Editing 1885 (section)

=== January&ndash;March ===
[[File:Washington Monument Dusk Jan 2006.jpg|thumb|135px|right| [[February 21|Feb. 21]]: [[Washington Monument]] dedicated.]]
* [[January 3]]&ndash;[[January 4|4]] &ndash; [[Sino-French War]] &ndash; [[Battle of Núi Bop]]: French troops under General [[Oscar de Négrier]] defeat a numerically superior [[Qing dynasty|Qing Chinese]] force, in northern [[Vietnam]].
* [[January 17]] &ndash; [[Mahdist War]] in [[Sudan]] &ndash; [[Battle of Abu Klea]]: British troops defeat Mahdist forces. 
* [[January 20]] &ndash; American inventor [[LaMarcus Adna Thompson]] patents a [[roller coaster]].
* [[January 24]] &ndash; Irish rebels damage [[Westminster Hall]] and the [[Tower of London]] with dynamite.<ref name=CBH>{{cite book|last=Palmer|first=Alan|last2=Palmer |first2=Veronica|year=1992|title=The Chronology of British History|publisher=Century Ltd|location=London|pages=310–311|isbn=0-7126-5616-2}}</ref>
* [[January 26]] &ndash; [[Mahdist War]] in Sudan: Troops loyal to [[Mahdi]] [[Muhammad Ahmad]] conquer [[Khartoum]]; British commander [[Charles George Gordon]] is killed.<ref name="Cassell's Chronology">{{cite book|last=Williams|first=Hywel|title=Cassell's Chronology of World History|location=London|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|year=2005|isbn=0-304-35730-8|pages=[https://archive.org/details/cassellschronolo0000will/page/438 438–440]|url=https://archive.org/details/cassellschronolo0000will/page/438}}</ref>
* [[February 5]] &ndash; King [[Leopold II of Belgium]] establishes the [[Congo Free State]], as a personal possession.
* [[February 9]] &ndash; The first Japanese arrive in Hawaii.
* [[February 16]] &ndash; [[Charles Dow]] publishes the first edition of the [[Dow Jones Industrial Average]]. The index stands at a level of 62.76, and represents the dollar average of 14 stocks: 12 railroads and two leading American industries.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20131004232102/http://articles.philly.com/1995-02-24/news/25702996_1_blue-chip-stocks-industrial-shares-index Dow Record Book Adds Another First]. Philly.com. Retrieved 2013-07-08.</ref>
* [[February 20]] &ndash; The [[Richmond Football Club]] is officially formed at the Royal Hotel in the [[Melbourne]] suburb of [[Richmond, Victoria|Richmond]], [[Victoria (Australia)|Victoria]].<ref>Hansen (1992), p. 28.</ref>
* [[February 21]] &ndash; United States President [[Chester A. Arthur]] dedicates the [[Washington Monument]].
* [[February 23]]
** [[Sino-French War]] &ndash; [[Battle of Đồng Đăng (1885)|Battle of Đồng Đăng]]: France gains an important victory over China, in the [[Tonkin]] region of modern-day Vietnam.
** An English executioner fails after several attempts to [[Hanging|hang]] [[John Babbacombe Lee]], sentenced for the murder of his employer Emma Keyse; Lee's sentence is commuted to life imprisonment.
* [[February 26]] &ndash; The final act of the [[Berlin Conference]] regulates European colonization and trade, in the ''[[scramble for Africa]]''.<ref name="Cassell's Chronology"/>
* [[February 28]] &ndash; February concludes without having a full moon.
* [[March 3]] &ndash; A subsidiary of the American Bell Telephone Company, [[American Telephone and Telegraph]] (AT&T), is incorporated in New York.
* [[March 7]] &ndash; The [[Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Madrid]] is founded.
* [[March 14]] &ndash; [[Gilbert and Sullivan]]'s comic opera ''[[The Mikado]]'' opens, at the [[Savoy Theatre]] in London.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Hutchinson Factfinder|publisher=Helicon|year=1999|isbn=1-85986-000-1}}</ref>
* [[March 26]]
** [[Prussian deportations]]: The [[Prussia]]n government, motivated by [[Otto von Bismarck]], expels all ethnic Poles and Jews without German citizenship from Prussia.
** The [[North-West Rebellion]] in Canada by the [[Métis people (Canada)|Métis people]], led by [[Louis Riel]], begins with the [[Battle of Duck Lake]].
** First legal [[cremation]] in England: widowed painter [[Jeanette Pickersgill]] of London, "well known in literary and scientific circles",<ref>{{cite news|title=Cremation|newspaper=[[The Times]]|location=London|date=1885-03-27|page=10|issue= 31405}}</ref> is cremated by the Cremation Society at [[Woking]], [[Surrey]].
* [[March 30]] &ndash; The [[Battle for Kushka]] triggers the [[Panjdeh Incident]], which nearly gives rise to war between the [[British Empire]] and [[Russian Empire]].
* [[March 31]] &ndash; The United Kingdom establishes the [[Bechuanaland Protectorate]].<ref>{{cite book | publisher=[[Sampson Low|Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington]] via [[World Digital Library]] | last=Mackenzie | first=John | title=Austral Africa: Losing It or Ruling It; Being Incidents and Experiences in Bechuanaland, Cape Colony, and England | location=London | access-date=April 10, 2018 | date=1887 | url=http://www.wdl.org/en/item/2525 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180412145903/https://www.wdl.org/en/item/2525/ | archive-date=April 12, 2018 | url-status=dead }}</ref>