1815
On January 8, the news of the peace not having reached America, Jackson won the battle of New Orleans, inflicting a loss of two thousand on the British, and losing only twenty-one men. At Mobile, the Americans captured another British force, but off New York Commodore Decatur had to surrender, with his ship, the President, to the British blockading squadron.
England restored Java to Holland, but retained Demerara and the Cape of Good Hope. The Papal States were reestablished, and the Swiss Federation formed. On February 26 Napoleon slipped out of Elba; on March 1 he landed in France, where he was received with joy by his old soldiers, and on March 20 he entered Paris, beginning the Hundred Days. Ney deserted Louis XVIII to join Napoleon, and practically the whole army followed. Louis fled to Ghent.
England, Austria, Prussia, and Russia at once united against Napoleon. In a few days he mobilized and equipped an army of one hundred and twenty thousand veterans, and in June he was ready to attack the British and Prussian forces in Belgium. At Quatre-Bras, on June 16, Ney fought an indecisive engagement with the former, while at Ligny, on the same day, Napoleon defeated the Prussians under Blücher. On the 18th, Napoleon's army confronted that of Wellington before Waterloo. Before noon the fight began. Ney made repeated and gallant charges against the solid British squares, but his cavalry was slaughtered. Late in the day Blücher, after a forced march, arrived with part of his army, and, joining the British, sent the French forces flying. Napoleon barely escaped, and the allies pursued the shattered remnants of his army. The Napoleonic wars, which had cost nine million lives and untold treasure, and had remade the map of the world, were ended.
On June 20 Napoleon reached Paris, and on June 22 he abdicated, the House of Representatives having adopted by acclamation Lafayette's motion that the chamber should sit permanently, and that any attempt to dissolve it should be high treason. On July 7 the allies again entered Paris; on the 15th Napoleon surrendered to Captain Maitland of the British ship Bellerophon, at Rochefort. He was taken to England, and thence sent as a prisoner to the island of St. Helena, where he arrived October 15.
Madison reelected President of the United States. Philadelphia began construction of waterworks system. United States victorious in the war with Algiers. The Holy Alliance formed, including all the rulers of Europe excepting the Sultan of Turkey, the Pope, and the King of England. Davy invented the safety lamp. Wollaston, English scientist, by means of electricity, brought platinum to incandescence—the forerunner of the incandescent electric light. Daniel O'Connell killed D'Esterre in a duel. Anti-corn-law riots in England. Robert Fulton died. Financial depression throughout the United States.
RULERS—The same as in the previous year, except that for a hundred days (March to June) Napoleon was in power in France, Louis XVIII having fled from Paris.