In Britain and its colonies (except Scotland),[a] 1751 only had 282 days due to theCalendar (New Style) Act 1750, which ended the year on 31 December (rather than nearly three months later according to its previous rule).
January 7 – TheUniversity of Pennsylvania, conceived 12 years earlier byBenjamin Franklin and its other trustees to provide non-denominational higher education "to train young people for leadership in business, government and public service".[3] rather than for the ministry, holds its first classes as "The Academy and Charitable School in the Province of Pennsylvania" inPhiladelphia.[4]
January 13 – For the first time, the American colony inGeorgia has an elected legislature after having been administered by a corporate Board of Trustees since its founding in 1732. The original Georgia Assembly meets inSavannah with 16 representatives as the colony prepares to become a British colonial province.[5] After electing Francis Harris as the Speaker of the unicameral Assembly, the delegates successfully ask the Trustees not to surrender control of Georgia to the neighboringProvince of South Carolina.[6]
January 18 – In the aftermath of theLhasa riot of 1750, Chinese General Ban Di arrives at the capital ofTibet on behalf of theQianlong Emperor and the seven imprisoned leaders of the rebellion are turned over to his custody by the7th Dalai Lama, Keizang Gyatzo. General Ban Di guides the interrogation under torture of rebel leader Lobsang Trashi and, after five days orders the beheading and dismemberment of the seven rebels.[7]
February 14 – AtLakkireddipalle in southeasternIndia, the newNizam of Hyderabad,Subhadar Muzaffar Jang, leads an invasion of cavalry against the small kingdom ofKurnool and is confronted by its monarch, theNawab Bahadur Khan. The Subhadar and the Nawab order their soldiers to stand down and then engage in hand-to-hand combat, during which the Nawab "thrust[s] a spear into the Subhadar's brain" before he is "himself hacked to pieces."[8]
March 25 – For the last time,New Year's Day is legally on March 25, inEngland andWales and "in all his Majesty's Dominions in Europe, Asia, Africa and America"[11] due to theCalendar (New Style) Act 1750. The months of January 1751, February 1751 and most of March 1751 did not exist in British territories: those months were recorded as the last three of 1750 according to theOld Style dating system; the equivalent months a year later were recorded as the first three of 1752 under the New Style system.
April 5 –Sweden'sKing Frederick I dies at the age of 74 (March 25 on the Julian calendar, which remains in effect in Sweden and Finland until 1753), after a reign of 31 years, bringing an end to the rule of Sweden by theHouse of Hesse because he has no legitimate heirs.Prince Adolf Frederick of theHouse of Holstein-Gottorp, who had been elected as the crown prince in 1743, becomes the new King.
April 19 – TheQianlong Emperor of China visits the southern capital ofNanjing for the first time, bringing with him 3,000 staff and 6,690 horses and stays for four days[13]
April 20 – A month after the death of his father, 12-year old Prince George William Frederick is formally invested as the newPrince of Wales[14] Nine years later, Prince George becomes King George III upon the death of his grandfather, King George II.
April 29 – The sport ofcricket is first played in the American colonies, as a team of New Yorkers plays against a team of Englishmen and defeats them, 167 to 80, in a match in Greenwich Village[15][16]
June 14 – The colony ofSouth Carolina reverses a 10-year-old law that had imposed a tax of 100 pounds sterling on the purchase of imported African slaves, and reduces the tax to £10.[19] The move effectively restores theslave trade to the colony.
October 22 –William V, Prince of Orange, the three-year-old son of the late William IV, becomes the lastStadtholder of theDutch Republic. During his minority, his mother,Princess Anne, acts asregent until her death in 1759. Upon becoming of age in 1766, he will have a corrupt reign as the Republic's head of state until the office is abolished on February 23, 1785.
Future United States PresidentGeorge Washington becomes seriously ill withsmallpox while he and his older brotherLawrence are visiting the island ofBarbados during an epidemic[23] Washington, 19 years old, survives the virus but is bedridden for almost a month.
ThePima Revolt begins in the area that now includes the Mexican state of Sonora and the U.S. state of Arizona, as Pima Indian leaderLuis Oacpicagigua carries out the massacre of 18 Spanish settlers at Oacpicagigua's home inSáric. The rebellion, which takes the lives of more than 100 Spaniards, is ended on March 18 after Governor Diego Ortiz Parilla permits the rebels to surrender for imprisonment.[24]
November 29 – TheCherokee nation signs a treaty with British colonial authorities at the close of the two-week Charlestown Conference inCharleston, South Carolina, withGovernorJames Glen signing an agreement with Cherokee war chiefs led by the "OldSkiagunsta" of Keowee, the Raven of Hiwasee, Old Caesar of Chatuga and Kittagusta of Joree.[25]
