Seven southern states, meeting in Montgomery, Alabama, agree to form the Confederate States of America

The seven members of the newly formed Condederacy elect Jefferson Davis as their provisional president

Richmond, the state capital of Virginia, becomes the capital of the Southern Confederacy

Shots are fired against the Federal military garrison in Fort Sumter, in Charleston harbour, launching the American Civil War

British officer Charles Gordon leads untrained auxiliaries against the Taiping rebels in China, becoming known as Chinese Gordon

Mobs of women destroy shops in Richmond, Virginia, in protest at food prices inflated by the war

Four days of riots in New York greet Lincoln's new conscription or draft laws, with exemptions for the rich

Imperial Chinese troops and Gordon's auxiliaries take Nanjing, the rebel capital, finally bringing to an end the Taiping rebellion

The first volume of Das Kapital is completed by Marx in London and is published in Hamburg

An uprising against Spanish rule in Cuba sparks off a Ten Years' War

An armed uprising against Spanish rule takes place in the town of Lares in Puerto Rico, becoming known as the Grito de Lares ('Cry of Lares')

The Afghan philosopher Jamal al-Din, moving to Cairo, urges drastic and violent measures against western influence

An uprising results in the Paris Commune, followed by the siege of the city by French government forces

The Paris communards are overwhelmed in a battle at the Père Lachaise cemetery, which is followed by brutal reprisals

US president Ulysses S. Grant uses the new Civil Rights Act to suppress the violent Ku Klux Klan in southern states

A strike against wage cuts by Baltimore railway workers spreads until it becomes almost a national strike

Romania achieves a new status as an internationally recognized independent nation

A war of liberation against Turkey wins full independence for Serbia

A secret revolutionary group (Union and Progress, later known as the Young Turks) is formed in Salonika in the Ottoman empire

In the Haymarket Affair a demonstration in Chicago against police brutality results in deaths and subsequent executions

The closing of the Homestead Steel Works near Pittsburgh in a dispute with unions leads to massive confrontation and violence

US Socialist Eugene Debs comes to prominence as leader of a strike by railway workers against the Pullman Company

The Basque Nationalist Party is founded, beginning more than a century of separatist unrest in northwest Spain

Lenin is arrested in St Petersburg, along with other members of the Union for the Struggle for the Liberation of the Working Class

The Philippines declare independence from the colonial power, Spain, with whom they are at war