William D. Roy, the editor of the Vicksburg Weekly Sun, had accused employee Daniel J. Sheppard of theft.  He had him brought back from Louisiana and examined in magistrate's court in Vicksburg.  When the court cleared Sheppard of the charges, Roy repeated them in a Sun column, bringing the enraged Sheppard to shoot Roy through the heart on the corner of Washington and Clay streets in the middle of the day. (By John Osborne)

Around twenty people were crossing the Hudson River to Rhinebeck, New York in a sleigh drawn by four horses.  The ice gave way under the vehicle and it sank immediately carrying eight of its occupants down with it.  The other dozen or so people were able to reach the shore and survived.  (By John Osborne)  

The forty-third annual meeting of the American Colonization Society gathered at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. under its president, John H. B. Latrobe.  The large membership heard reports on the state of Liberia, and speeches.  N. G. Taylor of Tennessee remarked, for example, that the recent efforts in some states to expel free blacks meant that the society should redouble its efforts had providing a haven in Liberia.   (By John Osborne)

In the early hours of the morning, the largest cotton warehouse in Houston, Texas caught fire and was quickly completely destroyed.  Lost were around twenty-one hundred bales of cotton along with sugar, molasses, and other items.  Total costs were estimated at a massive $138,000 but no-one was injured. (By John Osborne)

In Jefferson City, the Missouri state legislature adjourned itself without specifying a returning date.  Governor Robert Marcellus Stewart immediately ordered it to return on February 27, 1860 to complete legislation concerning state railroads and other business.  Governor Stewart had recently been at odds with body, having just vetoes its bill to expel and exclude free blacks from Missouri.  (By John Osborne) 

A self-made Pennsylvania German who had only learned English in his teens, Eli Slifer was elected at meeting of the Pennsylvania house and senate to a second term as State Treasurer.   New governor Andrew Curtin tapped him as Secretary of the Commonwealth in 1861 and he made invaluable contributions to the running of the Pennsylvania war effort, gaining for Curtin much of the reputation he enjoyed as a war governor.  (By John Osborne)

The ice on the Monongahela River gave way suddenly in the morning just about Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The newly freed river carried massive sections of ice with some violence down through the docks, bridges, and moorings of the city and scores of vessels, including fully loaded barges and the ferry Black Hawk, were carried away.  Commercial damage on the busy river was considerable.  (By John Osborne)