Editing 1854 (section)

=== April–June ===
* [[April 1]] &ndash; ''[[Hard Times (novel)|Hard Times]]'' begins serialisation in [[Charles Dickens]]' magazine, ''[[Household Words]]''.
* [[April 16]] &ndash; The United States packet ship ''[[Powhattan (1837)|Powhattan]]'' is wrecked off the New Jersey shore, with more than 200 victims.
* [[May 5]]–[[May 15|15]] &ndash; Hokkien–Teochew Riots in [[Singapore in the Straits Settlements|Singapore]].
* [[May 18]] &ndash; The [[Catholic University of Ireland]] (forerunner of [[University College Dublin]]) is founded.
* [[May 27]] &ndash; [[Taiping Rebellion]]: United States [[Minister (diplomacy)|diplomatic minister]] [[Robert Milligan McLane|Robert McLane]] arrives at the Heavenly Capital aboard the {{USS|Susquehanna|1850|6}}.
* [[May 30]] &ndash; The [[Kansas–Nebraska Act]] becomes law (replacing the [[Missouri Compromise]] of 1820), creating the [[Kansas Territory]] and the [[Nebraska Territory]], west of the [[State of Missouri]] and the [[State of Iowa]]. The Kansas–Nebraska Act also establishes that these two new Territories will decide either to allow or disallow [[slavery]], depending on balloting by their residents (these areas would have been strictly "free territory" under the Missouri Compromise, which allowed slavery in the State of Missouri but disallowed it in any other new state north of latitude 36° 30', which forms most of the southern boundary of Missouri. This prohibition of slavery extended all the way from the western boundary of Missouri to the Pacific Ocean).
* [[June 10]] &ndash; The first class of the [[United States Naval Academy]] graduates at [[Annapolis, Maryland]].
* [[June 21]] &ndash; [[Battle of Bomarsund]] in [[Åland]] off the coast of Finland: British [[Royal Navy]] seaman's mate [[Charles Davis Lucas]] throws a live Russian [[artillery shell]] overboard by hand before it explodes, for which he is awarded the first [[Victoria Cross]] in [[1857]].
* [[June]] &ndash; The [[Grand Excursion]] takes prominent Eastern United States inhabitants from [[Chicago]] to [[Rock Island, Illinois]], by railroad, then up the [[Mississippi River]] to [[Saint Paul, Minnesota]], by [[steamboat]].