1810 in the United States

Incumbents

Federal government

• President: James Madison (DR-Virginia)
• Vice president: George Clinton (DR-New York)
• Chief justice: John Marshall (Virginia)
• Speaker of the House of Representatives: Joseph Bradley Varnum (DR-Massachusetts)
• Congress: 11th

State governments

Demographics

Main article: 1810 United States census

Events

• May 1 – Macon's Bill Number 2 becomes law, intending to motivate Britain and France to stop seizing American vessels during the Napoleonic Wars.
• June 4 – The Society in Dedham for Apprehending Horse Thieves is founded in Dedham, Massachusetts.
• June 23 – John Jacob Astor forms the Pacific Fur Company.
• September 8 – The Tonquin sets sail from New York Harbor with 33 employees of John Jacob Astor's newly created Pacific Fur Company on board. After a 6-month journey around the tip of South America, the ship arrives at the mouth of the Columbia River and Astor's men establish the fur-trading post of Fort Astoria.
• September 23 – The Republic of West Florida declares independence from Spain.
• October 27 – The United States annexes the Republic of West Florida.

Undated

• Rocky Point Manor is built in Harrodsburg, Kentucky.

Births

• April 10 – Mary Whitwell Hale, American teacher, school founder, and hymnwriter (died 1862)
• April 10 – Willis Benson Machen, U.S. Senator from Kentucky from 1872 to 1873 (died 1893)
• April 17 – Joseph A. Wright, U.S. Senator from Indiana from 1862 to 1863 (died 1867)
• May 10 – James Shields, U.S. Senator from Illinois from 1849 to 1855, from Minnesota from 1858 to 1859 and from Missouri in 1879, born in Ireland (died 1879)
• May 23 – Margaret Fuller, Transcendentalist journalist, literary critic and women's rights advocate (drowned 1850)
• May 31 – Horatio Seymour, 18th Governor of New York, Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States in the presidential election of 1868 (died 1886)
• June 12 – David Levy Yulee, U.S. Senator from Florida from 1845 to 1851 and from 1855 to 1861 (died 1886)
• July 2 – Robert Toombs, U.S. Senator from Georgia from 1853 to 1861, 1st Confederate States Secretary of State (died 1885)
• July 5 – P. T. Barnum, showman (died 1891)
• August 6 – William Ticknor, publisher (died 1864)
• August 24 – Theodore Parker, preacher, Transcendentalist and abolitionist (died 1860)
• September 2 – William Seymour Tyler, educator and historian (died 1897)
• October 4 – Eliza McCardle Johnson, First Lady of the United States, Second Lady of the United States (died 1876)
• October 8 – James W. Marshall, contractor, builder of Sutter's Mill (died 1885)
• November 2 – Andrew A. Humphreys, general and civil engineer (died 1883)
• November 9 – Thomas Bragg, U.S. Senator from North Carolina from 1859 to 1861, 2nd Confederate States Attorney General (died 1872)
• November 25 – Charles E. Stuart, U.S. Senator from Michigan from 1853 to 1859 (died 1887)
• December 14 – John Burton Thompson, U.S. Senator from Kentucky from 1853 to 1859 (died 1874)
• December 25 – L. L. Langstroth, beekeeper (died 1895)

Deaths

• January 20 – Benjamin Chew, Chief Justice of colonial Pennsylvania (born 1722)
• February 22 – Charles Brockden Brown, novelist (born 1771)
• March 6 – William Washington, United States soldier (born 1752)
• October 13 – John Heath, politician (born 1758)
• October 15 – Alfred Moore, judge, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court (born 1755)
• November 11 – John Laurance, attorney, statesman and judge (born 1750)
• December 14 – Cyrus Griffin, lawyer, judge, last president of the Continental Congress (born 1749)