
• July 23 – The Boundary Treaty of 1881 between Chile and Argentina is signed in Buenos Aires.
• August 3 – The Pretoria Convention peace treaty is signed, officially ending the war between the Boers and Britain.
• August 27 – The fifth hurricane of the Atlantic season hits Florida and the Carolinas, killing about 700.
• September 5 – The Thumb Fire in the U.S. state of Michigan destroys over a million acres (4,000 km²) and kills 282 people.
• September 12 – Francis Howell High School (Howell Institute) in St. Charles, Missouri, and Stephen F. Austin High School in Austin, Texas open on the same day, putting them in a tie for the title of the oldest public high school west of the Mississippi River.
• September 19 – President James A. Garfield dies eleven weeks after being shot. Vice President Chester A. Arthur becomes the 21st President of the United States.
• September 20 – President Chester A. Arthur is sworn in.
• September 26 – Godalming in England becomes the first town to have its streets illuminated by electric light (hydroelectrically generated).^[3]

October–December

• October 5–December 31 – The International Cotton Exposition is held in Atlanta, Georgia.
• October 10 – Richard D'Oyly Carte's Savoy Theatre opens in London, the world's first public building to be fully lit by electricity, using Joseph Swan's incandescent light bulbs.^[2][4][5] The stage is first lit electrically on December 28.^[6]
• October 13 – Determined to bring about the revival of the Hebrew language as a way of unifying Jews, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda has what is believed to be the first conversation in Modern Hebrew, with friends living in Paris.
• October 26 – The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral occurs in Tombstone, Cochise County, Arizona, USA.
• October 29 – Judge (U.S. magazine) is first published.
• November – The Newcastle United F.C. is founded as the Stanley F.C., with a further name change to Newcastle East End F.C. the following year.
• November 3 – The Mapuche uprising of 1881 begins, with an attack on Quillem, Chile.
• November 9 – Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 2 premieres in Budapest.
• November 11 – The Clarkson Memorial in Wisbech is completed, and unveiled to the public.
• November 19 – A meteorite strikes the Earth near the village of Großliebenthal, a few kilometers southwest of Odessa, Ukraine.
• December 8 – Ringtheaterbrand: At least 380 die in a fire at the Vienna Ringtheater.
• December 25–27 – The Warsaw pogrom is carried out in Vistula Land, Russian Empire.^[7]
• December 28 – Virgil Earp is ambushed in Tombstone, Arizona, and loses the use of his left arm.

Date unknown

• Kinshasa (the capital of the modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo) is founded by Henry Morton Stanley, as a trading outpost called Léopoldville.
• On the Isle of Man (an internally self-governing dependent territory of the United Kingdom), the House of Keys Election Act extends the franchise for the national legislature, to spinsters and widows owning real estate of a certain value.
• Edward Rudolf founds the Church of England Central Society for Providing Homes for Waifs and Strays (modern-day The Children's Society).
• The Pali Text Society is founded by British scholar Thomas William Rhys Davids, for the study of Pali (Ceylonese) texts.
• Some Vatican archives are opened to scholars for the first time.
• Abilene, Texas, is founded.
• Minto, North Dakota, is founded.
• Rafaela, Argentina, is formed.
• New York City's oldest independent school for girls, the Convent of the Sacred Heart New York (91st Street), is founded.
• Culford School, a public school in Suffolk, England, is founded as the East Anglian School for Boys.
• Leyton Orient F.C. is founded in London.

January–March

Anna Pavlova

Hermann Staudinger

Béla Bartók

• January 9
  • Lascelles Abercrombie, English poet, critic (d. 1938)
  • Giovanni Papini, Italian essayist, poet and novelist (d. 1956)
• January 13 – Essington Lewis, Australian industrialist (d. 1961)
• January 15 – John Rodgers, American naval officer, naval aviation pioneer (d. 1926)
• January 17 – Antoni Łomnicki, Polish mathematician (d. 1941)
• January 21 – Arch McCarthy, American baseball player (d. unknown)
• January 23 – Luisa Casati, Italian heiress, artistic muse and patron of the arts (d. 1957)
• January 30 – Whitford Kane, Irish born American actor (d. 1956)
• January 31 – Irving Langmuir, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1957)
• February 1 – Dimitrana Ivanova, Bulgarian reform pedagogue, suffragist and women's rights activist (d. 1960)
• February 2 – Gustav Herglotz, German mathematician (d. 1953)
• February 4
  • Eulalio Gutiérrez, President of Mexico (d. 1939)
  • Kliment Voroshilov, Russian military officer, politician (d. 1969)
• February 11 – Carlo Carrà, Italian painter (d. 1966)
• February 12 – Anna Pavlova, Russian ballerina (d. 1931)
• February 13 – Eleanor Farjeon, English children's writer, poet (d. 1965)
• February 17 – Bess Streeter Aldrich, American fiction writer (d. 1954)
• February 21 – Kenneth J. Alford, British soldier, composer (d. 1945)
• February 27 – Sveinn Björnsson, 1st President of Iceland (d. 1952)
• February 28 – Otto Dowling, United States Navy Captain, 25th Governor of American Samoa (d. 1946)
• March 4
  • Thomas Sigismund Stribling, American novelist (d. 1965)
  • Richard C. Tolman, American mathematical physicist (d. 1948)
• March 9 – Ernest Bevin, British labour leader, politician and statesman (d. 1951)
• March 10 – Thomas Quinlan, English operatic impresario (d. 1951)
• March 13 – Louis Chauvin, American ragtime pianist (d. 1908)
• March 17 – Walter Rudolf Hess, Swiss physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1973)
• March 20 – Fritz Pfleumer, German-Austrian engineer, inventor (d. 1945)
• March 22 – Hans Wilsdorf, German-Swiss watchmaker, founder of Rolex (d. 1960)
• March 23
  • Roger Martin du Gard, French writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1958)
  • Hermann Staudinger, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965)
• March 25
  • Béla Bartók, Hungarian composer (d. 1945)
  • Mary Webb, English novelist (d. 1927)
• March 26 – Guccio Gucci, Italian fashion designer, founder of Gucci (d. 1953)

April–June

• April 1 – Octavian Goga, 37th Prime Minister of Romania (d. 1938)
• April 3 – Alcide De Gasperi, Italian statesman, politician (d. 1954)
• April 12 – Rudolf Ramek, 5th Chancellor of Austria (d. 1941)
• April 14 – Husain Salaahuddin, Maldivian writer (d. 1948)
• April 16 – E. F. L. Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax, British politician (d. 1959)
• April 27 – Móric Esterházy, 18th Prime Minister of Hungary (d. 1960)
• May 1 – Mary MacLane, Canadian writer (d. 1929)
• May 4 - Alexander Kerensky, Russian politician (d. 1970)
• May 13 – Lima Barreto, Brazilian writer (d.1922)
• May 14
  • G. Murray Hulbert, American politician (d. 1950)
  • Maude Fulton, American playwright and actress (d. 1950)
• May 19 – official birthday of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder and first President of Turkey (d. 1938)
• May 20 – Władysław Sikorski, Polish general, politician (d. 1943)
• May 26 – Adolfo de la Huerta, 38th President of Mexico (d. 1955)
• May 30 – Georg von Küchler, German field marshal (d. 1968)
• June 9 – Marion Leonard, American silent film actress (d. 1956)
• June 17 – Tommy Burns, Canadian-born boxer (d. 1955)
• June 26 – Ya'akov Cohen, Israeli poet (d. 1960)

July–September

Hans Fischer

Cecil B. DeMille

• July 2 – Royal H. Weller, American politician (d. 1929)
• July 3 – Leon Errol, Comedic American actor (d. 1951)
• July 4 – Ulysses S. Grant III, American soldier, planner (d. 1968)
• July 11
  • Dirk Janssen, Dutch gymnast (d. 1986)
  • Louise Marion Bosworth, American social scientist (d. 1982)
• July 22
  • Augusta Fox Bronner, American psychologist, specialist in juvenile psychology (d. 1966)
  • Kenneth Whiting, United States Navy officer, submarine and naval aviation pioneer (d. 1943)
• July 27 – Hans Fischer, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1945)
• July 28 – Günther Quandt, German industrialist, founder of the industrial empire that in modern times includes BMW and Altana (d. 1954)
• July 30 – Smedley Butler, United States Marine Corps general (d. 1940)
• August 3 – Nathan Post, 7th and 10th Governor of American Samoa (d. 1938)
• August 6 – Sir Alexander Fleming, Scottish biomedical researcher, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1955)^[8]
• August 7 – François Darlan, French admiral and 81st Prime Minister of France from 1941 to 1942 (d. 1942)
• August 8 – Paul Ludwig Ewald von Kleist, German field marshal (b. 1954)
• August 12 – Cecil B. DeMille, American film director, producer (d. 1959)
• August 19 – George Enescu, Romanian composer (d. 1955)
• August 20 – Edgar Guest, English poet (d. 1959)
• September 5
  • Otto Bauer, Austrian Social Democratic politician (d. 1938)
  • Henry Maitland Wilson, British field marshal (d. 1964)
• September 8
  • Harry Hillman, American track athlete (d. 1945)
  • Refik Saydam, 5th Prime Minister of Turkey (d. 1942)
• September 11 – Asta Nielsen, Danish silent film star (d. 1972)
• September 12 – Daniel Jones, British phonetician (d. 1967)
• September 15 – Ettore Bugatti, Italian car designer, founder of Bugatti Automobiles (d. 1947)
• September 16 – Clive Bell, English art critic (d. 1964)
• September 17
  • Alfred Francis Blakeney Carpenter, British admiral (d. 1955)
  • Aubrey Faulkner, South African cricketer (d. 1930)
• September 25 – Lu Xun, leading figure of modern Chinese literature (d. 1936)
• September 26 – Hiram Wesley Evans, American Ku Klux Klan Imperial Wizard (d. 1966)
• September 29 – Ludwig von Mises, Austrian economist (d. 1973)

October–December

Pablo Picasso

Pope John XXIII

• October 1 – William Boeing, American engineer, airplane manufacturer (d. 1956)
• October 4 – Walther von Brauchitsch, German field marshal (d. 1948)
• October 11 – Hans Kelsen, Austrian legal theorist (d. 1973)
• October 15
  • William Temple, English Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1944)
  • P. G. Wodehouse, English-born comic writer (d. 1975)
• October 22 – Clinton Davisson, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1958)
• October 25 – Pablo Picasso, Spanish painter (d. 1973)
• October 26 – Margaret Wycherly, English stage, film actress (d. 1956)
• October 28 – Vin Coutie, Australian footballer (d. 1951)
• November 4 – Gaby Deslys, French dancer, actress (d. 1920)
• November 5 – George A. Malcolm, American lawyer, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the Philippines and educator (d. 1961)
• November 8 – Robert Esnault-Pelterie, French aircraft designer, pioneer rocket theorist (d. 1957)
• November 12 – Maximilian von Weichs, German field marshal (d. 1954)
• November 14 – Nicholas Schenck, Russian-born film studio executive (d. 1969)
• November 15 – Franklin Pierce Adams, American columnist, poet (d. 1960)
• November 24 – Al Christie, Canadian-born director, producer (d. 1951)
• November 25
  • Jacob Fichman, Romanian-born Israeli poet, essayist (d. 1958)
  • Pope John XXIII (b. Angelo Roncalli), Italian pontiff (1958-1963) (d. 1963)
• November 28 – Stefan Zweig, Austrian writer (d. 1942)
• December 2 – Heinrich Barkhausen, German physicist (d. 1956)
• December 5 – René Cresté, French actor, director (d. 1922)
• December 3 – Henry Fillmore, American composer, bandleader (d. 1956)
• December 12 – Doris Keane, American stage actress (d. 1945)
• December 16 – Henri Dentz, French general (d. 1945)
• December 24 – Juan Ramón Jiménez, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1958)

January–June

• January 1 – Louis Auguste Blanqui, French socialist, political activist (b. 1805)
• January 3 – Anna McNeill Whistler, James Whistler's mother, subject of his painting (b. 1804)
• January 21 – Wilhelm Matthias Naeff, member of the Swiss Federal Council (b. 1802)
• January 24 – Frances Stackhouse Acton, British botanist, archaeologist, writer and artist (b. 1794)
• February 5 – Thomas Carlyle, Scottish writer, historian (b. 1795)
• February 9 – Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist (b. 1821)
• February 14 – Fernando Wood, New York City mayor (b. 1812)
• February 23 – Robert F. R. Lewis, American naval officer (b. 1826)
• March 2 – Sir John Cracroft Wilson, British civil servant, and politician in New Zealand (b. 1808)
• March 13 – Emperor Alexander II of Russia (assassinated) (b. 1818)
• March 28 – Modest Mussorgsky, Russian composer (b. 1839)
• March 31 – Lucy Virginia French, American blank verse poet (b. 1825)
• April 19 – Benjamin Disraeli, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1804)
• April 26 – Ludwig Freiherr von und zu der Tann-Rathsamhausen, Bavarian general (b. 1815)
• April 27 – Ludwig von Benedek, Austrian general (b. 1804)
• May 24 – Samuel Palmer, English artist (b. 1805)
• May 25 – Giuseppe Maria Giulietti, Italian explorer (b. 1847)
• June 6 – Henri Vieuxtemps, Belgian composer (b. 1820)
• June 28 – Jules Armand Dufaure, 3-time Prime Minister of France (b. 1798)

July – December

• July 1 – Baron Jules Dupotet de Sennevoy, French writer (b. 1796)
• July 14 – Billy the Kid, American gunslinger (b. 1859)
• July 17 – Jim Bridger, American explorer and trapper (b. 1804)
• August 11 – Jane Digby, English adventurer (b. 1807)
• August 15 – Alexandru G. Golescu, 11th Prime Minister of Romania (b. 1819)
• September 7 – Sidney Lanier, American writer (b. 1842)
• September 8 – Prince Frederick of the Netherlands, Dutch noble, general (b. 1797)
• September 13 – Ambrose Burnside, American Civil War general, inventor, politician from Rhode Island (b. 1824)
• September 19 – James A. Garfield, 20th President of the United States (b. 1831)
• September 22 – Solomon L. Spink, U.S. Congressman from Illinois (b. 1831)
• October 3 – Orson Pratt, American religious leader (b. 1811)
• October 3 – Princess Sumiko, Japanese princess (b. 1829)
• October 31 – George DeLong, American naval officer, explorer (starvation) (b. 1844)
• December 18 – George Edmund Street, British architect (b. 1824)