1801 in the United States explained

Events from the year 1801 in the United States.

Incumbents

• President:

John Adams (F-Massachusetts) (until March 4)

Thomas Jefferson (DR-Virginia) (starting March 4)

• Vice President:

Thomas Jefferson (DR-Virginia) (until March 4)

Aaron Burr (DR-New York) (starting March 4)

• Chief Justice: John Marshall (Virginia)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives:

Theodore Sedgwick (F-Massachusetts) (until March 4)

Nathaniel Macon (DR-North Carolina) (starting December 7)

• Congress: 6th (until March 4), 7th (starting March 4)

Events

• January 10  - William Henry Harrison becomes the first Governor of the Indiana Territory.
• January 31 – John Marshall is appointed Chief Justice of the United States.
• February – Contingent election of 1801: An electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr is resolved, when Jefferson is elected President of the United States and Burr Vice President by the United States House of Representatives.
• February 27 – Washington, D.C. is placed under the jurisdiction of the Congress of the United States.
• March 4 – Thomas Jefferson is sworn in as the third president of the United States, and Aaron Burr is sworn in as the third vice president.
• May 10 – The First Barbary War begins as the pasha of Tripoli declares war on the United States by having the flagpole on the consulate chopped down.
• July – Eli Whitney demonstrates before Congress the advantages of the system of interchangeable parts in the manufacture of firearms.
• August 1 – Action of 1 August 1801 (First Barbary War): United States Navy schooner captures the 14-gun Tripolitan corsair polacca Tripoli off the north African coast in a single-ship action.
• November 16 – The first edition of New York Evening Post is printed.
• Jefferson, the first American yacht, is built in Salem, Massachusetts, for George Crowninshield Jr.

Ongoing

• First Barbary War (1801–1805)

Births

• January 20 – Thomas Hickman Williams, United States Senator from Mississippi from 1838 to 1839 (died 1851)
• March 15 – George Perkins Marsh, diplomat, philologist and pioneer environmentalist (died 1882)
• March 27 – Alexander Barrow, United States Senator from Louisiana from 1841 to 1846 (died 1846)
• April 26 – Ambrose Dudley Mann, first United States Assistant Secretary of State (died 1889)
• May 6 – George S. Greene, Union Army general (died 1899)
• May 16 – William H. Seward, United States Secretary of State from 1861 to 1869 (died 1872)
• June 1 – Brigham Young, leader in the Latter Day Saint movement (died 1877)
• July 5 – David Farragut, flag officer of the United States Navy during the American Civil War (died 1870)
• June 14 – Heber C. Kimball, religious leader (died 1868)
• June 15 – Benjamin Wright Raymond, 3rd Mayor of Chicago (died 1883)
• August 10 – Robert Woodward Barnwell, United States Senator from South Carolina from 1862 to 1865 (died 1882)
• August 31 – Pierre Soule, United States Senator from Louisiana in 1847 and from 1849 to 1853 (died 1870)
• September 10 –
  • Garrett Davis, United States Senator from Kentucky from 1861 to 1872 (died 1872)
  • Marie Laveau, Voodoo Queen of New Orleans (died 1881)
• November 4 – Ambrose Hundley Sevier, United States Senator from Arkansas from 1836 to 1848 (died 1848)
• November 9 – Gail Borden, surveyor, newspaper publisher and inventor of condensed milk (died 1874)
• November 10 – Samuel Gridley Howe, physician and abolitionist (died 1876)
• December 28 – James Barnes, Union Army general (died 1869)
• Date unknown – Solomon W. Downs, United States Senator from Louisiana from 1847 to 1853 (died 1854)

Deaths

• January 9 – Margaretta Faugères, playwright, poet and political activist (born 1771)
• February 6 – Annis Boudinot Stockton, poet and sponsor of literary salons (born 1736)
• February 23 – Elizabeth Graeme Fergusson, poet and sponsor of literary salons (born 1737)
• March 14 – Margarita "Peggy" Schuyler, youngest child of Philip Schuyler (born 1758)
• June 4 – Frederick Muhlenberg, first Speaker of the House of Representatives (born 1750)
• June 14 – Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary hero and traitor (born 1741)
• September 10 – Jason Fairbanks, murderer (born 1780)
• November 4 – William Shippen, physician and Continental Congressman (born 1712)
• November 23 – Philip Hamilton, first son of Alexander Hamilton and Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton, (fatally shot by George Eacker in a duel at age 19) (born 1782)

See also

• Timeline of United States history (1790–1819)

Further reading

• A. P. C. Griffin. Issues of the District of Columbia Press in 1800, 1801, 1802. Records of the Columbia Historical Society, Washington, D.C., Vol. 4, (1901), pp. 32–74
• John Marshall on the Judiciary, the Republicans, and Jefferson, March 4, 1801. The American Historical Review, Vol. 53, No. 3 (April, 1948), pp. 518–520
• Dorothy MacKay Quynn. Dangers of Subversion in an American Education: A French View, 1801. The Catholic Historical Review, Vol. 39, No. 1 (April, 1953), pp. 28–35
• Bennard B. Perlman. Baltimore Mansion, 1801–03. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 14, No. 1 (March, 1955), pp. 26–28.
• Carroll W. Pursell, Jr. E. I. du Pont, Don Pedro, and the Introduction of Merino Sheep into the United States, 1801: A Document. Agricultural History, Vol. 33, No. 2 (April, 1959), pp. 86–88
• Donald R. Hickey. The United States Army versus Long Hair: The Trials of Colonel Thomas Butler, 1801–1805. The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 101, No. 4 (October, 1977), pp. 462–474
• Albert E. Van Dusen. "Eli Whitney". Laptop Encyclopedia of Connecticut History. CTHeritage.org, 2003. Retrieved December 24, 2011.
• John W. Wagner. New York City Concert Life, 1801-5. American Music, Vol. 2, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), pp. 53–69
• Book: Long Stanley, Wendy. 2019 . The Power to Deny: A Woman of the Revolution Novel . Carmenta Publishing . 978-1-951747-00-8 .