1873 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar).

Events

January - April

• January 17 - Indian Wars: First Battle of the Stronghold during the Modoc War.
• February 11 - Spanish Cortes deposes King Amadeus I and proclaims the First Spanish Republic.
• February 12 - Former foreign minister Emilio Cistelar y Ripoli becomes prime minister of the new Spanish Republic.
• February 20 - The University of California opens its first medical school in San Francisco, California
• March 1 - E. Remington and Sons of Ilion, New York start production of the first practical typewriter.
• March 3 - Censorship: The U.S. Congress enacts the Comstock Law, making it illegal to send any "obscene, lewd, or lascivious" books through the mail.
• April 1 - The British steamer SS Atlantic sinks off Nova Scotia killing 547.
• April 15 - 17 - Indian Wars: Second Battle of the Stronghold

May - August

• May 9 Der Krach: Vienna stock market crash heralds Long Depression
• May 23 - The Canadian Parliament establishes the North West Mounted Police (which will be renamed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1920).
• June 4 - Indian Wars: The Modoc War ends with the capture of Captain Jack.
• July 21 - At Adair, Iowa, Jesse James and the James-Younger gang pull off the first successful train robbery in the American West (US$3,000 from the Rock Island Express).
• August 4 - Indian Wars: While protecting a railroad survey party in Montana, the Seventh Cavalry, under Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer, clash for the first time with the Sioux (near the Tongue River; only one man on each side is killed).

September - December

• September 16 - German troops leave France upon completion of payment of indemnity for Franco-Prussian War.
• September 18 - New York stock market crash.
• November 6 - Formation of the Halifax Rugby Club.
• November 7 - Alexander Mackenzie becomes Canada's second prime minister.
• November 17 - From Pest, Buda and Óbuda, Budapest, Hungary's capital is formed.

Unknown date

• Glasgow Rangers Football Club are founded. Rangers go on to be the most successfull club in the world in terms of trophies won.
• The United Kingdom declares war against Ghana's King Kofi KariKari, who was involved in the trading of slaves. The war ended by July and the British established the Gold Coast Colony.
• Coors Brewing Company begins making beer in Golden, Colorado.
• DDT first synthesized.
• Swedish arms company Bofors is incorporated.
• Prince Edward Island joins the Canadian Confederation.
• In Mexico, Veracruz to Mexico City railroad completed.
• Royal Montreal Club in Montreal, Quebec is founded, becoming the first permanent golf club in North America.
• Henry Rose exhibits barbed wire at an Illinois county fair, which is taken up by Joseph Glidden and Jacob Haish , who invent a machine to mass-produce it.
• Britain puts pressure on Sultan Barghash Sayyid who closes slave markets in Zanzibar
• Peter Tchaikovsky composes The Tempest
• First running of the Preakness Stakes horse race in Baltimore, Maryland

Births

January births

• January 2 - Marie Frances Therese Martin, "The Little Flower," Saint Therese of Lisieux of the Child Jesus
• January 7 - Adolph Zukor, motion-picture studio pioneer (d. 1976)
• January 10 - George Orton, Canadian athlete
• January 12 - Spiridon Louis, Greek marathon runner
• January 20 - Johannes Vilhelm Jensen, Danish author, Nobel prize winner (d. 1950)
• January 28 - Colette, writer (d. 1954)

February births

• February 2 – Maurice Tourneur, French film director (d. 1961)
• February 3 - Karl Jatho, German airplane pioneer
• February 4 - Étienne Desmarteau, Canadian athlete
• February 13 - Feodor Chaliapin, Russian bass (d. 1938)
• February 27 - Enrico Caruso, Italian tenor (d. 1921)

March births

• March 3 - William Green, President of the American Federation of Labor (d. 1952)
• March 11 – David Horsley, pioneer film executive (d. 1933)
• March 19 - Max Reger, composer (d. 1916)

April births

• April 1 - Sergei Rachmaninoff, composer and pianist (d. 1943)
• April 7 - John McGraw, baseball coach, manager, player (d. 1934)
• April 10 - Kyösti Kallio, former Prime Minister and President of Finland (d. 1940)
• April 22 - Ellen Glasgow, Pulitzer Prize winning author (d. 1945)

May births

• May 4 - Joe De Grasse, pioneer Hollywood film director (d. 1940)
• May 9 - Anton Cermak, mayor of Chicago (d. 1933)
• May 9 - Howard Carter, British archaeologist (d. 1939)
• May 17 - Henri Barbusse, French novelist and journalist (d. 1935)
• May 17 - Dorothy Richardson, English feminist writer (d. 1957)
• May 26 - Olaf Gulbransson , painter (d. 1958)
• May 28 - D.D. Sheehan, first independent Labour MP. in Ireland (d. 1948)

July births

• July 1 - Alice Guy-Blaché, pioneer French/American filmmaker (d. 1968)
• July 20 - Alberto Santos-Dumont, Brazilian aviation pioneer (d. 1932)

August births

• August 26 - Lee De Forest, American inventor (d. 1961)

September births

• September 5 - Cornelius Vanderbilt III, military officer, inventor, engineer (d. 1942)
• September 8 - David O. McKay, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d. 1970)
• September 20 - Sidney Olcott, pioneer film director (d. 1949)
• September 20 - Ferenc Szisz, Hungarian-born French race car driver (d. 1944)
• September 21 - Papa Jack Laine, jazz musician (d. 1966)

October births

• October 14 - Ray Ewry, American athlete
• October 19 - Jaap Eden, Dutch skater and cyclist
• October 26 - Thorvald Stauning, Prime Minister of Denmark (d. 1942)

November births

• November 16 - W.C. Handy, Blues composer (d. 1958)

December births

• December 11 - Josip Plemelj, Slovene mathematician (d. 1967)
• William Ernest Hocking, American philosopher

Deaths

• January 9 - Napoleon III, last emperor of France, in exile in England
• January 18 - Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, author
• January 20 - Fr. Basil Anthony Mary Moreau , founder of the Congregation of Holy Cross
• February 7 - Sheridan Le Fanu, writer
• March 10 - John Torrey, (American botanist
• April 11 - Edward Canby, US Army General killed during peace negations with Captain Jack
• May 6 - José Antonio Páez, First Venezuelan president
• May 8 - John Stuart Mill, British philosopher, (b. 1806)
• May 20 - Sir George-Étienne Cartier, French-Canadian statesman
• September 17 - Alexander Berry, Scottish adventurer, founder of Berry, Australia.
• September 22 - Friedrich Frey-Herosé, member of the Swiss Federal Council (b. 1801)
• September 23 - Jean Chacornac, astronomer (b. 1823)
• October 3 - Captain Jack, Modoc tribal leader, hanged for the murder of Edward Canby
• October 6 - Sir Paweł Edmund Strzelecki, Polish explorer and geologist (b. 1797)
• December 14 - Louis Agassiz, Swiss-American geologist and naturalist