1779:
§ June 9th: John Byron marries Lady Carmarthen.
1783:
§ Augusta Byron is born of the union of John Byron and Lady Carmarthen.
1784:
§ January 26th: Lady Carmarthen dies in France.
1785:
§ May 13th: John Byron marries for a second time; he weds Catherine Gordon of Gight.
1787:
§ September: Catherine Gordon joins her husband in France where he had gone to escape creditors.
1788:
§ January 22nd: George Gordon Byron born at London.
1789:
§ June 14th: Storming of the Bastille.
§ Catherine moves to Aberdeen, where she and her young son can live more easily on her limited income. John Byron does not move with his family but eventually does arrive at Aberdeen. Byron's father stays for several weeks after which he returns to France.
1791:
§ August 2nd: John Byron, our poet's father, dies at Valenciennes, France.
1793:
§ January: Louis XVI is beheaded.
§ February 1st: War breaks out between France and England; it runs pretty much continually (the Napoleonic Wars) for the next 23 years.
§ Godwin's book, Political Justice appears.
1795:
§ His mother arranges to have Byron's first portrait drawn. It is one that shows the boy holding a bow and arrow. It is done by the Edinburgh artist, John Kaye. (Your compiler has yet to see it.)
1798:
§ Coleridge with Wordsworth bring out Lyrical Ballads.
§ Through the rules of lineal descent, a hereditary peerage falls to our poet so that he becomes the Sixth Baron, Byron of Rochdale. The event brings little but a title, as the estate is in debt.
§ Because a peerage falls to a minor, the young Lord Byron becomes a ward of the Chancery Court, and, because of this, a Chancery Solicitor, John Hanson plays a role thereafter in Lord Byron's life.
§ August: Nelson destroys Napoleon's fleet at the Battle of the Nile.
1801:
§ Byron enters Harrow (1800 or 1801).
§ Byron divides his time between his mother's place at London (16 Piccadilly) and the Hansons (Earl's Court).
§ All along, Byron is being seen by doctors re his deformed foot and being fitted with special shoes and braces.
§ Christmas: Byron spends time with both his mother (Half Moon Street) and pays frequent visits to the Hansons at Earl's Court.
1802:
§ Still at Harrow.
§ Christmas: Byron with his mother at Bath.
1803:
§ February: After a long Christmas holiday, reluctant to leave Bath where he has so much fun, Byron returns to Harrow where he lives at Evans's house.
§ July: Mrs. Byron moves to Burgage Manor in Southwell, a village about 12 miles from Nottingham, viz. near the ancestral Byron estate, Newstead Abbey.
§ July: Byron's breaks away from Harrow; he travels to his mother's at Southwell but soon tires of things there, so rides up and stays at Newstead, for a period of time. He does not return to Harrow for the balance of the year.
§ Byron has a love interest in Mary Chaworth until he overhears her mocking his lameness.
1804:
§ March: Byron begins his holiday at Southwell.
§ April: Byron returns to Harrow.
§ September: Byron returns to Harrow.
§ December: Byron, forsaking his mother's residence at Southwell, spends the holidays with the Hansons at London.
1805:
§ February: Byron returns to Harrow.
§ April: On holidays from Harrow, Byron travels to Southwell, where his quarrels with his mother renew.
§ May: New term opens at Harrow.
§ London, Morning Post, June 15th, 1805: "The shop of Lardner and Co., the corner of the Albany, Piccadilly, is illuminated every evening with Carbonated Hydrogen Gas, obtained from the decomposition of Coals. It produces a much more brilliant light than either oil or tallow, and proves, in a striking manner, the advantages to be derived from so valuable an application."
§ August: Byron back to see his mother at Southwell; more quarrels.
§ September: Byron flees Southwell for Hanson's in London.
§ October 21st: Nelson's victory at Trafalgar: By this event, both the French and Spanish navies were annihilated, and the danger of any invasion, which all of England had anticipated, passed.
§ October: Byron enters Cambridge (Trinity College).
§ In December of 1805, the Battle of Austerlitz took place (Austerlitz is a place located in modern day Czechoslovakia). Napoleon decisively defeated the armies of Russia and Austria, each with its emperor at its head.
§ December: Byron is at London for his Christmas vacation, during which time he is approaching the London money-lenders.
1806:
§ February: Though the new Cambridge term begins, Byron chooses to remain in London.
He takes fencing and boxing lessons.
§ April: Having been warned by Hanson that his allowance might be cut off, Byron returns to Cambridge.
§ July: On summer holidays with his mother at Southwell. Quarrels with his mother over his extravagances at Cambridge and London and his arrangements with the money-lenders.
§ August: Leaves for London in the middle of the night.
§ With friends, Byron is now passing his days in shooting pistols, playing cricket, and swimming. Also he is now writing and seeing to the publication of his first poems, Fugitive Pieces (privately printed without Byron's name).
1807:
§ Robert Fulton's Clermont proves the practicality of steam power for river craft.
§ January: Raises £3000 from the money-lenders.
§ January: Having carried out "excisions and prunings" of his Fugitive Pieces, Byron brings out Poems on Various Occasions, again, privately printed (about 100 copies).
§ At only five foot, eight inches, Byron is concerned with his weight at two hundred and two pounds, so starts a severe diet which he returns to, off and on, for the balance of his life.
§ Publishes Hours of Idleness, "imitative, sentimental, and mawkish."
§ June: Returns to Cambridge, but only for a brief visit.
§ August: Byron returns to Cambridge. Friendship develops with Hobhouse.
§ Christmas: In financial straits, Byron leaves Cambridge for good, returning only to visit friends.
1808:
§ The Hunt brothers involve themselves in a new journalistic effort, a political weekly, the Examiner.
§ In support of a Spanish rising, in July, Arthur Wellesley (later to become known as the Duke of Wellington) leads the first small British force of 9000 men into the Peninsula of Spain; a gate into the hostile fortress of Napoleonic Europe.
§ Byron now living extravagantly at London.
§ February: A scathing review of Hours of Idleness appears in the Edinburgh Review.
§ March: The second edition of Hours of Idleness appears with some additions and deletions, though, in view of criticism in the Edinburgh Review, Byron is unwilling to distribute the volume to any but his close friends.
§ June: Byron goes to Brighton. Hobhouse and another friend join him there.
§ June: Lord Grey's lease on Newstead Abbey comes to an end.
§ July: Cambridge somehow manages to grant a degree to Byron.
§ September: Byron takes up residence at Newstead. He keeps his mother away on the bases that repairs first be carried out. Hobhouse arrives at Newstead.
§ November: Boatswain, Byron's favorite dog, dies.
§ November: Hobhouse leaves and Byron continues writing in the isolation of the Abbey.
1809:
§ January 22nd: Byron's twenty-first birthday.
§ January: At London, Byron files papers in order to become, as is his heredity right, a member of the House of Lords.
§ March: English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (Cawthorn prints 1000 copies).
§ March: Byron's friend, Lord Falkland, dies in a duel, "leaving his widow and children penniless. Byron eventually leaves £500 in a teacup to help her with expenses."
§ March: Byron takes his seat at the House of Lords, but is "humiliated by the manner in which he is announced."
§ July 2nd: Byron and Hobhouse sail from Falmouth on the Lisbon packet, Princess Elizabeth; They arrive five days later.
§ July: From Lisbon, Byron and Hobhouse go by horseback to Seville and Cadiz.
§ August: Byron sends all his servants (save for Fletcher) home to England, then boards a vessel for Malta.
§ September: Byron and Hobhouse sail for Greece.
§ October: Byron begins Childe Harold.
§ December: Byron is at Delphi, which to Byron was a dirty village; he is disappointed.
§ December: On horseback the Byron party arrives in Thebes then on to Athens.
1810:
§ January: Byron visits the Acropolis.
§ March: Byron finishes second canto of Childe Harold.
§ April: Byron sees plains of Troy.
§ May: Byron and a retired marine, swim the Hellespont.
§ May: Byron is at Constantinople.
§ June: Byron receives a letter advising him that his finances are in a bad state.
§ July: Hobhouse returns to England.
§ August: At Athens, Byron takes up residence at the Capuchin convent.
§ November: Though in bad financial shape, Byron some how manages to partake of the high life in Athens.
1811:
§ Byron leaves Athens in the spring of the year. In June we find him back in Gibraltar. By July 14th he is back in England after an absence of a little more than two years.
§ Back in England: George III being ill, his son, the Duke of Wales (1762-1830) had taken over as the Prince Regent.
§ William Hazlitt listed the Questions of the Day: "Our colonial policy, prison discipline, the state of the Hulks, agricultural distress, commerce and manufactures, the Bullion question, the Catholic question, the Bourbons or the Inquisition, 'domestic treason, [and] foreign levy'" ("Mr. Brougham -- Sir F. Burdett.")
§ While Byron was spending his time in Athens his work, which had first appeared in March of 1809 had been selling well. The printer, Cawthorn had put out four editions of English Bards and Scotch Reviewers.
§ July: Byron meets up with Hobhouse, now a captain in the Militia, and the pair tour Canterbury and its vicinity.
§ August: Receiving news that his mother is ill, Byron borrows £40 from his Solicitor John Hanson in order to travel home to Newstead, however, Lady Byron had died on the 1st.
§ December: Having spent time at Newstead, Byron returns to London. Though, before the month is out, he travels back to Newstead with friends.
1812:
§ January: Byron returns to London for the opening of Parliament.
§ March: Childe Harold, Cantos I and II offered for public sale by John Murray. "Within three days, the first edition of 500 copies sells out. Byron awakes to find himself famous."
§ March: Byron meets Caroline Lamb at Holland House.
§ March: Byron meets Annabella Milbanke at Melbourne House.
§ May: Francis Jeffrey praises Childe Harold in the Edinburgh Review.
§ August: Thomas Claughton purchases Newstead Abbey, the furniture, and remaining timber for £140,000 with the full price to be paid in time.
§ October: Annabella rejects Byron's proposal of marriage.
§ October Murray reports that booksellers have purchased 878 copies of the 5th edition of Childe Harold.
1813:
§ In England 13 "Luddites" are hung at the York Assizes.
§ January: At London, Byron's relationship with the Oxfords "draws him into the circle of the Princess of Wales, and Byron becomes a regular visitor at Kensington Palace."
§ February: Byron attends several sessions of Parliament.
§ February 3rd: The Hunt brothers are convicted of libeling the Prince Regent and are sent off to prison for two years.
§ April: Byron visits Leigh Hunt who is then in jail taking him some books.
§ News comes to England of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow and his struggle to retain hold of central Europe.
§ During forty days in May and June, the British troops drive the French armies over the Pyrenees and out of Spain; Napoleon's back is broken by the military and diplomatic actions of Wellington and Castlereagh.
§ June: Byron accompanies Lady Oxford to Portsmouth.
§ June: Back at London, Byron dines with Mme de Stadl, Sheridan, and other literary figures.
§ Summer: Shelley's Queen Mab is published.
§ September 26: Byron meets Southey at London. Southey had in that year become the Poet Laureate and was so until 1843.
§ December: Murray publishes Bride of Abydos, within a month, 6000 copies are sold; "Byron is once more the lion of the London literary scene, and he receives invitations daily."
1814:
§ January: Byron and Augusta Leigh set out for Newstead where Byron celebrates his 26th birthday.
§ February: Byron returns to London from Newstead.
§ February: Byron's new work, The Corsair sells 10,000 copies on the first day, and over 25,000 copies in seven editions in the first month.
§ March: Byron moves to Albany House, Piccadilly.
§ April: Paris is captured and Bonaparte abdicates. Byron composes his "Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte."
§ April: Augusta Leigh gives birth to a daughter. The child is named Medora after Byron's famous heroine in The Corsair.
§ May: Byron sends Augusta £3000 to settle her husband's debts.
§ July 1st: "Byron, dressed as a monk, and Hobhouse attend the masked ball in honor of the Duke of Wellington at Burlington House." In his diary Hobhouse estimates that 1700 people were seated for the dinner.
§ August: A settlement is made with Thomas Claughton. Claughton had agreed in 1812 to purchase Newstead Abbey and while he had made some payments he was in default of the agreement. The agreement to terminate the contract called for Claughton to give up £25,000 money paid and to return the property to Byron.
§ August: Byron, Augusta, and the Leigh children travel to Newstead.
§ September: Annabella accepts Byron's marriage proposal.
1815:
§ January 2nd: Byron marries Annabella.
§ February 3rd: The prison terms of both Hunt brothers end.
§ February: Byron and Annabella to Six Mile Bottom where Annabella and Augusta meet for the first time. They stay there for a few weeks.
§ Byron is introduced to Walter Scott.
§ March 1st: Napoleon returns from Elba and the "Hundred Days" begin.
§ April: Byron's creditors bring legal suits on his debts. The couple however are living mostly on Lady Byron's marriage settlement from her parents which barely pays the rent at Piccadilly Terrace.
§ June 18th: The Battle of Waterloo.
§ Unemployed ex-servicemen walk the streets.
§ Lord Wentworth, Lady Byron's uncle, whom she took care of in his last days dies. In adherence to Wentworth's will, the Milbankes change their name to Noel. Byron too adds Noel to his name becoming George Gordon Noel Byron.
§ November: Though Byron's properties are worth over £100,000, he remains unable to sell Newstead. Bailiffs are actively after Byron in respect to his debts. After selling furniture at Newstead, he arranges to sell his library. Byron is now drinking heavily which often leads to arguments and fights with anyone who is around.
§ December 10: Byron's wife Annabella delivers a baby girl, Augusta Ada.
1816:
§ January: Acting on Byron's proposal that they break up the expensive house in London, Annabella and the baby move, "temporarily" to her parents' house in Kirkby Mallory.
§ Annabella's family consult their solicitors and formal separation papers are drawn up. By March formal terms are agreed to.
§ April: Hobhouse moves in with Byron to help him prepare to leave for the Continent.
§ April 23rd: Byron leaves for Dover.
§ April 25th: Byron and his party leave Dover for Ostend.
§ May 4th: Byron visits the field of Waterloo.
§ May 18th: Byron's party cross into Switzerland at Basel.
§ May 27th: Shelley, Mary Godwin and Mary Jane Clairmont set out for Geneva; Shelley and Byron meet for the first time.
§ March: Alastor is published.
§ Byron writes Prisoner of Chillon.
§ Shelley writes Mont Blanc and the Hymn to Intellectual Beauty.
§ July: Byron becomes a frequent visitor at the home of Madame de Staël who attempts to effect a reconciliation between Lady and Lord Byron.
§ Mary Godwin (Shelley) writes Frankenstein.
§ August 29th: The Shelleys and Claire set out to return to England.
§ Shelley having carried Byron's recent manuscripts, delivers them to the publisher (Murray) who agrees to pay "2000 guineas" for Childe Harold (canto III) and Prisoner of Chillon.
§ September: Byron and Hobhouse set out for Italy touring the Alps on route.
§ October 12th; Byron and Hobhouse arrive at Milan.
§ November 10th: Byron and Hobhouse arrive in Venice. "Byron takes lodgings over the shop of a draper named Segati for 20 francs a day. He is quickly entranced by Segati's wife, Marianna. Hobhouse takes different lodgings."
§ November 6th: Byron and Hobhouse arrive in Verona.
§ December 5th: Murray publishes Childe Harold (canto III), and the Prisoner of Chillon and Other Poems. Murray writes that he sold 7000 copies of both publications.
§ Hobhouse leaves Venice for a tour of Italy.
1817:
§ January: Claire gives birth to Allegra.
§ March: A chancery decree deprives Shelley of the guardianship of his children.
§ April 13th: Byron visits the Manfrini Palace.
§ April 29th: Byron arrives in Rome and meets Hobhouse.
§ May 20: Byron leaves Rome for Venice, traveling quickly." His affair with Marianna Segati continues.
§ June: Byron takes up residence at the Villa Foscarini, "a large house on the river near La Mira outside of Padua."
§ July: Byron finishes Childe Harold (canto IV).
§ August: Byron takes up with Margarita Cogni, while still involved with Marianna Segati.
§ October: Byron finishes Beppo.
§ October: John Gibson Lockhart, then, but age 23, at Edinburgh, with his platform being Blackwood's Magazine, a Tory magazine, fulminates against "The Cockney School of Poetry."
1818:
§ January: Shelley's The Revolt of Islam is published.
§ January: Hobhouse leaves for England taking with him Byron's latest manuscripts.
§ January: At Countess Albrizzi's, Byron meets the newly married Countess Teresa Guiccioli. Nothing comes of this meeting.
§ February: Byron falls ill with gonorrhea.
§ February: Murray publishes Beppo anonymously. Jeffrey reviews the poem positively in the Edinburgh Review.
§ March: Shelley leaves England with Mary, Claire and children.
§ Though refusing to see Claire personally, Byron, who was then living in Venice, sends for Allegra. Actually, the little girl was not long at Byron's place -- just as well, considering the kind of life that he led. Allegra was boarded with the family of the English Consul at Venice, Richard Hoppner.
§ May: Byron moves into the Palazzo Moncenigo.
§ August: Claire and Shelley visit Allegra at the Hoppner's, then Shelley visits Byron in the afternoon to discuss Allegra. Shelley is generally shocked at Lord Byron's way of living. The two take a ride on the sands of the Lido, a ride which Shelley memorializes in Julian and Maddalo.
§ September: Byron completes the first part of Don Juan.
§ September: Byron's lawyer, John Hanson arrives at Venice with the Newstead sale papers for Byron to sign.
§ November: Shelley settles in Naples.
1819:
§ April: Byron again meets Teresa Guiccioli.
§ June -- October: The Shelleys are at a place near Leghorn.
§ July: Murray publishes anonymously Don Juan (cantos I & II).
§ August: Leaving Venice, Byron moves to Bologna, thus to be near the Guicciolis. He takes his old rooms at the Pellegrino.
§ October: The Shelleys take up residence at Florence.
§ November: Count Guiccioli and Teresa return to Ravenna.
§ December: Leaving Venice for the last time, Byron moves to live at Ravenna.
1820:
§ January: Shelley moves to Pisa.
§ January: Byron continues to cast about for accommodations large enough for his entourage. Of all persons, it was Count Guiccioli who made known to Byron that the unused upper floor of the Count's spacious Palazzo Osio was available; Byron rents it.
§ February: Byron finishes Don Juan (cantos III & IV) and sends them to Murray.
§ March: Byron writes an article critical of the Lake Poets (Wordsworth, Southey, et al) referring to Keats as "a tadpole of the Lakes." Byron praises the earlier poets such as Pope and Dryden.
§ May: The Count grows angry at Teresa's familiarity with Byron and confronts Byron.
§ June: Shelley moves to Leghorn.
§ July: The Pope grants Teresa a separation. Teresa returns to her father's house at Filetto, 15 miles southwest of Ravenna.
§ August: Byron visits Teresa for the first time since her separation from her husband.
§ August: Shelley moves to San Giuliano, near Pisa.
§ October: Byron receives praise from Goethe.
§ October: Keats, seriously ill, arrives at Italy and takes up residence at Rome.
§ October: Shelley moves his household to a place in Pisa.
§ November: Teresa moves to her father's house in town.
1821:
§ February 23rd: Keats dies at Rome.
§ March: The political situation in Italy ripens.
§ March: Byron places Allegra in the Capuchin convent of Bagnacavallo. Claire protests but to no avail.
§ March: Greek war for independence breaks out.
§ Shelley makes friends with Edward and Jane Williams.
§ May 8 -- October 25: The Shelleys are mostly at San Giuliano.
§ June: Byron's servant, Tita is arrested but Byron negotiates Tita's release.
§ July: Political unrest drives the Gambia family to settle in Florence. Teresa, however, stays behind to be near Byron. Count Guiccioli considers that because she is not with her family that she in breach of one of the terms of the separation agreement and he moves to force Teresa to return to him or to place her in a convent. This action causes Byron to encourage Teresa to return to her family at Florence.
§ August: Shelley pays a visit to Byron at Ravenna. Talk of Byron coming to Pisa to be near Shelley. Byron reluctant to move.
§ Byron is having considerable literary success back in England and Murray is paying considerable sums for his work.
§ Shelley invites Hunt to Italy with a view to working with both Shelley and Byron in a new literary journal to be called The Liberal.
§ September: The Gamba family takes up residence at Pisa.
§ September: The Pope issues an encyclical threatening excommunication to the members of a secret society which has as its aim an Italian revolution.
§ October: Byron moves to Pisa; he employs moving wagons.
§ November: The Pisa Circle: The Shelleys moved from San Giuliano to Pisa taking a flat in the Tre Palazzi di Chiesa. Byron is at the Casa Lanfranchi. Teresa and her family reside at the Casa Parra.
§ Shelley's friends, Edward and Jane Williams who also had moved recently to Pisa are introduced to Byron.
§ December: Murray publishes further cantos of Don Juan, Sardanapalus, Two Foscari and Cain.
1822:
§ Trelawny (b.1792) joins the circle at Pisa.
§ January: Byron sits for the sculptor, Lorenzo Bartolini. The marble bust is not finished until September.
§ February: "Leaving for Venice, Claire begs to see Allegra. Byron ignores her letters."
§ February: "News arrives that Lady Noel has died, bringing Byron into an inheritance. ... Byron ultimately receives about 2,500 yearly -- an amount which almost doubles his yearly income."
§ April: Byron leases a summer residence at Montenero outside Leghorn, Villa Dupuy. He moves in, in the following month.
§ April: Allegra, the five year old child of Claire's and Byron's dies.
§ May 1: Together with the Williamses, the Shelleys move to Casa Magni, San Terenzo, on the Bay of Spezzia.
§ June 15th: Having sailed from England the Hunt family touch at Genoa. Staying with the vessel, on the first of July, the family arrives at Leghorn.
§ July 2nd: Shelley meets the Hunt family at Leghorn and escorts them to their new residence at Pisa (lower floor of Byron's place).
§ July 8th: Shelley dies as a result of a sailing accident.
§ August: Trelawny makes the arrangements and the Shelley's body is disinterred and cremated on the beach where it was first found with Byron being one of the witnesses.
§ Back at Pisa, Byron with Teresa occupy the second floor of Casa Lanfranchi; the Hunts the ground-floor.
§ September: Hobhouse pays a visit to Byron at Pisa.
§ September: "Nicolas Karvellas, the Greek patriot, visits Byron, encouraging the poet's interest in the Greek Revolution."
§ September: Byron leaves Pisa for Lerici. The Leigh Hunt family and Mary Shelley follow along and take a house not far from Byron.
§ October: Back in London John Hunt (Leigh's brother) publishes the first number of The Liberal.
§ October: Citing the savings of living on the Continent, Byron asks Augusta to consider moving herself, husband, and children to Nice at his expense.
§ By November: Byron is living in a less ostentatious manner, "having stored his schooner, sold horses, and dismissed servants."
§ December: Byron finishes the 12th Canto of Don Juan.
1823:
§ February: Byron finishes writing The Island.
§ March: Byron finishes the 15th Canto of Don Juan.
§ April: Edward Blaquiere, representative of the London Greek Committee, and Andreas Luriottis, delegate of the Greek government, visit Byron en route to collect information on the fighting in Greece.
§ April: "Mary Shelley writes to Jane Williams that Byron had advised her to return to England as well as offered to pay her passage."
§ May: Byron finishes the 16th and begins the 17th Canto of Don Juan.
§ June 18th: The Hercules is chartered for Byron's expedition to Greece. Teresa is to return to her family. She is upset, and, at Byron's request, Mary Shelley arrives to comfort Teresa.
§ July 14th or 15th: Byron and his party sail for Greece.
§ August 3rd: After a slow trip down the boot of Italy and across the Adriatic, the Hercules arrives Argostoli harbor.
§ September: Byron moves to Metaxata. Trelawny travel on to Pyrgos leaving with Byron at Metaxata: Pietro Gamba and Dr. Bruno.
§ December: Byron's party set out to go to Missolonghi.
1824:
§ January 4th: Byron arrives at Missolonghi.
§ February: Byron falls ill.
§ February 21st: Earthquake rock Missolonghi.
§ March: Weather is bad; there are floods.
§ March: Byron complains of vertigo and "restrictions in his chest."
§ April 19th: After a period of about ten days of hot and cold spells, body pains, and sleeplessness, and after having been attended to by a number of doctors (who eventually talk the reluctant Byron into letting them bleed him), Byron dies.
