Sioux, Fox, and Sauk tribes signed the Treaty of Prairie du Chien, ceding to the United States most of the land that would become Missouri, Minnesota and Iowa.

Bloodiest slave rebellion in American history took place in Southampton County, Virginia when an African American slave and preacher, Nat Turner, and about seventy followers began the systematic murder of white people across the county. Fifty-five whites, men, women, and children were slaughtered. The rebellion was crushed and everyone associated with Turner executed. The rising sent shock waves through the South and emancipation debate ended abruptly in that region.

Charles Carroll of Carrollton died at age 95; the Marylander was the last living signer of the Declaration of Independence.

City of Chicago established by 350 settlers

American Anti-Slavery Society founded by William Garrison and Lewis Tappan. Garrison’s anti-slavery publication The Liberator already had a large and growing readership.

Senator Henry Clay officially named the Anti-Andrew Jackson Party the “Whigs.”

Anti-abolitionist riots occurred in New York City.

Under President Andrew Jackson, the National Debt was paid off for the first and only time in history.

Texas declared independence

Second Seminole War broke out in Florida.

Martin Van Buren elected President of the United States, Andrew Jackson’s hand-picked choice for successor.

The Republic of Texas created after a successful war of secession from Mexico.

Abolitionist printer, Elijah P. Lovejoy, murdered by a pro-slavery mob in Alton, Illinois, as he tried to protect the destruction of his business for the third time.

Birth of Dwight L. Moody, America’s most famous evangelical evangelist of the second half of the century.

Cherokee tribes from the Carolinas and Georgia forge the “trail of tears” as they are removed to new reservations in Oklahoma Territory.

The Virginia Military Institute was founded in Lexington, Virginia to train young men for military service as officers. The Institute will provide hundreds of graduates to the Confederate army in the War Between the States. One of the professors, General Thomas Jackson will become one of the most famous American officers in history, as will later graduate, George C. Marshall.