1794 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar).

Events

• February 11 - 1st session of the United States Senate is open to the public.
• March 14 - Eli Whitney is granted a patent for the cotton gin.
• March 27 - The United States Government established a permanent United States Navy and authorized the building of six vessels (in 1797 the first three frigates, USS United States, USS Constellation and USS Constitution went into service).
• April 6 - Execution of Georges Danton
• May 8 - French chemist Antoine Lavoisier is executed by guillotine.
• May 28-June 1 - The Glorious First of June (Battle of Ushant), naval battle between British and French.
• June 4 - British troops capture Port-au-Prince in Haiti.
• July 27 - French Revolution: French Convention ousts Maximilien Robespierre - he is arrested when he encourages the execution of more than 17,000 "enemies of the Revolution."
• July 28 - Maximilien Robespierre is guillotined in front of a cheering crowd, for sending thousands of others to a similar fate during the French Revolution. Terror ends.
• August 7 - Whiskey Rebellion begins: Farmers in the Monongahela Valley of Pennsylvania rebel against the federal tax on liquor and distilled drinks.
• August 20 - Battle of Fallen Timbers - American troops force a confederacy of Shawnee, Mingo, Delaware, Wyandot, Miami, Ottawa, Chippewa and Potawatomi warriors into a disorganized retreat.
• October - Fort Wayne founded in what is now the U.S. state of Indiana.
• November 19 - The United States and the Kingdom of Great Britain sign Jay's Treaty, which attempts to clear up some of the lingering problems left over from the American Revolutionary War.

Unknown dates

• Horatio Nelson loses a right eye at Calvi in Corsica
• Coffee forbidden by royal decree in Sweden
• France occupies Aachen.

Ongoing events

• French Revolution (1789-1799)
• French Revolutionary Wars (1792-1802)-First Coalition

Births

• February 20 - William Carleton, Irish novelist
• February 21 - Antonio López de Santa Anna, Mexican general and President of Mexico
• April 10 - Matthew Calbraith Perry, American Commodore.
• May 17 - Anna Brownell Jameson, British writer (d. 1860)
• May 27 - Cornelius Vanderbilt, entrepreneur
• July 5 - Sylvester Graham, inventor of Graham cracker (d. 1851)
• Charles Thomas Longley, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1868)

Deaths

• January 16 - Edward Gibbon historian
• March 28 - Marquis de Condorcet, mathematician, philosopher, and political scientist
• April 27 - Sir William Jones, British philologist and discoverer of the Indo-European languages family.
• May 8 - Antoine Lavoisier, French chemist and father of modern chemistry
• June 18 - François Nicolas Leonard Buzot, French Revolutionary leader (b. 1760)
• July 23 - Alexandre, Vicomte de Beauharnais, French political figure and general (executed).
• July 28 - Maximilien Robespierre (executed)