Events

• 20 January - Bushranger
  Bushranger
  Bushrangers, or bush rangers, originally referred to runaway convicts in the early years of the British settlement of Australia who had the survival skills necessary to use the Australian bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities...
  
   Captain Moonlite (real name Andrew George Scott) hanged in Sydney
  Sydney
  Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
  
  .
• 31 January - The Bulletin
  The Bulletin
  The Bulletin was an Australian weekly magazine that was published in Sydney from 1880 until January 2008. It was influential in Australian culture and politics from about 1890 until World War I, the period when it was identified with the "Bulletin school" of Australian literature. Its influence...
  
   magazine is first published
• 16 April - School
  Education in Australia
  Education in Australia is primarily the responsibility of the states and territories. Each state or territory government provides funding and regulates the public and private schools within its governing area. The federal government helps fund the public universities, but is not involved in setting...
  
   is made compulsory for children aged 6 to 14 in New South Wales
  New South Wales
  New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
  
  .
• 28 June Ned Kelly
  Ned Kelly
  Edward "Ned" Kelly was an Irish Australian bushranger. He is considered by some to be merely a cold-blooded cop killer — others, however, consider him to be a folk hero and symbol of Irish Australian resistance against the Anglo-Australian ruling class.Kelly was born in Victoria to an Irish...
  
   captured at Glenrowan, Victoria
  Glenrowan, Victoria
  Glenrowan is a small town located in the Wangaratta Local Government Area of Victoria, Australia. It is 184 kilometres north-east of Melbourne and 14 kilometres from Wangaratta and located near the Warby Ranges and Mount Glenrowan...
  
  .
• 1 October - The Melbourne International Exhibition
  Melbourne International Exhibition (1880)
  The Melbourne International Exhibition was held from 1 October 1880 until 30 April 1881. It was the second international exhibition to be held in Australia , the first being held the previous year in Sydney...
  
   is opened at the Royal Exhibition Building
  Royal Exhibition Building
  The Royal Exhibition Building is a World Heritage Site-listed building in Melbourne, Australia, completed in 1880. It is located at 9 Nicholson Street in the Carlton Gardens, flanked by Victoria, Nicholson, Carlton and Rathdowne Streets, at the north-eastern edge of the central business district...
  
   in Carlton
  Carlton, Victoria
  Carlton is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 2 km north from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Melbourne...
  
  .
• 10 October - Geologist Lamont Young
  Lamont Young
  Lamont H. Young was an assistant geological surveyor for the New South Wales Mines Department. He mysteriously disappeared while on field-work at Bermagui, New South Wales.Young was inspecting the new goldfields at Bermagui in 1880...
  
   and four others disappear on a boat trip north from Bermagui, New South Wales
  Bermagui, New South Wales
  Bermagui is a town on the south coast of New South Wales, Australia in the Bega Valley Shire. The name is derived from the Dyirringanj word, permageua, possibly meaning 'canoe with paddles'....
  
  .
• 11 November - Bushranger
  Bushranger
  Bushrangers, or bush rangers, originally referred to runaway convicts in the early years of the British settlement of Australia who had the survival skills necessary to use the Australian bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities...
  
   Ned Kelly is hanged.
• 23 November - Redmond Barry
  Redmond Barry
  Sir Redmond Barry KCMG was an Irish colonial judge in Victoria, Australia.-Early life:Barry was the son of Major-General Henry Green Barry, of Ballyclough, County Cork and his wife Phoebe Drought, daughter of John Armstrong Drought and Letita Head...
  
  , the judge who sentenced Ned Kelly
  Ned Kelly
  Edward "Ned" Kelly was an Irish Australian bushranger. He is considered by some to be merely a cold-blooded cop killer — others, however, consider him to be a folk hero and symbol of Irish Australian resistance against the Anglo-Australian ruling class.Kelly was born in Victoria to an Irish...
  
   to be hanged, dies just twelve days after Kelly was hanged.
• Parliamentarians in Victoria
  Parliament of Victoria
  The Parliament of Victoria is the bicameral legislature of the Australian state of Victoria. It follows a Westminster-derived parliamentary system and consists of The Queen, represented by the Governor of Victoria; the Legislative Council ; and the Legislative Assembly...
  
   become the first in Australia to be paid for their work.

Science and technology

• 2 February - The first successful shipment of frozen mutton from Australia arrived in London aboard the SS Strathleven.

Sport

• Grand Flaneur wins the Melbourne Cup
  Melbourne Cup
  The Melbourne Cup is Australia's major Thoroughbred horse race. Marketed as "the race that stops a nation", it is a 3,200 metre race for three-year-olds and over. It is the richest "two-mile" handicap in the world, and one of the richest turf races...
  
  
• England defeat Australia by 5 wickets in a Cricket Test held at The Oval
  The Oval
  The Kia Oval, still commonly referred to by its original name of The Oval, is an international cricket ground in Kennington, in the London Borough of Lambeth. In the past it was also sometimes called the Kennington Oval...
  
  

Births

• 15 April - Doug McLean, Sr., rugby footballer (d. 1947)
• 11 December - Frank Tarrant
  Frank Tarrant
  Frank Tarrant Frank Tarrant Frank Tarrant (in full Francis Alfred Tarrant (Melbourne, Australia, 11 December 1880 – 29 January 1951 in Melbourne) was an Australian all-rounder who played with great success for Middlesex in the County Championship in the years before World War I.His record is...
  
  , cricketer (d. 1951)
• 20 December - Earle Page
  Earle Page
  Sir Earle Christmas Grafton Page, GCMG, CH was the 11th Prime Minister of Australia, and is to date the second-longest serving federal parliamentarian in Australian history, with 41 years, 361 days in Parliament.-Early life:...
  
  , the eleventh Prime Minister of Australia
  Prime Minister of Australia
  The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
  
   (d. 1961)

Deaths

• 20 January - Captain Moonlight, bushranger (b. 1842), hanged
• 27 October - Samuel Gill
  S. T. Gill
  S. T. Gill , also known by his signature S.T.G., was and English-born Australian artist.sheet 20.2 x 25.7 cm...
  
  , artist (b. 1818)
• 11 November - Ned Kelly
  Ned Kelly
  Edward "Ned" Kelly was an Irish Australian bushranger. He is considered by some to be merely a cold-blooded cop killer — others, however, consider him to be a folk hero and symbol of Irish Australian resistance against the Anglo-Australian ruling class.Kelly was born in Victoria to an Irish...
  
  , bushranger (b. c. 1855), hanged
• 23 November - Redmond Barry
  Redmond Barry
  Sir Redmond Barry KCMG was an Irish colonial judge in Victoria, Australia.-Early life:Barry was the son of Major-General Henry Green Barry, of Ballyclough, County Cork and his wife Phoebe Drought, daughter of John Armstrong Drought and Letita Head...
  
  , Judge (b. 1813)