1905

As the second year of the massive Russo-Japanese War begins, more than 100,000 die in the largest world battles of that era, and the war chaos leads to the 1905 Russian Revolution against Nicholas II of Russia (Shostakovich's 11th Symphony is subtitled ''The Year 1905'' to commemorate this) and the start of Revolution in the Kingdom of Poland. Canada and the U.S. expand west, with the Alberta and Saskatchewan provinces and the founding of Las Vegas. 1905 is also the year in which Albert Einstein, at this time resident in Bern, publishes his four ''Annus Mirabilis'' papers in ''Annalen der Physik'' (Leipzig) (March 18, May 11, June 30 and September 27), laying the foundations for more than a century's study of theoretical physics.

Events

January

* January 1 – In a major defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, General Anatoly Stessel of the Russian Army surrender Port Arthur, located in mainland China, to the Japanese.
* January 3 – Japan take former possession of Port Arthur and rename it Ryojun, holding it for the next 40 years. The area will revert in 1945 to China and is now the Lushunkou District.
* January 4 –
**Gheorghe Grigore Cantacuzino becomes Prime Minister of Romania for the second time, having previously served from 1899 to 1900, and remains in office for more than two years.
**The city of Bend, Oregon, plotted out in 1900 by Alexander Drake, iss incorporated as a town for local logging companies, and will have a population of 536 in 1910. By the year 2020, it will have almost 100,000 residents.
* January 5 – Baroness Emma Orczy's play ''The Scarlet Pimpernel'', the forerunner of her novel, opens at the New Theatre in London, beginning a run of 122 performances and numerous revivals.
* January 6 –
**The Lick Observatory announces the discovery of a sixth moon of Jupiter, made by their astronomer Charles D. Perrine. Unlike the first five Jovian satellites discovered, the sixth one will be referred to by number as "Jupiter VI" until 1975, and is now called Himalia.
**The U.S. Senate confirms the nomination of William D. Crum, an African-American, to the office of collector of customs at Charleston, South Carolina after Crum's nomination by President Theodore Roosevelt.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews''
(February 1905) pp. 154-156
* January 11 – Under the supervision of five editors, work begins on the comprehensive ''Catholic Encyclopedia'', subtitled "An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church" and published by the Robert Appleton Company. The first volume will appear in 1907.
* January 14 – Jens Christian Christensen takes office as the new Prime Minister of Denmark.
* January 15 – A series of three high tsunamis kill 61 people in the Norway in the villages of Ytre Nesdal and Bødal, after a rockslide sweeps down Mount Ramnefjell and crashes into Lake Lovatnet.
* January 17 – In France, Prime Minister Émile Combes and his cabinet announce their resignations after being implicated in the Affair of the Cards (''L'Affaire des Fiches''), a system set up by the War Ministry to purge the French Army officers corps of Jesuits.
* January 21 – The Dominican Republic sign an agreement with the United States to allow the U.S. to administer the collection of customs taxes for Santo Domingo for 50 years, with the U.S. to assume responsibility for payment of the Republic's debts to foreign nations from Dominican income. The agreement is done as an exercise of the "Roosevelt Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews''
(March 1905) pp. 283-286
* January 22 (January 9 O.S.) – The Bloody Sunday massacre of peaceful Russian demonstrators at the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg took place, leading to an unsuccessful uprising.
* January 24 – Maurice Rouvier forms a government as the new Prime Minister of France.
* January 25 – Tsar Nicholas II appoints General Dmitri Trepov to be the Governor-General of Saint Petersburg, with absolute power to issue regulations to keep order.
* January 26 – (January 13 O.S. in Russia)
**The Imperial Russian Army opens fire on demonstrators in Riga, Governorate of Livonia, killing 73 people and injuring 200 in the Russian Revolution of 1905
** Elections are held in Hungary for the 413 seats in the Országgyűlés, the Kingdom's parliament within Austria-Hungary. Voters overwhelmingly rejected the Liberal Party, led by Prime Minister István Tisza, that had ruled Hungary since 1875, and the Liberals lost 118 of their 277 seats, but Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria-Hungary (in his capacity as King Ferenc József) ignored the results and kept Tisza in power.
* January 27 – The Nelson Act is passed into law in the United States, providing for racial segregation of schools in the Alaska Territory.
* January 29 – Rioting breaks out in Warsaw, at the time under Russian Imperial rule with a Russian Governor-General.
* January 30 – The U.S. Supreme Court renders its unanimous decision in the landmark case of '' Swift & Co. v. United States''.
* January 31 – "The greatest ball of the Gilded Age" is held by James Hazen Hyde, the 28-year-old heir to the fortune of the founder of the Equitable Life Assurance Association" at New York City's Sherry Hotel, who spends $200,000 for a "Louis XV costume ball" for invited guests.

February

* February 1 – U.S. Senator John H. Mitchell of Oregon is indicted by a federal grand jury on charges arising from a scandal involving land grants in the state and illegally using his influence for private clients.
* February 3 – The first performance of '' A Shropshire Lad'', the setting to music of the 1896 set of 63 poems of A. E. Housman by Arthur Somervell as a song-cycle, takes place at Aeolian Hall in London.
* February 4 – A simultaneous uprising begins at six cities in Argentina against the government of President Manuel Quintana.
* February 5 – The French ship ''Anjou'' is wrecked off of the coast of the uninhabited Auckland Island, located from the nearest inhabited land in New Zealand. The castaways live on the isle for more than three months until being rescued on May 7.
* February 6 – Eliel Soisalon-Soininen, the Chancellor of Justice of the Grand Duchy of Finland (at the time part of the Russian Empire) is assassinated at Helsingfors (now Helsinki).
* February 9 – Dr. Prince A. Morrow begins the movement in the U.S. for sex education, with the founding of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis.
* February 12 – The Switzerland national football team plays its first international game, losing to France, 1 to 0.
* February 16 – Six of the 11 crew of the Royal Navy submarine HMS ''A5'' are killed by a pair of explosions caused by gasoline fumes.
* February 17 – Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia, the Governor-General of Moscow and uncle of Tsar Nicholas II, is assassinated.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews''
(April 1905) pp. 413-416
* February 20 – In the Russo-Japanese War, the Battle of Mukden began in Manchuria.
* February 21 – Sir Wilfrid Laurier introduces a resolution in the Canadian parliament proposing that two new provinces, Alberta and Saskatchewan, be created out of the Northwest Territories.
* February 23 – Rotary International is founded in Chicago in the U.S.
* February 25 – Alcide Laurin becomes the first known ice hockey player to be killed during a game.
* February 26 – Russian sustains a severe defeat in Manchuria at Tsen-ho-Cheng.
* February 28 – Jane Stanford, the co-founder with her husband Leland of Stanford University, is fatally poisoned while visiting the Moana Hotel in Hawaii.

March

* March 2 – Russia's Committee of Ministers votes to grant religious freedom to the residents of the Russian Empire.
* March 3 – Tsar Nicholas II of Russia announces his decision to create an elected assembly, the Duma, to represent the people of the Russian Empire in an advisory capacity, although the real power to make laws will remain with the Tsar and the cabinet of ministers.
* March 10 – Russo-Japanese War: The Japanese capture of Mukden (modern-day Shenyang) completes the rout of Russian armies in Manchuria. The Russian Army commander, General Aleksey Kuropatkin, telegraphs the Tsar that his armies will be retreating to avoid further danger.
* March 13 – Mata Hari introduces her exotic dance act in the Musée Guimet, Paris.
* March 14 – Twenty-three of the 26 crew of the British windjammer ship ''Kyber'' die when the ship is wrecked off of the coast of Land's End.
* March 17 – – U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt gives the bride away at the wedding of his 20-year-old niece, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, to her distant cousin, 23-year-old law student Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
* March 18 – Albert Einstein submits his paper "On a heuristic viewpoint concerning the production and transformation of light", in which he explained the photoelectric effect using the notion of light quanta, for publication.
* March 20 – The Grover Shoe Factory disaster kills 58 employees in Brockton, Massachusetts, when a boiler explodes and the factory building collapses.
* March 22 – Russia's Committee of Ministers votes to abolish the compulsory use of the Russian language in schools in " Congress Poland" (Tsarstvo Polskoye).
* March 23 – The Theriso revolt begins in Crete as about 1,500 people led by Eleftherios Venizelos demand unification with Greece.
* March 24 – Toastmasters International is founded by Ralph C. Smedley in Bloomington, Illinois.
* March 29 – Jimmy Walsh knocks out Monte Attell, in a controversial six-round bout in Philadelphia, to win recognition of the World Bantamweight Championship by the National Boxing Association, despite being disqualified by the referee.

April

* April 1 – The British Imperial Penny Post was extended to include Australia.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (May 1905) pp. 537-539
* April 2 –
**The Simplon Tunnel through the Alps was opened to railway traffic.
**The government of Chile, having recently enlarged its territory by the settlement of its boundary dispute with Bolivia, announced that it wanted to acquire sovereignty over two provinces in Peru, Tacna and Arica.
* April 3 –
**A coal mine explosion at Zeigler, Illinois, killed 50 miners.
**U.S. President Roosevelt appointed Charles E. Magoon as the new Governor of the Canal Zone as he replaced all seven members of the Panama Canal Commission.
**The Boca Juniors football club was founded in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
* April 4 – In India, the 1905 Kangra earthquake hit the Kangra Valley, killed 20,000 and destroyed most buildings in Kangra, McLeod Ganj and Dharamshala.
* April 5 –
**The body of John Paul Jones, the Revolutionary War hero who was known as "The Father of the American Navy", was located in Paris almost 113 years after his death after a six-year search by U.S. Ambassador to France Horace Porter. On April 20, the casket was located on April 5, and taken to the American Church of the Holy Trinity in Paris "where his coffin rested beneath a draped American flag to await its return to a grateful nation." and the remains were returned to the United States, where they now rest at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.
**Electric streetcar transportation was introduced to the Philippines as the Tranvia system replaced horse-drawn trolleys in Manila.
* April 6 – A violent strike by the Teamsters' Union began in Chicago as the 10,000 members of the local United Brotherhood of Teamsters walked off the job to join 5,000 members of the 26 locals of the National Tailors' Association. After the Teamsters entered, rioting began on April 7 and would continue through August 1. Before the strike was settled, 21 people had been killed and 416 injured in what was the most deadly labor dispute in 20th century up to that time; it remains second only to the East St. Louis Riot of 1917.
* April 7 – In San Antonio, Texas, U.S. President Roosevelt attended the first reunion since 1898 of the Rough Riders.
* April 8 – Hundreds of people were killed in Spain in the collapse of a dam holding back a reservoir near Madrid.
* April 9 – The Swedish Civil Administration's Employees' Union (''Civilförvaltningens Personalförbund''), the first labor union for government employees and civil servants in Sweden, was founded under the name "State Caretakers' Association" (''Statens vaktmästares förening''), with 242 members. By 1969, it would have over 9,000; in 1970, the Swedish National Union of State Employees (''Statsanställdas förbund'') would be created and absorb the private union.
* April 10 –
**The last legal executions in China by the practice of Lingchi, a method of slow torture called "death by a thousand cuts" because of the gradual severing of parts of the body, were carried out in Beijing on a condemned Mongol prisoner. "Fou-tchou-li", later referred to as Fuzhuli had been convicted of the murder of his master. Photographs were taken by French soldiers at the scene, leading to pressure on the Chinese government to abolish the penalty entirely.
**The Ottoman Empire's governor of the Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem in Ottoman Palestine issued a decree allowing Chechen immigrants, who had fled persecution in the Russian Empire, to own lands that they had settled on, leading to the rapid growth of the city of Zarqa, now located in Jordan.
* April 11 – The Gibbes Museum of Art opened in Charleston, South Carolina.
* April 12 –
**The New York Hippodrome, at the time the world's largest theater with 5,300 seats, had its grand opening with an extravagant show called ''A Yankee Circus on Mars'', followed by the drama ''Andersonville''. The theater would be closed on August 16, 1939, to be demolished in order for the real estate to be sold for more than the building was worth.
**The Diatto-Clément automobile company was founded in Italy as part of a partnership between the railway car manufacturer Diatto and the French carmaker Clément-Bayard.
**The cities of Twin Falls, Idaho, and Alachua, Florida were incorporated.
* April 13 – Albert Libertad first published the journal ''L'Anarchie'' to promote the cause of individual anarchism in France. The journal lasted until the outbreak of World War One in August 1914, with the final isue published on July 22, 1914.
* April 14 – Erik Gustaf Boström resigned as Prime Minister of Sweden over the issue of the Swedish-Norwegian Union. His Minister without Portfolio, Johan Ramstedt, succeeded him.
* April 15 –
**The FA Cup was won by Aston Villa over Newcastle United, 2 to 0, before a crowd of 101,117 people at the Crystal Palace stadium in South London.
**The Norddeutscher Fußball-Verband (NFV), one of the earliest national soccer football leagues in Germany, was formed by the agreement of six regional associations (based in Hamburg, Bremen, Kiel, Hannover, Braunschweig and Mecklenburg) from eight different German kingdoms, principalities and duchies.
* April 16 – The Battle of Čelopek was fought in the Ottoman Empire (in what is now the Republic of North Macedonia) as a force of 130 Serbian Chetnik fighters killed an entire column of 200 Ottoman Army soldiers and officers, while losing only four of its own men.
* April 17 –
**Russia's Tsar Nicholas II issued a decree granting religious freedom to his subjects allowing believers outside the Russian Orthodox Church (including Roman Catholics and Muslim) to minister to Russians.
**In the case of '' Lochner v. New York'', the Supreme Court of the United States invalidated New York's 8-hour-day law in a 5 to 4 decision.
* April 18 – Real Madrid won its first soccer football title ever, Spain's third Copa del Rey, by defeating Athletic Bilbao, 1 to 0 after having beaten the (now defunct) San Sebastián Recreation Club two days earlier.
* April 19 – The United Kingdom and the Republic of Nicaragua signed the Harrison—Altamirano Treaty, recognizing absolute Nicaraguan sovereignty over the Mosquito Coast. The new treaty annulled the 1860 Zeldon-Wyke Treaty that had preserved British authority on the Mosquito Indians reservation.
* April 20 – The largest ocean liner in the world at the time, the German cruiser SS ''Amerika'' was launched from Ireland's Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast for the Hamburg America Line. It would go into service on October 11. After World War One, it was taken acquired by the United States Navy, which would rechristen it as USS ''America''.
* April 21 – The deputies of the Assembly of the island of Crete voted to unite with Greece, and swore their allegiance to the Hellenic constitution. The government of Greece announced that it would not recognize the Cretan proclamation.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (June 1905) pp. 665–668
* April 22 – Théophile Delcassé withdrew his resignation as Foreign Minister of France, the day after giving it, after a personal request by President Émile Loubet.
* April 23 – German General Lothar von Trotha commander of troops in Germany's colony of Südwestafrika (now Namibia), ordered the extermination of the Nama people within the colony's borders, ultimately killing 10,000 of the Africans. Von Trotha's proclamation ''Aan de oorlogvorende Namastamme'', proclaimed that "The Nama who chooses not to surrender and lets himself be seen in German territory will be shot, until all are exterminated." The Nama extermination followed an order by von Trotha on October 2, 1904, to kill the Ovaherero people in the colony.
* April 24 – China's Empress Regent Cixi (Tzu Hsi) abolished further use in executions of the nation's three most cruel torture execution methods, lingchi ("death by a thousand cuts"), gibbeting (similar to crucifixion, hanging until dying of exposure, thirst or starvation), and desecration of a dying person.
* April 25 – A revolt broke out in what is now Saudi Arabia against the authority of the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire as leader of the Islamic faith.
* April 26 – The government of the United States announced that it was abandoning its negotiations with the Chinese Empire for a treaty regarding Chinese immigration to the U.S.
* April 27 – General Alexander Alexandrovich Kozloff was appointed as the new Governor-General of Moscow, replacing the recently assassinated Grand Duke Sergius.
* April 28 –
**A tornado struck Laredo, Texas and killed 100 people.
** Herbert W. Bowen, the U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela, was removed from office the Department of State and directed to return to the U.S. to explain charges made against him by the Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Francis B. Loomis (who had been Bowen's predecessor as Ambassador). The State Department replaced with William W. Russell, the U.S. Ambassador to neighboring Colombia.
* April 29 –
**Inventor John J. Montgomery made the first public demonstration of his "Montgomery Aeroplane", a glider that he released from a balloon at an altitude of above Santa Clara College in California.
**The Imperial Russian Navy's submarine fleet, which had been on patrol since February 14, had its first combat in the Russo-Japanese War. An Imperial Japanese Navy torpedo boat fired upon the Russian submarine ''Som'', but was unable to score a hit.
* April 30 – Albert Einstein completed his doctoral dissertation, ''A New Determination of Molecular Dimensions'' (submitted July 30 to the University of Zurich).

May

* May 1 – As uprisings in Poland continued, Imperial Russian Army soldiers fired into a crowd a crowd of protesters in Warsaw and in Lodz.

* May 2 –
**The Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) was founded by act of the state legislature, in response to the violence of the coal strike of 1902.
**In Notodden in Norway, the first mass production of synthetic potassium nitrate, using the Birkeland–Eyde process, was carried out.
* May 3 – Aleksandr Kuprin's novel '' The Duel'' was first published.
* May 4 –
**The first world championship of professional wrestling took place at Madison Square Garden in New York City, as Estonian-born strong man George Hackenschmidt defeated U.S. champion Tom Jenkins.
**New York's Belmont Park for horse racing was opened at the Long Island town of Elmont, initially to host the Belmont Stakes
* May 5 –
** Korea University was founded in Seoul as Bosung College.
**The city of Kelowna, British Columbia, was incorporated.
* May 6 – The Klamath National Forest was founded in California near the town of Yreka and now covers of protected lands in the California and part of Oregon.
* May 7 – The Japanese and Korean Exclusion League was launched in San Francisco in California by Americans of European descent, P. H. McCarthy of the San Francisco Building Trades Council labor union, and Andrew Furuseth of the International Seamen's Union to lobby for further immigration to the U.S. from Asia.
* May 8 –
**The first immigrants to Mexico from Korea arrived on a British cargo ship and landed at the port of Salina Cruz after departing Incheon on April 4. The group, under contract to a plantation, boarded trains to the town of Progreso in the state of Yucatán, but most were not able to save enough money to go home.
**The case of '' United States v. Ju Toy'' was decided by the United States Supreme Court, determining that the decision of immigration authorities to deny a person entry into the U.S. was not subject to judicial review and that denial of entry was not a violation of due process.
* May 9 – Upon the death of U.S. social activist Ann Reeves Jarvis In West Virginia, her daughter Anna Jarvis resolved to campaign across the United States for a proposed "Mother's Day", lobbying successfully to get the state of West Virginia to recognize the second Sunday in May as the day for remembrance of mothers both living and dead. Miss Jarvis's campaign would be the inspiration for multiple celebratory days for family members during the year, and provide a new outlet for business for florists and sellers of greeting cards.
* May 10 –
**In the U.S., A tornado destroyed the town of Snyder, Oklahoma and killed 97 people, making it the seventh deadliest storm in U.S. history up to that time.
**The Kentucky Derby was held, with only three horses. Agile, ridden by Jack Martin, won, while Ram's Horn placed and Layson showed.
* May 11 –
**Albert Einstein submitted for publication his paper "''Über die von der molekularkinetischen Theorie der Wärme geforderte Bewegung von in ruhenden Flüssigkeiten suspendierten Teilchen''" ("On the Motion of Small Particles Suspended in a Stationary Liquid, as Required by the Molecular Kinetic Theory of Heat"), based on his doctoral research, delineating a stochastic model of Brownian motion. The paper would be published on July 18.
**A dynamite explosion killed 20 passengers and three employees on a Pennsylvania Railroad train, the ''Cincinnati Express'', after a freight train from the same company derailed at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania while carrying of the explosive.
* May 12 –
**The recently opened Natural History Museum in London unveiled its centerpiece, and exact replica of the skeleton of the ''Diplodocus carnegii'' dinosaur, made from plaster from the original fossilized bones that were still being prepared for display at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. The press soon dubbed the diplodicus with the name "Dippy".
**Yi Han-eung, the Korean Empire's highest-ranking diplomatic representative as charge d'Affaires to the United Kingdom, hanged himself in his private residence in London, after the British Foreign Secretary had refused to meet with him regarding Japan's imminent takeover of Korea.
* May 13 – The Nippon Club, the first traditional Japanese gentlemen's club in the United States, was founded in Manhattan in New York City by 75 prominent Japanese and Japanese-American business leaders, with renowned chemist Takamine Jōkichi as its first president.
* May 14 – Franz Roubaud's massive panorama painting '' The Siege of Sevastopol'' was unveiled to the public in the Russian city of Sevastopol in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Crimean War siege that had ended in 1855. The full-size painting which is in length and high.
* May 15 – Las Vegas, Nevada, was founded when of land adjacent to the Union Pacific Railroad tracks were auctioned to what is now today Downtown Las Vegas.
* May 16 – Nikolai Evgenievich Bogdanovich, the Russian Governor-General of the province of Ufa Governorate was shot and killed.
* May 17 – The Kappa Delta Rho fraternity was founded in Room 14 of Old Painter Hall, at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont.
* May 18 – Fighting broke out during a meeting of the Philadelphia city council after the council approved a 75-year lease to the United Gas Improvement Company of the city's natural gas plant to a private company, despite opposition from Mayor Weaver, for the amount of 25 million dollars, with exclusive control of the energy supply until the year 1980. Five days later, Mayor Weaver fired the Director of Public Works and the Director of Public Safety for negotiating the agreement, an action he was forced to rescind by a court injunction. On May 27, United Gas withdrew its proposition for the 75-year lease.
* May 19 – Harry George Galt, the much-despised British sub-commissioner of the Western Province of Uganda (at the time a British protectorate) was killed with a spear while resting in a government-owned house near the town of Ibanda.
* May 20 – Burmah Oil acquired the " D'Arcy Concession", the exclusive right, until 1961, to prospect and drill for oil in the kingdom of Persia, now the Islamic Republic of Iran. William Knox D'Arcy had secured a 60-year option in 1901 for £20,000, but the project did not become feasible until the British government agreed to provide protection in the oil fields. The first oil strike would happen in 1908 for the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, owned by D'Arcy and Burmah Oil.
* May 21 – George Bernard Shaw's play ''Man and Superman'' premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in London as produced by the Stage Society. After the first two performances of the four-act play proved to be problematic, the play was performed from May 23 onward without Act III ("Don Juan in Hell").
* May 22 – Abdul Hamid II, the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire established the Ullah Millet for the Aromanians of the empire. For this reason, the Aromanian National Day is sometimes celebrated on this day.
* May 23 –
**Venezuelan President Cipriano Castro decreed an amnesty to all persons who had been exiled from Venezuela, and ordered the freedom of most political prisoners except for officers above the rank of colonel or navy captain.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews''
(July 1905) pp. 26-29
**The Ottoman Sultan's decision to create the Ullah Millet was publicly announced. This day is the most common date for the celebration of the Aromanian National Day.
**The assassin of Moscow's Grand Duke Sergius was executed.
* May 24 – Physicist and chemist Otto Hahn confirmed his discovery of a new element, "radiothorium", publishing his results in the journal ''Proceedings of the Royal Society''.
* May 25 –
**Ljubomir Stojanović formed a government as the new Prime Minister of Serbia, succeeding Nikola Pašić.
**The first meeting of the International Waterways Commission of the United States and Canada took place by agreement between the two nations to work together "to investigate and report upon the conditions and uses of the waters adjacent to the boundary lines... including all waters of the lakes and rivers whose natural outlet is by the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean." The Commission was composed of three members from the U.S., "and three who shall represent the interests of the Dominion of Canada."
* May 26 – A newly completed drawbridge for the Pennsylvania Railroad, over the Hackensack River in New Jersey, was destroyed by dynamite.
* May 27 – In the Russo-Japanese War, the decisive Battle of Tsushima began in the Straits of Korea, as the Japanese fleet under Admiral Heihachiro Togo staged a surprise attack on the Russian fleet under Admiral Zinovi Petrovich Rozhdestvenski.
* May 28 – At the end of two days in fighting in the Battle of Tsushima, the Russian Imperial Navy had suffered the deaths of more than 14,000 of the 18,000 sailors and officers it had brought to the battle. Most of the Russian dead had gone down with the sinking of their battleships, including Admiral Voelkersam. Another 3,000 Russian Navy members were captured, including Admiral Rozhdestvenski and Admiral Nebogatov. Only four Russian cruisers and 1,000 men, directed by Admiral Enquist, were able to escape the area, with three able to go to the Philippine Islands and one able to return to the Russian port of Vladivostok. The Japanese loss was three torpedo boats and 800 men.
* May 29 –
**Brooklyn Superbas pitcher Elmer Stricklett introduced the "spitball" to major league baseball, according to one baseball historian, after learning the now-illegal technique while in the minor leagues. Eldon L. Ham would write later that Stricklett "unloaded an errant moistened missile that defied baseball physics. With a much nastier break than a normal big league curve, the spitter was born," and that after learning from a former teammate (George Hildebrand) how to use saliva to change the trajectory of a baseball, Stricklett "seems to have introduced the depraved missile at the Major League level."
**The first completely uncensored performance of Frank Wedekind's play '' Die Büchse der Pandora'' (''Pandora's Box'') premiered at the Trianon Theatre in Vienna, by invitation only, in order to avoid prosecution under anti-obscenity laws.
**The Widnes–Runcorn Transporter Bridge, the largest transporter bridge ever built, and the first in Britain, opened to the public. Persons crossing from one side of the bridge to the other boarded a large transporter car that had a capacity to carry up to 300 passengers or up to four horse-drawn wagons, and the transporter car would then travel on cables suspended from the underside of the bridge over the Mersey River.
* May 30 – Two days after Japan's overwhelming victory at the Battle of Tsushima, Japan's Prime Minister Katsura Tarō sent a request, by way of the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, to U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt asking him to bring together representatives of the Japanese and Russian empires to the U.S. as a neutral site for discussions to end the Russo-Japanese War. Within a week, Roosevelt would contact the Russians and peace discussions would take place at the U.S. Navy shipyard in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, starting on August 9, 1905.
* May 31 – In Paris, Spain's visiting King Alfonso and France's President Loubet escaped assassination after an anarchist threw a bomb at the carriage in which they were riding. The King and the President were returning from an opera.

June

* June 1 –
**The Lewis and Clark Exposition, celebrating the centennial of the two explorers' arrival at the northwest United States, opened in Portland, Oregon.
**The Sultan of Morocco rejected France's demands for a scheme of reforms.
* June 2 –
**The palace of Spain's Governor-General of Catalonia in Barcelona was seriously damaged by a bomb.
**Board chairman H. C. Frick and several other directors of the Equitable Life Insurance resigned after a Congressional investigation of the company's scandal was made public. Former U.S. Secretary of the Navy Paul Morton was elected the new chairman of the board on June 9.
* June 3 – Russia's three surviving cruisers from the Battle of Tsushima-- ''Oleg'', ''Aurora'' and ''Jemchug''—limped into Manila Harbor with serious damages.
* June 4 – Morocco's Foreign Minister asked the major powers for an international conference on France's demands. Germany joined in the proposal on June 8.
* June 5 –
**U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt informed Russia that it would have to remove three Imperial Navy cruisers that had fled to Manila Bay to repair damages sustained at the Battle of Tsushima. On June 10, Admiral Enquist of Russia replied that the cruisers would remain anyway.
**The Russian Navy cruiser ''Terck'' sank the British steamer ''Ikhona''.
**Venezuela and Colombia resumed diplomatic relations.
* June 6 – In Germany's last royal wedding, Crown Prince Wilhelm, son of Kaiser Wilhelm II and heir to the throne, was married to Duchess Cecilie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin at Berlin.
* June 7 – The Norwegian Parliament, the Storting, declared dissolution of the union between Norway and Sweden, giving Norway full independence. While King Oscar protested the action, there was no disturbance in either nation.
* June 8 – The sinking of a Royal Navy torpedo boat during maneuvers killed 14 officers and men.
* June 9 –
**King Oscar of Sweden declined a request from the Storting to nominate a king for Norway.
** Charlton Athletic F.C. was founded in London, England.
* June 10 –
**Russia and Japan both accepted U.S. President Roosevelt's invitation to have a peace conference to end the Russo-Japanese War. On June 15, the event was tentatively scheduled for Washington, D.C. to begin by August 10.
**Norway's government lowered the flag of the Union of Sweden and Norway from all offices, and substituted the Norse tricolor flag.
* June 11 –
**The Pennsylvania Railroad inaugurated express service that allowed travel between New York City and Chicago in only 18 hours.
**Sweden's government said that it would not recognize the secession of Norway from the Union of Sweden and Norway. The Storting replied on June 19 that it inended to proceed with secession anyway.
* June 12 –
**The Servants of India Society was founded by Gopal Krishna Gokhale, pledging "to train men for the work of political education and agitation, and to promote by all constitutional means the natural interests of the Indian people."
**The fastest speed ever set for a steam powered locomotive, by the Pennsylvania Railroad's 4-4-2 7002.
* June 13 – Theodoros Diligiannis, Prime Minister of Greece since December 29, was stabbed to death by a professional gambler, Antony Gherakaris, as he was entering the Hellenic Parliament house. Diligiannis had recently led the government in outlawing gambling houses in Greece.
* June 14 – A gun explosion on the British battleship HMS ''Magnificent'' killed 18 sailors.
* June 15 – Princess Margaret of Connaught married Prince Gustaf Adolf of Sweden, Duke of Skåne, the future King Gustaf VI Adolf.
* June 16 – As the Russo-Japanese War continued, Japan's Field Marshal Ōyama Iwao routed 3,000 Russian troops led by General Mistchenko in a battle at Liaoyang in Manchuria.
* June 17 –
**The crash of a Western Maryland Railroad train at Ransen, Maryland, killed 23 people.
**France's premier and Germany's ambassador in Paris began conferences on the Moroccan situation.
* June 18 –
**A coal mine explosion in Russia killed 500 employees at the Ivan Colliery at Kharsisk.
** Géza Fejérváry took office as the new Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Hungary, after being appointed by Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Joseph (King Ferenc József). The Hungarian parliament voted to declare the Fejérváry ministry unconstitutional.
* June 19 – The U.S. signed postal treaties with Australia and Panama.
* June 20 – Dr. Ernest Henry Starling introduced the word "hormone" into the English language by coining the term in his paper "The Chemical Correlation of the Functions of the Body" in a lecture to the Royal College of Physicians in London.
* June 21 –
**The New York Central Railroad's flagship passenger train, the ''20th Century Limited'', was derailed in an apparent act of sabotage, leaving open of a switch in Mentor, Ohio, killing 21 people.
** King Oscar II of Sweden and Norway opened the Riksdag's new session and endorsed the recommendation of the Swedish government to negotiate with Norway's Storting for a peaceful dissolution of the union of the two nations.
* June 22 – Grand Duke Nicholas of Russia was appointed by the Tsar Nicholas II to be the new President of the Council of National Defense.
* June 23 –
**Eighteen months after their first powered flight, the Wright Brothers tested their new ''Wright Flyer III'' airplane.
**Russian troops killed 50 Polish independence demonstrators and wounded another 200 in the city of Lodz.
** Eugenio Montero Rios was sworn in as the new Prime Minister of Spain.
* June 24 – Prime Minister Dimitrios Rallis of Greece formed a new cabinet of ministers.
* June 25 – The Danish Navy training ship ''Georg Stage'' was accidentally sunk after a collision with the English steamship ''Ancona'', killing 22 young recruits ranging in age from 14 to 17.
* June 26 – The House of Commons rejected a motion of no confidence in the government of British Prime Minister Arthur Balfour, after revelations of corruption in the British Army.
* June 27 – (June 14 O.S.): Mutiny broke out on the Russian ironclad ''Potemkin''. The principal officers were killed as the mutineers seized the ship on the Black Sea and steered it into the harbor of Odessa, where a riot had broken out. The Russian Navy's Black Sea squadron was dispatched from Sevastopol to either capture or sink the rebel battleship. By June 29, over 1,000 people had been killed in street fighting and the ''Potemkin'' began shelling of the city.
* June 28 – A portion of the "Pomp And Circumstance March No. 1 In D", subtitled "Land of Hope and Glory", composed by Sir Edward Elgar and simply referred to in North America as "Pomp and Circumstance", was first played as a graduation march, after Yale University music professor Samuel Sanford invited Elgar to receive an honorary degree.
* June 29 –
**The Automobile Association was founded in the United Kingdom.
**Russian Imperial Navy sailors at the port of Libava (now Liepāja in Latvia) mutinied.
* June 30 – Albert Einstein submitted for publication his paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies", establishing his theory of special relativity. It would be published on September 26.

July

* July 1 –
**Hundreds of people died in the flooding of Guanajunto in Mexico.
**A federal grand jury in Chicago indicted five corporations and 17 people for violations of the Sherman Act after charges were brought by the U.S. Department of Justice in an antitrust prosecution.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (August 1905) pp. 158-161
**China's government ordered all provincial governors and viceroys to put a stop to anti-American protests.
**U.S. Secretary of State John Hay died suddenly. Funeral services were conducted on July 5 with President Roosevelt and Vice President Fairbanks attending. Roosevelt appointed Elihu Root to succeed ay, and Root was confirmed and took office on July 19.
** Charles J. Bonaparte became the new U.S. Secretary of the Navy.
* July 2 –
**The Russian Imperial Navy's Black Sea squadron returned to Sevastopol after having been unable to capture or sink the battleship ''Potemkin'', and the ships were disabled.
**Philadelphia police arrested almost 2,000 people in a raid on gambling houses and "disorderly resorts".
* July 3 – France's Chamber of Deputies passed the bill for separation of church and state, 341 to 233.
* July 4 –
**The lower house of Austria's parliament voted down a motion to prepare for a separation of Hungary from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
**The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced more than 1,200 civil lawsuits against American railroad companies for violation of federal laws regarding transportation of livestock.
* July 5 – Alfred Deakin took office as the new Prime Minister of Australia.
* July 6 – The remains of John Paul Jones were turned over to U.S. Navy officials in Paris, and a special squadron departed from Cherbourg on July 8 to send the remains to the U.S.
* July 7 – U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt delivered a speech to 60,000 people at the National Educational Association convention at Asbury Park, New Jersey.
* July 8 –
**U.S. President Roosevelt sent his 21-year-old daughter, Alice Roosevelt Longworth, and her party on a diplomatic journey to Japan, the Philippines, Hong Kong, China and Korea.
**France accepted Germany's terms for a conference at Tangier to resolve their dispute in Morocco
* July 9 – Romania returned the battleship ''Potemkin'' to the Russian Imperial Navy the day after the mutineering crew had been granted asylum at the Black Sea port of Kustenji.
* July 10 –
**A Japanese expedition took control of the Russian island of Sakhalin after a short battle. Before retreating, the Russian Navy commander burned the government buildings and destroyed the coast defense guns, as well as destroying much of the capital at Korsakorsk.
**Field Marshal Lord Roberts declared in a speech at the House of Lords that the British Army was totally unfit for war and called for conscription of additional young men into the service.
** Portsmouth, New Hampshire was agreed upon by the U.S., Japan and Russia to negotiate the terms of the treaty to end the Russo-Japanese War.
* July 11 –
**Major General Count Shuvalov, chief of police operations in Moscow, was assassinated.
**More than 100 coal miners were killed in an explosion at the United National Colliers Company at Wattstown in Wales.
* July 12 –
**The University of Sheffield, an amalgamation of Firth College, the Medical Institution and the Technical School, was officially opened by King Edward VII in England.
**The first World Congress of the Baptist Church ended with all attending stood up and voluntarily recited the Apostles' Creed.
* July 13 – Britain's Prime Minister Balfour declared that he was opposed to using the draft to increase the strength of the British Army.
* July 14 –
**The government of France instituted its first government assistance program for elderly and disabled persons.
** Orville Wright suffered minor injuries in a test-flight of the Wright Brothers' new ''Wright Flyer III'' airplane, prompting them to begin a major redesign of the aircraft.
**The first known suicide attack by a civilian (as opposed to sacrifices made in military combat) took place when a New Zealand farmer, Joseph Sewell, walked into a courtroom in Murchison (where he was the defendant in a civil lawsuit) and announced that he intended to detonate dynamite sticks strapped to his body. Sewell was ushered from the courtroom to the street and set off the dynamite after a police officer (who survived the blast) attempted to arrest him.
* July 15 – The popular fictional character Arsène Lupin, the gentleman thief, was introduced in France. Created by French writer Maurice Leblanc, the first Lupin story appeared in the magazine ''Je sais tout'', with the publication of the story ""The Arrest of Arsène Lupin" ("L'Arrestation d'Arsène Lupin"). Lupin went on to be featured in 17 novels and 39 short novels, and has been featured in plays, films and several television series.
* July 16 –
*Ottoman Empire forces, led by General Ahmad Faydi Pasha, began a three-pronged attack on Yemen, capturing the Sana'a on August 30.
*At the age of 14, Julius Henry Marx made his show business debut, appearing as a boy singer with the Gene Leroy Trio at the Ramona Theatre in Grand Rapids, Michigan as part of a vaudeville act. He would later become famous as comedian Groucho Marx.
* July 17 – Ali Pasha ibn Abd Allah became the new Emir of the Hejaz in what is now Saudi Arabia, upon the death of his uncle, Sharif Awn ar-Rafiq. Ali Pasha would be appointed Sharif of Mecca on October 31, 1905. William Ochsenwald, ''Religion, Society, and the State in Arabia: The Hijaz under Ottoman Control, 1840-1908'' (Ohio State University Press, 1984).
* July 18 – The opposition party in Hungary's parliament voted to issue a manifesto urging Hungarians to refuse to obey orders of the incumbent government.
* July 19 – The Congress of Russian Zemstvos opened at Moscow, to make plans for setting the form of the Duma, Russia's first national assembly.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (September 1905) pp. 283-286
* July 20 – The British House of Commons narrowly voted a resolution of no confidence in the government of Prime Minister Balfour, by a majority of three votes. Balfour announced on July 24 that he would not resign.
* July 21 –
**Sixty members of the crew of the USS ''Bennington'' were killed in an explosion of the U.S. Navy gunboat in the harbor at San Diego.
**An attempt to assassinate the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire was unsuccessful after a bomb was thrown at him and he escaped, uninjured.
**The Russian chief of police forces in Russian Finland was assassinated in Helsingfors.
* July 22 –
*Florence Kelly delivered her landmark speech about child labor before the convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association in Philadelphia.
* July 23 –
**Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany met for a conference in Finland in the city of Borgo.
** Alfred Deakin became Prime Minister of Australia for the second time.
* July 24 – An 8.4 magnitude earthquake struck Mongolia, the second-largest on record there.
* July 25 – The Prime Minister of Sweden and his cabinet of ministers resigned after the rejection of a bill to negotiate the terms of dissolution of the Union of Sweden and Norway.
* July 26 – The British House of Commons rejected a bill that would have limited the length of parliament to no more than five years.
* July 27 –
*The Taft–Katsura agreement was reached in Tokyo between U.S. Secretary of State (and future U.S. president) William Howard Taft, and Japan's Prime Minister, Count Katsura Tarō, to discuss their respective positions regarding Korea and the Philippines. Though no formal agreement was signed, the U.S. agreed to Korea becoming a protectorate of Japan, in return for Japan's recognition of U.S. jurisdiction over the Philippines.
**Japan's new ambassador to the U.S., Baron Komura, along with Foreign Minister Takahira, met with President Roosevelt at his home in Oyster Bay in New York.
**Russian security police seized all documents relating to the recently ended Congress of Zemstvos.
**Twenty people were killed in the derailment of a Lancashire & York Railway train near Liverpool.
* July 28 – Frankie Neil became the new world bantamweight boxing champion by defeating title holder Harry Tenny in a 25-round bout at Colma, California.
* July 29 – In California, the government of the City of Los Angeles announced plans to build an aqueduct to bring water from the Owens River to adequately supply the city's residents. The Los Angeles Aqueduct would become operational in 1913 and transform the city into the second largest metropolis into the United States within less than a century.
* July 30 – At Basel in Switzerland, the International Zionist Conference delegates voted to reject the British officer of land in Uganda for a Jewish homeland.
* July 31 –
**Japan completed its conquest of Russia's island of Sakhalin with the surrender of the remaining Russian garrison of 3,200 men and 70 officers commanded by Governor Mikhail Lyapunov.
**Japan secured a commitment from the Korean Empire to open the three Korean ports to international trade.

August

* August 1 –
**Japan established its own government on the recently-captured Russian island of Sakhalin. ''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (September 1905) pp. 283-286
**Tsar Nicholas II of Russia held a council of the grand dukes, cabinet ministers, and other officials to make plans to create the Duma, Russia's first representative legislature.
* August 2 –
** Businessman and right-wing politician Christian Lundeberg became Prime Minister of Sweden.
** The Ancient Order of Druids initiated neo-Druidic rituals at Stonehenge in England.
* August 3 – The Governor of Louisiana ordered the state naval reserve to seize two U.S. Coast Guard cutters outside of New Orleans. The ships had been directed to enforce a quarantine against people leaving the state during a yellow fever epidemic. One cutter was seized the next day, while the other sailed away.
* August 4 – Japanese warships appeared off of the coast of the Russian Empire's easternmost city, Vladivostok.
* August 5 – The peace conference representatives of Russia and Japan met for the first time as the guests of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt at his home in Oyster Bay, New York. From there, they sailed on U.S. Navy ships for the meeting site at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The peace envoys of Russia and Japan arrived on August 8, where they were welcomed by the Governor of New Hampshire.
* August 6 – In a gunbattle in New York City's Chinatown section, three Chinese residents were shot dead and several others severely injured.
* August 7 –
**King Oscar II appointed Prince Gustaf to serve as his regent.
**G. A. Van Harmel became the new Prime Minister of the Netherlands.
**Surgeons with the U.S. Marine Hospital Service entered New Orleans to take charge of preventing the spread of yellow fever.
**A crowd of 20,000 Finnish people under the administration of the Russian Empire gathered at Helsingfors (now Helsinki) to demand sweeping changes in the Finnish governorate.
* August 8 – Fourteen employees of a department store in Albany, New York were killed when the building collapsed suddenly.
* August 9 – The peace conference between Russia and Japan began at Portsmouth. The next day, Japan presented its terms for peace and the Russian representatives telegraphed the information to Tsar Nicholas.
* August 10 – U.S. President Roosevelt addressed a large crowd of mining union members at Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
* August 11 –
*The Russian Council appointed by Tsar Nicholas II met at Peterhoff and approved a plan for a national Duma, the first representative assembly in the Empire.
* August 12 –
**Russia's Tsar sent his counterproposal to Japan regarding peace conditions, and the conference began to consider the 12-point agenda. The Russians agreed to three of the 12 conditions on August 14, and two more on August 15.
** Leopold II of Belgium opened the Antwerpen-Central railway station.
** The first running took place of the Shelsley Walsh Speed Hill Climb in England, the world's oldest motorsport event to be staged continuously on its original course.
* August 13 –
**At a referendum in Norway, voters opted almost unanimously for dissolution of the union with Sweden.
**In Canada, an Indian village near Ashcroft, British Columbia, was swept away by a flash flood of the Thompson River caused by a landslide.
**A train collision on the Toledo, St. Louis and Western Railroad killed 12 people near Vermillion, Ohio.
* August 14 –
**Judge Frank Plumley, the American arbitrator of France's claims against Venezuela, allowed $636,212 of more than eight million dollars worth of demands.
**Polish novelist Henryk Sienkiewicz was sentenced to house arrest indefinitely after being convicted of signing and publishing a manifesto protesting the Russification of schools within the Governorate of Warsaw.
* August 15 – Mexican-American prospector Pablo Valencia got lost in the Sonoran Desert of Arizona with no water. Enduring almost eight days of dehydration, Valencia wandered until he was discovered on August 23 by anthropologist William J. McGee and McGee's Papago Indian assistant, Jose. McGee would later recount Valencia's ordeal in a paper, "Desert Thirst as Disease".
* August 16 – The Sultan of Morocco refused the French ministers demands for the release of an Algerian chief, as well as for indemnity for French financial losses.
* August 17 – Negotiations between Russia and Japan broke down over disagreements with the remaining seven Japanese conditions for peace. The conference adjourned the next day, but agreed to meet again on August 22.
* August 18 – Russian Tsar II proclaimed the creation of the Russia's first representative assembly, to be selected by indirect vote.
* August 19 – President Roosevelt invited one of the Russian peace envoys, Baron Rosen, to discuss with him the necessity to make peace.
* August 20 – –
**Chinese revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen formed the first chapter of T'ung Meng Hui, a union of all secret societies determined to bringing down the Manchu dynasty.
**Lord Curzon resigned as Viceroy of India, and the Earl of Minto was appointed as his successor.
* August 21 – The Sequoyah Constitutional Convention took place in Muskogee in the U.S. Indian Territory and approved a constitution for the proposed State of Sequoyah, seeking admission as the only Native American majority state in the U.S. Delegates from the Creek, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw and Seminole nations drafted the document, which was approved overwhelmingly in a November 7 referendum. Instead, President Roosevelt proposed the joining of the Indian Territory with the white-ruled Oklahoma Territory, and the Oklahoma Enabling Act would unify the two territories effective June 16, 1906, with Oklahoma admitted as the 46th U.S. state on November 16, 1907.
* August 22 – The sinking of the Japanese ferry ''Kinjo Maru'' killed 160 people after the British ship HMS ''Baralong'' collided with it in the Sea of Japan off of the coast of Shimishima.
* August 23 – A. Roy Knabenshue introduced the dirigible to the skies of New York City, piloting the lighter-than-air vehicle within view of hundreds of thousands of spectators. ''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (October 1905) pp. 410-413
* August 24 – Frederick D. White became the first Commissioner of the Northwest Territories in Canada, and would serve until his death in 1918.
* August 25 –
**Theodore Roosevelt became the first U.S. President to travel underwater, after boarding the Navy submarine USS ''Plunger''.
**A flash flood killed 18 people in the mining towns of Berwind, Colorado and Tabasco, Colorado.
* August 26 – Near Point Barrow, Alaska, the crew of the Norwegian ship ''Gjoa'', led by Roald Amundsen, made the breakthrough of finding the long-sought "Northwest Passage" from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. Amundsen would write later, "The North-West Passage had been accomplished-- my dream from childhood. This very moment it wa fulfilled. I had a peculiar sensation in my throat; I was somewhat overworked and tired, and I suppose it was weakness on my part, but I could feel tears coming to my eyes."
* August 27 –
**Influenced by educator Sergei Trubetskoy, Tsar Nicholas II issued a decree restoring autonomy to Russia's universities, restoring the autonomy that had been taken away from them in 1884. As part of the reform, students were allowed to hold meetings on university grounds for the first time in more than 20 years.
**Han Kyu-seol was appointed as the new Prime Minister of the Korean Empire, and the last before Korea would be turned into a protectorate of Japan. He would be fired on November 17, shortly after Korea and Japan signed the treaty of protection.
* August 28 – The sinking of the American steamship ''Peronic'' killed 28 of the crew off the coast of Florida.
* August 29 – The largest steamship in the world was launched from the then-German port of Stettin (now Szeczin in Poland), with Kaiser Wilhelm II presiding.
* August 30 –
**A solar eclipse took place, with greatest visibility in North Africa.
**Baseball star Ty Cobb made his major league debut at the age of 18, appearing for the Detroit Tigers after being called up from the Augusta (Georgia) Tourists in the South Atlantic League.
* August 31 – The imperial government of China issued an order restoring commercial relations with the U.S. and prohibiting Chinese citizens from further participation in the boycott of American goods that had started on December 22, 1904.

September

* September 1 – The Canadian provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan are established, from the southwestern part of the Northwest Territories.
* September 5 – Russo-Japanese War: Treaty of Portsmouth – In New Hampshire, a treaty mediated by U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt is signed by Japan and Russia. Russia cedes the island of Sakhalin together with port and rail rights in Manchuria to Japan.
* September 8 – The 7.2 Calabria earthquake shakes Southern Italy with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (''Extreme''), killing between 557 and 2,500 people.
* September 10 – Crystal Palace F.C. is founded in London.
* September 27 – Albert Einstein submits for publication his paper "Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?", in which he puts forward the idea of mass–energy equivalence by publishing the famous equation ''E'' = ''mc''² (published November 21).

October

* October – Fauvist artists, led by Henri Matisse and André Derain, first exhibit their works, at the Salon d'Automne in Paris.
* October 1 – Turkish Football team Galatasaray was founded in Istanbul.
* October 1 – A Czech worker, František Pavlík (b. 1885), is bayoneted to death during a demonstration for a Czech university in Brno. This event is the motivation for a piano sonata, '' 1. X. 1905'', by composer Leoš Janáček, which premières on 27 January 1906.
* October 2 – is laid down in the United Kingdom, revolutionizing battleship design and triggering a naval arms race.
* October 5 – The Wright brothers' third aeroplane (Wright Flyer III) stays in the air for 39 minutes with Wilbur piloting, the first aeroplane flight lasting over half an hour.
* October 11 – The Institute of Musical Art, predecessor of the Juilliard School, opens in New York City.
* October 16 – The Partition of Bengal is made by Lord Curzon to separate the region of Bengal into Muslim and Hindu territories until its reunification in 1911.
* October 26 – Sweden–Norway agrees to the repeal of the union with Norway, forming the two modern countries today.
* October 29 (October 16 O.S.) – In the Russian Empire:
** Russian Revolution of 1905: The Imperial Russian Army opens fire on a meeting at a street market in Tallinn, Governorate of Estonia, killing 94 and injuring over 200 people.
** The Circum-Baikal Railway is brought into permanent operation, completing through rail communication on the Trans-Siberian Railway.
* October 30
** (October 17 Old Style) – October Manifesto: Tsar Nicholas II of Russia is forced to announce the granting of his country's first constitution (the Russian Constitution of 1906), conceding a national assembly ( State Duma) with limited powers.

November

* November 1 – Lahti, the city of Finland, is granted city rights by Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, the last Grand Duke of Finland.
* November 4 – The application of the infamous February Manifesto, removing the veto of the Diet of the autonomous Grand Principality of Finland over matters considered by the Emperor to concern Russian imperial interests, is interrupted by the new November Manifesto. The Senate of Finland is ordered to put forward a proposal for parliamentary reform, based on unicameralism and universal and equal suffrage.
* November 7 – Lawyer and liberal politician Karl Staaff becomes Prime Minister of Sweden, after a Riksdag election based mainly on voting rights reform.
* November 9 – The Province of Alberta, Canada, holds its first general election.
* November 12 – Norway holds a referendum, resulting in popular approval of the Storting's decision to authorise the government to make the offer of the throne of the newly independent country.
* November 17 – The Japan–Korea Treaty of 1905 ("Eulsa Treaty") effectively makes Korea a protectorate of Japan.
* November 18 – Prince Carl of Denmark becomes King Haakon VII of Norway.
* November 28 – Irish nationalist Arthur Griffith founds Sinn Féin in Dublin, as a political party whose goal is independence for all of Ireland.
* November–December – Russian Revolution of 1905: In the Baltic governorates, workers and peasants burn and loot hundreds of Baltic German manors. The Imperial Russian Army thereafter executes and deports thousands of looters.

December

* December 2 – Norsk Hydro, predecessor of Equinor, a state-run energy product and grid brand in Scandinavia, founded in Norway.
* December 7– 18 – Moscow Uprising: A Bolshevik-led revolt is suppressed by the army.
* December 9 – The 1905 French law on the Separation of the Churches and the State is passed, enacting ''laïcité''.
* December 11 – In support of the Moscow Uprising, the Council of Workers' Deputies of Kiev stages a mass uprising, establishing the Shuliavka Republic in the city, December 12– 16.
* December 15 – The Pushkin House is established in Saint Petersburg, Russia, to preserve the cultural heritage of Alexander Pushkin.
*December 16 – In Rugby Union, the "'' Game of the Century''" is played between Wales and New Zealand national rugby union team, New Zealand at Cardiff Arms Park.
* December 30
** A bomb kills Frank Steunenberg, ex-governor of Idaho; the case leads to a trial against leaders of the Western Federation of Miners.
** Franz Lehár's operetta ''The Merry Widow'' is first performed, at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna.

Date unknown

* The title Prime Minister of the United Kingdom is officially recognized by Edward VII.
* Pathé Frères colors black and white films by machine.
* ''Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Huckleberry Finn'' and ''The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Tom Sawyer'' are banned from the Brooklyn Public Library, for setting a "bad example."
* Alfred Einhorn introduces novocaine.
* Wolf, Wolves become extinct in Japan.
* Civil service examinations are abolished in Qing dynasty China.
* Ta-Ching Government Bank, predecessor of Bank of China, is founded in Beijing, Peiping.

Births

January – March

* January 1 – Malek Bennabi, Algerian philosopher (d. 1973)
* January 2
** Michael Tippett, English composer (d. 1998)
** Anna May Wong, American actress (d. 1961)
* January 3 – Nobuhito, Prince Takamatsu, younger brother of Japanese Emperor Hirohito (d. 1987)
* January 4 – Sterling Holloway, American actor (d. 1992)
* January 12 – Tex Ritter, American actor and singer (d. 1974)
* January 13 – Kay Francis, American actress (d. 1968)
* January 14 – Takeo Fukuda, 67th Prime Minister of Japan (1976-1978) (d. 1995)
* January 15 – Torin Thatcher, English actor, Lieutenant colonel of the Royal Artillery (d. 1981)
* January 17
** D. R. Kaprekar, Indian recreational mathematician (d. 1986)
** Saeb Salam, 4-time prime minister of Lebanon (d. 2000)
** Guillermo Stábile, Argentine football player, manager (d. 1966)
* January 18 – Joseph Bonanno (''Joe Bananas''), American gangster (d. 2002)
* January 21 – Christian Dior, French couturier (d. 1957)
* January 24 – J. Howard Marshall, American billionaire (d. 1995)
* January 26
** Maria von Trapp, Austrian singer and leader of the Trapp Family Singers, whose life was dramatized in ''The Sound of Music''(d. 1987)
** Charles Lane (actor), Charles Lane, American actor (d. 2007)
* January 29 – Barnett Newman, American painter (d. 1970)
* January 31 – John O'Hara, American writer (d. 1970)
* February 1 – Emilio Segrè, Italian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1989)
* February 2 – Ayn Rand, American author, philosopher (''The Fountainhead'') (d. 1982)
* February 7
** Paul Nizan, French author (d. 1940)
** Ulf von Euler, Swedish physiologist, academic and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1983)
* February 10
** Walter A. Brown, American basketball, ice hockey pioneer (d. 1964)
** Chick Webb, American drummer and bandleader (d. 1939)
* February 13 – Ra'ana Liaquat Ali Khan, Pakistani stateswoman, First Lady of Pakistan (d. 1990)
* February 15 – Harold Arlen, American popular music composer (d. 1986)
* February 17 – Frans Piët, Dutch comics artist (''Sjors en Sjimmie'') (d. 1997)
* February 23 – Derrick Henry Lehmer, American mathematician (d. 1991)
* February 27 – Franchot Tone, American actor (d. 1968)
* March 3 – Marie Glory, French silent-screen actress (d. 2009)
* March 10 – Richard Haydn, English comic actor (d. 1985)
* March 12 – Takashi Shimura, Japanese actor (d. 1982)
* March 15 – Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, German lawyer, Nazi opponent (d. 1944)
* March 16 – Elisabeth Flickenschildt, German actress (d. 1977)
* March 18
** Thomas Townsend Brown, American inventor (d. 1985)
** Robert Donat, English actor (d. 1958)
* March 19 – Albert Speer, German Nazi official, architect (d. 1981)
* March 20 – Vera Panova, Soviet-Russian writer (d. 1973)
* March 23
** Lale Andersen, German singer (d. 1972)
** John Randall (physicist), John Randall, English physicist, biophysicist (d. 1984)
* March 25 – Pote Sarasin, Thai diplomat and politician, 9th Prime Minister of Thailand (d. 2000)
* March 30
** Mikio Oda, Japanese athlete (d. 1998)
** Albert Pierrepoint, British executioner (d. 1992)

April – June

* April 1
** Gaston Eyskens, Prime Minister of Belgium (d. 1988)
** Paul Hasluck, Australian statesman, 17th Governor-General of Australia (d. 1993)
* April 18 – George H. Hitchings, American physician, pharmacologist and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1998)
* April 21 – Pat Brown, American lawyer, politician and 32nd Governor of California (d. 1996)
* April 25 – George Nēpia, New Zealand Maori rugby player (d. 1986)
* April 26 – Raúl Leoni, President of Venezuela (d. 1972)
* April 29 – George Beamish, British Royal Air Force air marshal, Irish rugby player (d. 1967)
* April 30 – Sergey Nikolsky, Russian mathematician (d. 2012)
* May 3 – Werner Fenchel, German mathematician (d. 1988)
* May 5 – Floyd Gottfredson, American cartoonist, primarily known for the Mickey Mouse (comic strip), ''Mickey Mouse'' comic strip (d. 1986)
*May 9 – Lilí Álvarez, Spanish tennis player, author and feminist (d. 1998)
* May 11
**Lise de Baissac, Mauritian-born Special Operations Executive, SOE agent, war hero (d. 2004)
**Catherine Bauer Wurster, American architect and public housing advocate (d. 1964)
* May 13 – Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed, Indian lawyer, politician and 5th President of India (d. 1977)
* May 15 – Joseph Cotten, American actor (d. 1994)
* May 16 – Henry Fonda, American actor (d. 1982)
* May 17 – Roy Nelson (cartoonist), Roy Nelson, American cartoonist (d. 1956)
* May 20 – Gerrit Achterberg, Dutch poet (d. 1962)
* May 22 – Tom Driberg, British politician/journalist (d. 1976)
* May 24 – Mikhail Sholokhov, Russian novelist, short story writer and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1984)
* May 27
** Signe Johansson-Engdahl, Swedish Olympic diver (d. 2010)
** Lilo Milchsack (b. Lisalotte Duden), German promoter of Anglo-German relations (d. 1992)
* May 28 – Sada Abe, Japanese actress (d. 1970)
* May 29 – Sebastian Shaw (actor), Sebastian Shaw, English actor (d. 1994)
* June 1 – Robert Newton, English actor (d. 1956)
* June 3
** Tupua Tamasese Meaʻole, Samoan politician (d. 1963)
** Martin Gottfried Weiss, Nazi commandant (d. 1946)
* June 5 – John Abbott (actor), John Abbott, English actor (d. 1996)
* June 7 – James J. Braddock, Irish-American heavyweight boxer (d. 1974)
* June 11 – Paul Wormser, French fencer (d. 1944)
* June 12 – Ray Barbuti, American athlete (d. 1975)
* June 13 – Franco Riccardi, Italian fencer (d. 1968)
* June 14
**Liesel Bach, German aerobatic pilot (d. 1992)
**Arthur Davis (animator), Arthur Davis, American animator (d. 2000)
* June 19 – Mildred Natwick, American stage, film actress (d. 1994)
* June 21
** Jean-Paul Sartre, French existentialist (d. 1980)
** Zeng Xueming, Chinese midwife, wife of Hồ Chí Minh (d. 1991)
** Tino Bianchi, Italian actor (d. 1996)
* June 23
** Jack Pickersgill, Canadian civil servant and politician (d. 1997)
** Isaac Schapera, English anthropologist (d. 2003)
** Mary Livingstone, American radio comedian (d. 1983)
* June 24 – Fred Alderman, American sprint runner (d. 1998)
* June 25
** Leon deValinger Jr., American archivist, historian (d. 2000)
** Arthur Maria Rabenalt, Austrian film director (d. 1993)
** Jun'ichi Yoda, Japanese poet (d. 1997)
* June 26 – Jack Longland, British educator, mountain climber and broadcaster (d. 1993)
* June 27
** Lady Rachel Pepys, Lady-in-Waiting to Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent (d. 1992)
** Kwan Tak-hing, Hong Kong actor (d. 1996)
** Tarzan Woltzen, American professional basketball player (d. 1995)
* June 28 – Ashley Montagu, British-American anthropologist (d. 1999)
* June 29 – Oswald Denison, New Zealand rower (d. 1990)
* June 30
** John Harmon (actor), John Harmon, American actor (d. 1985)
** Nestor Paiva, American actor (d. 1966)
** John Van Ryn, American tennis champion (d. 1999)

July – September

* July 2 – Eugene E. Lindsey, United States Navy officer (d. 1942)
* July 3
** Johnny Gibson, American runner, Olympic athlete (d. 2006)
** :es:Clorinda Málaga de Prado, Clorinda Málaga de Prado, First Lady of Peru (d. 1993)
* July 4
** Robert Hankey, 2nd Baron Hankey, British diplomat, public servant (d. 1996)
** Irving Johnson, American sail training pioneer (d. 1991)
** Marie-Thérèse Paquin, Canadian pianist (d. 1997)
** Lionel Trilling, American literary critic, short story writer, essayist and teacher (d. 1975)
* July 5 – Jock Cameron, South African cricketer (d. 1935)
* July 6 – Leonid Pavlovich Potapov, Russian ethnographer (d. 2000)
* July 8
** Kathleen Hamilton, Duchess of Abercorn (d. 1990)
** Leonid Amalrik, Russian animator (d. 1997)
* July 10 – Thomas Gomez, American actor (d. 1971)
* July 11
**Betty Allan, Australian statistician and biometrician (d. 1952)
**Kikutaro Baba, Japanese malacologist (d. 2000)
**David Louis Lidman, American actor (d. 1982)
* July 12
** Edward Bernds, American director (d. 2000)
** Prince John of the United Kingdom (d. 1919)
* July 13
** Magda Foy, American child actress (d. 2000)
** Eugenio Pagnini, Italian modern pentathlete (d. 1993)
** Edvin Laine, Finnish film director (d. 1989)
** Alfredo M. Santos, Filipino general (d. 1990)
* July 14 – Laurence Chisholm Young, American mathematician (d. 2000)
* July 15
** Anita Farra, Italian actress (d. 2008)
** Dorothy Fields, American songwriter (d. 1988)
** Addie McPhail, American actress (d. 2003)
** Shirley Povich, American sports columnist (d. 1998)
* July 16 – Lou Garland, American baseball player (d. 1990)
* July 17
** William Gargan, American actor (d. 1979)
** Guillermo Hyslop, American businessman (d. 1993)
** Araken Patusca, Brazilian footballer (d. 1990)
** Marjorie Reeves, British historian, educationalist (d. 2003)
* July 19
** List of the oldest living people#Geertje Kuijntjes, Geertje Kuijntjes, Dutch supercentenarian (d. 2019)
** Giuseppe Girotti, Italian Roman Catholic priest and blessed (d. 1945)
* July 20 – Joseph Levis, American fencer (d. 2005)
* July 21
** David M. Kennedy (politician), David M. Kennedy, American politician, businessman (d. 1996)
** Diana Trilling, American literary critic, author (d. 1996)
* July 22 – Doc Cramer, American baseball player (d. 1990)
* July 23 – Leopold Engleitner, Austrian Holocaust survivor (d. 2013)
* July 25
** Elias Canetti, Bulgarian-born British writer (d. 1994)
** Masazō Nonaka, Japanese supercentenarian (d. 2019)
** Denys Watkins-Pitchford, British writer of children's books (d. 1990)
* July 26 – Alex Radcliffe, American baseball player (d. 1983)
* July 29
** Clara Bow, American film actress (d. 1965)
** Dag Hammarskjöld, Swedish diplomat, 2nd Secretary-General of the United Nations (d. 1961)
* July 30 – Pedro Quartucci, Argentine boxer, actor (d. 1983)
* July 31 – Robert A. Grant, American judge (d. 1998)
* August 2
** Ernst Kals, German submarine commander (d. 1979)
** Franz König, Austrian Roman Catholic archbishop (d. 2004)
** Myrna Loy, American actress (d. 1993)
** Ruth Nelson (actress), Ruth Nelson, American actress (d. 1992)
* August 4 – Abeid Karume, 1st President of Zanzibar (assassinated) (d. 1972)
* August 8 – André Jolivet, French composer (d. 1974)
* August 9 – Leo Genn, English actor (d. 1978)
* August 11 – Erwin Chargaff, Austrian biochemist (d. 2002)
* August 13 – Gareth Jones (journalist), Gareth Jones, Welsh journalist (d. 1935)
* August 16 – Marian Rejewski, Polish mathematician, cryptologist (d. 1980)
* August 20
** Jean Gebser, German-born author, linguist and poet (d. 1973)
** Mikio Naruse, Japanese filmmaker (d. 1969)
* August 22 – John Lyng, Norwegian politician, prime minister (d. 1978)
* August 23 – Constant Lambert, British composer (d. 1951)
* August 24 – Siaka Stevens, President of Sierra Leone (d. 1988)
* August 25 – Faustina Kowalska, Polish "Secretary of Divine Mercy", saint (d. 1938)
* August 28 – Sam Levene, American actor (d. 1980)
* August 29
** Dhyan Chand, Indian hockey player (d. 1979)
** Al Taliaferro, Disney comics artist (d. 1969)
* August 31 – Dore Schary, American film writer, director and producer (d. 1980)
* September 1
** Chau Sen Cocsal Chhum, Cambodian politician (d. 2009)
** Father Chrysanthus, Dutch arachnologist (d. 1972)
** Elvera Sanchez, Puerto Rican dancer (d. 2000)
* September 3 – Carl David Anderson, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1991)
* September 5
** Arthur Koestler, Hungarian-born novelist and social philosopher (d. 1983)
** Justiniano Montano, Filipino politician (d. 2005)
** Walther Müller, German physicist (d. 1979)
* September 10 – Ibrahim Biçakçiu, Albanian politician, 2-time Prime Minister of Albania (d. 1977)
* September 12
**Linda Agostini, English-Australian murder victim (d. 1934)
**Ali Amini, Iranian politician, 67th Prime Minister of Iran (d. 1992)
* September 18
** Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, Eddie Anderson, African-American actor (d. 1977)
** Agnes de Mille, American choreographer (d. 1993)
** Greta Garbo, Swedish actress (d. 1990)
*September 19 – Judith Auer, German World War II resistance fighter (d. 1944)
* September 20 – Reinhold O. Carlson, American politician (d. 2006)
* September 22
** Haakon Lie, Norwegian politician (d. 2009)
** Eugen Sänger, Austrian aerospace engineer (d. 1964)
* September 24 – Severo Ochoa, Spanish–American biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1993)
* September 26
** Juliana Koo, Chinese-American diplomat and supercentenarian (d. 2017)
** Emilio Navarro, Puerto Rican baseball player (d. 2011)
* September 28 – Max Schmeling, German boxer (d. 2005)
* September 30
** Savitri Devi, Greek writer, National Socialist philosopher (d. 1982)
** Nevill Francis Mott, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1996)
** Michael Powell, English film director (d. 1990)

October – December

* October 6 – Helen Wills, American tennis player (d. 1998)
* October 7 – Andy Devine, American character actor (d. 1977)
* October 11 – Fred Trump, American real estate developer, father of Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States (d. 1999)
* October 15 – C. P. Snow, English novelist (d. 1980 in literature, 1980)
* October 18 – Félix Houphouët-Boigny, President of Ivory Coast (d. 1993)
* October 23
** Felix Bloch, Swiss-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1983)
** Claude de Cambronne, French aircraft manufacturer (d. 1993)
** Yen Chia-kan, 2nd President of the Republic of China (d. 1993)
* October 29
** Giuseppe Alessi, Italian politician (d. 2009)
** Reg Bunn, English comic book artist (d. 1971)
** Berthold Wolpe, German-born British calligrapher, typographer and illustrator (d. 1989)
* October 31 – Harry Frederick Harlow, American psychologist (d. 1981)
* November 2
** Isobel Andrews, New Zealand writer (d. 1990)
** Georges Schehadé, Lebanese poet, playwright (d. 1989)
* November 3 – Lois Mailou Jones, African-American artist (d. 1998)
* November 4 – Dragutin Tadijanović, Croatian poet (d. 2007)
* November 5 – Sajjad Zaheer, Indian-born Urdu writer, revolutionary (d. 1973)
* November 7 – William Alwyn, English composer (d. 1985)
* November 9 – Erika Mann, German author, war correspondent (d. 1969)
* November 15 – Mantovani, Italian-born conductor, arranger (d. 1980)
* November 17
** Astrid of Sweden, Queen Astrid of Belgium (d. 1935)
** Mischa Auer, Russian-American actor (d. 1967)
* November 19 – Tommy Dorsey, American bandleader (d. 1956)
*November 21 – Georgina Battiscombe, British biographer (d. 2006)
*November 25 – Samiha Ayverdi, Turkish author and Sufi mystic (d. 1993)
* December 5
** Frank Pakenham, 7th Earl of Longford, British peer, politician and reformer (d. 2001)
** Otto Preminger, Austrian-born American film director (d. 1986)
* December 7
** Gerard Kuiper, Dutch astronomer (d. 1973)
** Edelgard Huber von Gersdorff, German supercentenarian (d. 2018)
* December 8 – Frank Faylen, American actor (d. 1985)
* December 11 – Gilbert Roland, Mexican-born American actor (d. 1994)
* December 16 – Ruben Nirvi, Finnish linguist and professor (d. 1986)
* December 17 – Simo Häyhä, Finnish sniper (d. 2002)
* December 19 – Irving Kahn, American financial analyst, investor (d. 2015)
* December 21 – Anthony Powell, British author (d. 2000)
* December 22 – Kenneth Rexroth, American poet (d. 1982)
* December 24 – Howard Hughes, American millionaire, aviation pioneer and film mogul (d. 1976)
* December 27 – Cliff Arquette (''Charley Weaver''), American comic (d. 1974)
* December 31 – Jule Styne, English-born composer (d. 1994)

Date unknown

* Gershon Liebman, French rabbi (d. 1997)

Deaths

January–February

* January 1
** Johannes Ludovicus Paquay, Belgian Roman Catholic priest and blessed (b. 1828)
* January 2 – Clara Augusta Jones Trask, American dime novelist (b. 1839)
* January 6
** José María Gabriel y Galán, Spanish poet (b. 1870)
** Ann Eliza Smith, American patriot (b. 1819)
* January 9 – Louise Michel, French anarchist (b. 1830)
* January 11 – Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter, Polish Hasidic rabbi (b. 1847)
* January 14 – Ernst Abbe, German physicist (b. 1840)
* January 19 – Debendranath Tagore, Indian philosopher (b. 1817)
* January 20 – Gyula Szapáry, 10th Prime Minister of Hungary (b. 1832)
* January 22
** Ștefan Fălcoianu, Romanian general and politician (b. 1835)
** Clara Harrison Stranahan, American college co-founder and trustee (b. 1831)
* January 27 – Watson Heston, American cartoonist (b. 1846)
* January 31 – Konstantin Savitsky, Russian painter (b. 1844)
* February 2 –Mabel Cahill, Irish tennis champion (b. 1863)
* February 3 – Adolf Bastian, German anthropologist (b. 1826)
* February 4 – Louis-Ernest Barrias, French sculptor (b. 1841)
* February 5 – Andrijica Šimić, Croatian hajduk (b. 1833)
* February 9 – Adolph von Menzel, German painter (b. 1815)
* February 12 – Marcel Schwob, French writer (b. 1867)
* February 15 – Lew Wallace, American writer (''Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ'') (b. 1827)
* February 16 – Jay Cooke, American financier (b. 1821)
* February 17 – Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia (b. 1857)
* February 19 – Benjamin Harris Babbidge, Australian politician, 19th Mayor of Brisbane (b. 1836)
* February 20 – Jeremiah W. Farnham, American merchant captain (b. c. 1828)
* February 24 – Fanny Cochrane Smith, Aboriginal Tasmanian (b. 1834)
* February 25 – Edward Cooper (mayor), Edward Cooper, 83rd Mayor of New York City (b. 1824)

March–April

* March 1 – Jean-Baptiste Claude Eugène Guillaume, French sculptor (b. 1822)
* March 3 – Antonio Annetto Caruana, Maltese archaeologist, author (b. 1830)
* March 6
** Pierre Théoma Boisrond-Canal, 12th President of Haiti (b. 1832)
** John Henninger Reagan, American Confederate politician (b. 1818)
* March 13 – Nil Izvorov, Bulgarian Orthodox priest and venerable (b. 1823)
* March 15
** Meyer Guggenheim, Swiss-born patriarch of the Guggenheim Family (b. 1828)
** Amalie Skram, Norwegian author, feminist (b. 1846)
* March 17 – Juan Nepomuceno Zegrí Moreno, Spanish Roman Catholic priest and blessed (b. 1831)
* March 23 – Martha E. Cram Bates, American journalist (b. 1839)
* March 24 – Jules Verne, French science fiction author (''Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea'') (b. 1828)
* March 25 – Maurice Barrymore, British actor (b. 1849)
* March 28 – Huang Zunxian, Chinese poet, writer (b. 1848)
* April 4 – Constantin Meunier, Belgian painter and sculptor (b. 1831)
* April 7 – Maria Assunta Pallotta, Italian Roman Catholic religious professed and blessed (b. 1878)
* April 9 – Frederic Thesiger, 2nd Baron Chelmsford, British general (b. 1827)
* April 18 – Juan Valera y Alcalá-Galiano, Spanish writer (b. 1824)
* April 23 – Joseph Jefferson, American actor (b. 1829)

May–June

* May 11 – Andrzej Jerzy Mniszech, Polish painter (b. 1823)
* May 13 – Sam S. Shubert, American theater owner (b. 1878)
* May 14 – Jessie Bartlett Davis, American actress and singer (b. 1860)
* May 23 – Mary Livermore, American American advocate of women's rights (b. 1820)
* May 26 – Alphonse James de Rothschild, French banker, philanthropist (b. 1827)
* May 29 – Francisco Silvela, Spanish politician, Prime Minister (b. 1843)
* June 1
** Émile Delahaye, French automotive pioneer (b. 1843)
** Giovanni Battista Scalabrini, Italian Roman Catholic prelate and blessed (b. 1839)
* June 3 – Hudson Taylor, James Hudson Taylor, British missionary (b. 1832)
* June 4 – Jan Mikulicz-Radecki, Polish-Austrian surgeon (b. 1850)
* June 5 – Małgorzata Szewczyk, Polish Roman Catholic religious professed and blessed (b. 1828)
* June 7 – Carl Kellner (mystic), Carl Kellner, Austrian mystic (b. 1851)
* June 13 – Theodoros Diligiannis, 5-time Prime Minister of Greece (assassinated) (b. 1820)
* June 17 – Máximo Gómez, Cuban general (b. 1836)
* June 18
** Carmine Crocco, Italian brigand (b. 1830)
** Per Teodor Cleve, Swedish chemist and geologist (b. 1840)
* June 22 – Francis Lubbock, Governor of Texas (b. 1815)
* June 27 – Grigory Vakulinchuk, Russian mutineer (b. 1877)

July–August

* July 1 – John Hay, American diplomat, private secretary to Abraham Lincoln (b. 1838)
* July 4 – Élisée Reclus, French geographer and anarchist (b. 1830)
* July 8 – Walter Kittredge, American musician and composer (b. 1834)
* July 11 – Muhammad Abduh, Egyptian philosopher, jurist (b. 1849)
* July 15 – Raimundo Fernández-Villaverde, 28th Prime Minister of Spain (b. 1848)
* July 30 – Gioacchino La Lomia, Italian Roman Catholic priest and venerable (b. 1831)
* August 1 – John Brown (Canadian politician), John Brown, Canadian politician (b. 1841)
* August 4
** Walther Flemming, German biologist (b. 1843)
** Kinjikitile Ngwale, Tanzanian rebel leader
* August 14 – Simeon Solomon, British artist (b. 1840)
* August 21 – Mary Mapes Dodge, American author of children's literature (b. 1831)
* August 31 – Francesco Tamagno, Italian opera singer (b. 1850)

September–October

* September 5 – Touch the Clouds, Minneconjou chief (b. c. 1838)
* September 13 – René Goblet, French politician, 52nd Prime Minister of France (b. 1828)
* September 14 – Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, Franco-Italian explorer (b. 1852)
* September 18 – George MacDonald, Scottish author, poet and Christian minister (b. 1824)
* September 19 – Thomas John Barnardo, Irish philanthropist (b. 1845)
* October 3 – José-Maria de Heredia, French poet (b. 1842)
* October 6 – Ferdinand von Richthofen, German explorer and geographer (b. 1833)
* October 11 – Isabelle Gatti de Gamond, Belgian educationalist and feminist (b. 1839)
* October 13 – Sir Henry Irving, English actor (b. 1838)
* October 15 – Mikhail Dragomirov, Russian general (b. 1830)
* October 29 – Étienne Desmarteau, Canadian athlete (b. 1873)

November–December

* November 2 – Albert von Kölliker, Swiss anatomist (b. 1817)
* November 9 -- William Parrott, British coalminer (b. 1843)
*November 14 – Robert Whitehead, British engineer and inventor (b. 1823)
* November 17 - Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxembourg (b. 1817)
* November 17 - Prince Philippe, Count of Flanders (b. 1837)
* November 22 – Viktor Sakharov, Russian general (assassinated) (b. 1848)
* December 5 – Henry Eckford (horticulturist), Henry Eckford, British horticulturist (b. 1823)
* December 9
** Henry Holmes (composer), Henry Holmes, British composer, violinist (b. 1839)
** Richard Claverhouse Jebb, Sir Richard Claverhouse Jebb, British scholar, politician (b. 1841)

Date unknown

* Abdul Wahid Bengali, Muslim theologian and teacher (b. 1850)
* Mary Thomas (labor leader), Mary Thomas, West Indian labor leader (b. 1848)

Nobel Prizes

* Nobel Prize in Physics, Physics – Philipp Eduard Anton von Lenard
* Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Chemistry – Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer
* Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, Medicine – Robert Koch
* Nobel Prize in Literature, Literature – Henryk Sienkiewicz
* Nobel Peace Prize, Peace – Bertha von Suttner

References

Further reading

* Gilbert, Martin (1997). ''A History of the Twentieth Century: Volume 1 1900–1933''. pp 105–22.

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