– France's Secretary of the Navy, César Gabriel de Choiseul, is fired from his position by the king. Date unknown Joseph Priestley, British chemist, recommends the use of a rubber to remove pencil marks. Joseph-Louis Lagrange proves Bachet's Conjecture. The Baron d'Holbach's (anonymous) materialist work Le Système de la Nature ou Des Loix du Monde Physique et du Monde Moral is produced in Neuchâtel. The last Cuman who spoke the Cuman language () dies in Hungary. Births February 21 – Georges Mouton, Marshal of France (d. 1838) March 2 – Louis-Gabriel Suchet, Marshal of France (d. 1826) March 20 – Friedrich Hölderlin, German writer (d. 1843) April 3 – Theodoros Kolokotronis, Greek general (d. 1843) April 7 – William Wordsworth, English poet (d. 1850) April 8 – John Campbell, Australian public servant, politician (d. 1830) April 11 – George Canning, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1827) April 25 – Georg Sverdrup, Norwegian philologist (d. 1850) April 30 – David Thompson, English-Canadian explorer (d. 1857) May 10 – Louis-Nicolas Davout, Marshal of France (d. 1823) May 15 – Ezekiel Hart, Canadian entrepreneur, politician (d. 1843) May 27 – Ignaz Döllinger, German anatomist, physiologist (d. 1841) May 29 – Charles Adams, second son of President John Adams (1735–1826) (d. 1800) June 1 – Friedrich Laun, German author (d. 1849) June 3 – Manuel Belgrano, Argentine politician, general in the Independence War (d. 1820) June 4 – Eleonora Charlotta d'Albedyhll, Swedish countess, poet and salon holder (d. 1835) June 7 – Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1828) June 20 – Moses Waddel, American educator/minister and bestselling author (d. 1840) August 1 – William Clark, American explorer, Governor of Missouri Territory, and Superintendent of Indian Affairs (d. 1838) August 3 – King Frederick William III of Prussia (d. 1840) August 18 – Dorothea von Rodde-Schlözer, German scholar (d. 1825) August 27 – Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, German philosopher (d. 1831) October 10 – Adam Johann von Krusenstern, Baltic German explorer who led the First Russian circumnavigation (d. 1846) October 18 – Thomas Phillips, English painter (d. 1845) November 5 – Sarah Guppy, English inventor (d. 1852) November 19 – Bertel Thorvaldsen, Danish-Icelandic sculptor (d. 1844) December 17 (bapt.) – Ludwig van Beethoven, German classical composer (d. 1827) December 18 – Nicolas Joseph Maison, Marshal of France, Minister of War (d. 1840) Deaths January 7