Events January–March January 1 – Major-General Lachlan Macquarie officially becomes Governor of New South Wales. January 4 – Australian seal hunter Frederick Hasselborough discovers Campbell Island, in the Subantarctic. January 12 – The marriage of Napoleon and Joséphine is annulled. February 13 - After seizing Jaén, Córdoba, Seville and Granada, Napoleonic troops enter Málaga under the command of General Horace Sebastiani. February 17 - Napoleon Bonaparte decrees that Rome would become the second capital of the empire. February 20 – Tyrolean rebel leader Andreas Hofer is executed. March 4 – Peninsular War: The French Army, under the command of André Masséna, retreats from Portugal. March 11 – Napoleon marries Marie-Louise of Austria by proxy in Vienna. April–June April – Kaumualii receives an assurance of the continued independence of the Kingdom of Hawaii. April 2 - Napoleon Bonaparte marries Marie Louise of Austria, Duchess of Parma, in person, in Paris. April 19 – Venezuela achieves home rule: Vicente Emparán, Governor of the Captaincy General of Venezuela, is removed by the people of Caracas, and Supreme Junta is installed. Venezuela is the first South American state to proclaim independence from Spain. April 27 – Beethoven composes his famous piano piece, Für Elise. May 1 – Macon's Bill Number 2 becomes law in the United States, intending to motivate Britain and France to stop seizing American vessels during the Napoleonic Wars. May 3 – Lord Byron swims across the Hellespont in Turkey. May 10 – Rev. Henry Duncan opens the world's first commercial savings bank, in Ruthwell, Scotland. May 16 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes his book Zur Farbenlehre (Theory of Colours). May 18–25 – May Revolution: Armed citizens of Buenos Aires expel the Viceroy and establish a provincial government for Argentina (the Primera Junta). Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros is removed. June 7 – Argentina's new junta publishes the country's first newspaper, the Gazeta de Buenos-Ayres, edited by Mariano Moreno. June 23 – John Jacob Astor forms the Pacific Fur Company. June – Nicolas Appert publishes L'art de conserver pendant plusieurs années toutes les substances animales ou végétales, the first description of modern food preservation using airtight containers. July–September July 9 Napoleon dissolves the Kingdom of Holland and occupies the country. Russia acquires Sukhumi through a treaty with the Abkhazian dukes, and declares a protectorate over the whole of Abkhazia. July 11 – Frederick Hasselborough discovers Macquarie Island, in the subantarctic. July