Events January–March January 1–24 – Siege of Geok Tepe: Russian troops under General Mikhail Skobelev defeat the Turkomans. January 13 – War of the Pacific – Battle of San Juan and Chorrillos: The Chilean army defeats Peruvian forces. January 15 – War of the Pacific – Battle of Miraflores: The Chileans take Lima, capital of Peru, after defeating its second line of defense in Miraflores. January 24 – William Edward Forster, chief secretary for Ireland, introduces his Coercion Bill, which temporarily suspends habeas corpus so that those people suspected of committing an offence can be detained without trial; it goes through a long debate before it is accepted February 2. January 25 – Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell form the Oriental Telephone Company. February 13 – The first issue of the feminist newspaper La Citoyenne is published by Hubertine Auclert. February 16 – The Canadian Pacific Railway is incorporated. February 18 – Carlos Finlay introduces his discovery of the transmission of Yellow Fever by mosquitoes Aedes aegypti, in the Fifth International Sanitary Conference held in Washington, D.C. February 19 – Kansas becomes the first U.S. state to prohibit all alcoholic beverages. February 24 (February 12 Old Style) – Qing dynasty China signs the Treaty of Saint Petersburg with the Russian Empire providing for the return to China of the eastern part of the Ili Basin. February 25 – Phoenix, Arizona, is incorporated. March 1 – The Cunard Line's , the first steel transatlantic liner, is launched at Clydebank in Scotland. March 4 – James A. Garfield is sworn in as the 20th president of the United States. March 12 – Andrew Watson makes his Scotland debut as the world's first black international football player. March 13 – Alexander II of Russia is killed near his palace when a bomb is thrown at him, an act falsely blamed upon Russian Jews. He is succeeded by his son, Alexander III. March 23 The First Boer War comes to an end. A fire caused by a gas explosion destroys the Opéra de Nice in the south of France with fatalities. March 26 (March 14 Old Style) – The Principality of Romania is proclaimed the Kingdom of Romania. April–June April 11 – Spelman College is established in Atlanta, Georgia. April 14 – The Four Dead in Five Seconds Gunfight erupts in El Paso, Texas. April 15 Temuco, Chile, is founded. Anti-Semitic pogroms in