pageType:month friendlyName:November 1865 onDate:in November 1865Pick an exact day to narrow your search.
Today is September14, 2026 Monday.
Surgery was a gamble. Wounds turned septic so often that a patient could survive the operation and die of infection a week later. In Glasgow a surgeon named Joseph Lister started soaking dressings in carbolic acid, and his ward stopped losing men to gangrene. In London a preacher called William Booth began holding meetings for the poor of the East End, the start of the Salvation Army. Cheap card photographs were the craze, and soldiers walking home carried them in their pockets.

The year in 8 events
About four million people were freed from slavery this year. That is more than the population of New York, the largest state in the country.
Political map of the World as it stood that year. Drag the timeline to explore. Open the map page ›
Scroll the timeline left for past events, future milestones to the right.