Historical Events
- Aug 8 Beta Theta Pi is founded in Oxford, Ohio.
Daguerreotype Photographic Process
Aug 19 Louis Daguerre's daguerreotype photographic process with complete working instructions is published "free to the world" in Paris as a gift to the world from the French government
- Aug 23 British capture Hong Kong from China
Famous Birthdays
- Aug 4 Walter Pater, English aesthete and writer (Plato & Platonism), born in London (d. 1894)
- Aug 8 Nelson Appleton Miles, American Major General (Union Army), born in Westminster, Massachusetts (d. 1925)
- Aug 10 Aleksandr Grigorievich Stoletov, Russian physicist (d. 1896)
- Aug 15 Hugh Archibald Clarke, Canadian organist, composer, and educator (The Music of The Spheres), born in Toronto, Ontario (d. 1927)
- Aug 17 Hubert Platt Main, American hymn composer, and music publisher, born in Ridgefield, Connecticut (d. 1925)
- Aug 17 Matthijs Maris [Thijs], Dutch painter and etcher influenced by Pre-Raphaelites, born in The Hague, Netherlands (d. 1917)
- Aug 19 Oskar Brefeld, German botanist and founder of modern mycology, born in Telgte, Germany (d. 1925)
- Aug 24 Eduard Napravnik, Czech conductor and composer, born in Býšť, Czech Republic (d. 1916)
- Aug 27 Emory Upton, Bvt Major General (Union Army), born in Batavia, New York (d. 1881)
- Aug 30 Gulstan Ropert, French Roman Catholic prelate, born in Kerfago, Brittany, France (d. 1903)
Famous Deaths
- Aug 3 Dorothea von Schlegel, German novelist (Florentin), dies at 74
- Aug 10 John St Aubyn, British fossil collector, dies at 81
- Aug 22 Benjamin Lundy, American Quaker abolitionist and philanthropist, dies at 50
- Aug 23 Charles Philippe Lafont, French violinist and composer, dies at 57
- Aug 28 William Smith, British geologist who is credited with creating the first nationwide geological map (Strata Identified by Organized Fossils), dies at 70
