1863 in France

Incumbents

• Monarch - Napoleon III

  Events

• 15 January - French forces bombard Veracruz, during the French intervention in Mexico.
• 16 March - French siege of Puebla begins.
• 14 April - Treaty of Hué is signed between Vietnam and the French Empire.
• 30 April - Battle of Camarón, between the French Foreign Legion and the Mexican army: Mexican victory, but successful French delaying action.
• 17 May - Puebla surrenders to the French.
• 7 June - French troops enter Mexico City.
• 21-22 June - Legislative election, first round.
• 5-6 July - Legislative election, second round.
• First outbreak of phylloxera on the European mainland observed in the vineyards of the southern Rhône region.
• The recipe for the herbal liqueur Bénédictine is devised by Alexandre Le Grand in Fécamp.
• The Paris Observatory begins to publish weather maps.

  Arts and literature

• 31 January - Jules Verne's scientifically inspired novel Five Weeks in a Balloon is published by Pierre-Jules Hetzel in Paris; it will be the first of Verne's Voyages Extraordinaires.
• 30 September - Georges Bizet's opera, Les pêcheurs de perles receives its première at the Théâtre Lyrique in Paris.
• 4 November - Hector Berlioz's opera Les Troyens receives its première at the Théâtre Lyrique.

  Births

• 1 January - Pierre de Coubertin, historian and founder of the International Olympic Committee
• 16 April - Émile Friant, painter
• 26 May - Charles-Victor Langlois, historian and paleographer
• 7 July - Marguerite Audoux, novelist
• 12 July - Albert Calmette, physician, bacteriologist and immunologist
• 8 November - René Viviani, politician, Prime Minister

  Deaths

• 16 February - Pierre-Médard Diard, naturalist and explorer
• 21 February - Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret, painter, lithographer and designer
• 25 February - Laure Cinti-Damoreau, soprano
• 30 March - Auguste Bravais, physicist
• 30 April - Jean Danjou, French Foreign Legion
• 12 July - Étienne-Jean Delécluze, painter and critic
• 13 August - Eugène Delacroix, painter
• 17 September - Alfred de Vigny, poet, playwright and novelist
• 13 October - Philippe Antoine d'Ornano, Marshal of France
• 16 November - Louis-René Villermé, doctor and economist
• 17 December - Émile Saisset, philosopher
• 30 December - Frédéric Monod, Protestant pastor
• Alphonse de Polignac, mathematician