1871 in France

Incumbents

• President: Louis Jules Trochu, Adolphe Thiers
• President of the Council of Ministers: Louis-Jules Trochu, Jules Armand Dufaure

  Events

• 3 January - Battle of Bapaume, a Prussian victory in the continuing Franco-Prussian War.
• 10 January - Besieged city of Péronne surrenders to Prussian forces.
• 10–12 January - Battle of Le Mans ends French resistance in western France.
• 15–17 January - Battle of the Lisaine: Prussian victory.
• 18 January - Prussian King Wilhelm I is proclaimed German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles.
• 19 January - Battle of St. Quentin: Prussians defeat French attempts to relieve the siege of Paris.
• 19–20 January - Battle of Buzenval: Prussian victory.
• 28 January - Siege of Paris ends with the city falling to Prussian forces.
• 8 February - 1871 French legislative election elects the first legislature of the Third Republic; monarchists favourable to peace with the German Empire gain a large majority. The National Assembly meets in Bordeaux.
• 15 February - Armistice signed between France and Prussia.
• 18 February - Siege of Belfort ends with surrender of French garrison.
• 26 February - Treaty of Versailles ends the Franco-Prussian War.
• 18 March - Troops of the regular French Army sent by Adolphe Thiers, Chef du pouvoir executive de la République française, to seize cannons stored on the Butte Montmartre fraternise with civilians and the National Guard, and two army generals are killed: origin of the Paris Commune. Regular troops are evacuated to Versailles.
• 23 March - Marseille Commune begins.
• 26 March - The Paris Commune is formally established.
• 4 April - Marseille Commune suppressed with the loss of 30 soldiers and 150 insurgents.
• 10 May - Treaty of Frankfurt is signed confirming the frontiers between Germany and France. The provinces of Alsace and Lorraine are transferred from France to Germany.
• 21 May - Government troops enter Paris to overthrow the Commune, beginning "Bloody Week".
• 27 May - Government troops massacre 147 Communards from Belleville at Père-Lachaise Cemetery.
• 28 May - Paris Commune falls to government forces.
• 2 July - July 1871 French by-elections for the legislative assembly are held.
• 31 August - Adolphe Thiers becomes President.
• 27 October - Henri, Count of Chambord, refuses to be crowned "King Henry V of France" until the country abandons its tricolor, and returns to the old Bourbon flag.

  Births

• 7 January - Émile Borel, mathematician and politician
• 6 May - Victor Grignard, chemist, shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1912
• 27 May - Georges Rouault, painter and printmaker
• 10 July - Marcel Proust, novelist, essayist and critic
• 29 August - Albert Lebrun, politician and President of France
• 30 October - Paul Valéry, poet, essayist and philosopher

  Deaths

• 25 January - Jeanne Villepreux-Power, marine biologist
• 2 March - Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio, naval painter
• 3 April - Gustave Flourens, revolutionary leader and writer
• 8 April - Jean-Baptiste Guimet, industrial chemist
• 13 May - Daniel Auber, composer
• 22 May - Jean-François Cail, entrepreneur and industrialist
• June - Charles Antoine Lemaire, botanist and botanical author
• 1 July - Charles Texier, historian and archaeologist
• 20 July - François Delsarte, musician and teacher
• 5 August - Paul-Martin Gallocher de Lagalisserie, engineer
• 9 September - Louis Édouard Bouët-Willaumez, admiral
• Full date unknown - Louis Dominique Girard, hydraulic engineer