peace, but war continues over the size of compensation. October 15 – French Army General Michel Ney enters Switzerland with 40,000 troops, on orders of Napoleon Bonaparte. October 16 – The port of New Orleans and the lower Mississippi River are closed to American traffic by order of the city's Spanish administrator, Juan Ventura Morales, threatening the economy in the western United States, and prompting the need for the Louisiana Purchase. October 26 - A powerful 7.9 earthquake shakes the Romanian district of Vrancea destroying hundreds of buildings, triggering landslides and killing 4 people. This earthquake is considered one of the strongest to have shaken Europe. November 16 – The newly elected British House of Lords is inaugurated by King George III, who tells the members, "In my intercourse with foreign powers, I have been actuated by a sincere disposition of the maintenance of peace," but adds that "My conduct will be invariably regulated by a due consideration of the actual situation of Europe, and by a watchful solicitude for the permanent welfare of my people." November 23 – East Indiaman Vryheid, in the service of the Batavian Republic, is shipwrecked in a gale off Hythe, Kent, in the south of England; only 18 of 472 on board survive. December 2 – The Health and Morals of Apprentices Act in the United Kingdom comes into effect, regulating conditions for child labour in factories. Although poorly enforced, it pioneers a series of Factory Acts. Births January–June January 3 – Charles Pelham Villiers, British politician (d. 1898) January 10 – Carl Ritter von Ghega, Albanian-born Venetian road engineer (d. 1860) January 22 – Richard Upjohn, English-American architect (d. 1878) February 6 – Charles Wheatstone, English physicist, inventor (d. 1875) February 11 – Lydia Maria Child, American abolitionist author (d. 1880) February 15 – Jean-Jacques Uhrich, French general (d. 1886) February 16 – Phineas Quimby, American physician (d. 1866) February 19 – Wilhelm Matthias Naeff, Swiss Federal Councillor (d. 1881) February 26 – Victor Hugo, French author (d. 1885) March 7 – Edwin Henry Landseer, British painter (d. 1873) March 8 - Zebulon Crocker, American congregationalist pastor (d. 1847) March 25 – Maria Silfvan, Finnish actor (d. 1865) March 27 – Charles-Mathias Simons, Prime Minister of Luxembourg (d. 1874) April 4 – Dorothea Dix, American activist (d. 1887) April 9 – Elias Lönnrot, Finnish folklorist, philologist who created the Finnish national epic, the