- Jan 11 Francis Lightfoot Lee, American advocate for independence (signed US Declaration of Independence), dies at 62
- Jan 13 Elisabeth C von Brunswick-Bevern, wife of Frederick II, dies at 81
- Jan 30 Johann Abraham Sixt, composer, dies at 40
- Feb 8 Johann Friedrich Doles, German composer, pupil of J. S. Bach, dies at 81
- Feb 11 Antoine Dauvergne, French composer, dies at 83
- Feb 22 Karl Friedrich Hieronymus Freiherr von Münchhausen, German officer and adventurer (b. 1720)
- Feb 27 Benvenuto Robbio San Raffaele, Italian composer, dies at 61
- Mar 1 Juan Manuel Olivares, Venezuelan composer, dies at 36
- Mar 2 Horace Walpole, British horror writer (Castle of Otranto), dies at 79
- Mar 19 Philip Hayes, English composer, dies at 58
James Hutton
Mar 26 James Hutton, geologist, dies
James Hutton
- Apr 3 Nonnosus Madlseder, composer, dies at 66
- Apr 12 Josef Antonin Stepan, Bohemian composer, dies at 71
- May 17 Michel-Jean Sedaine, French dramatist (Le Philosophe sans le savoir), dies at 77
- May 25 John Griffin Whitwell, 4th Baron Howard de Walden, British field marshal, dies at 78
- May 27 Francois-Noal "Gracchus" Babeuf, French utopian socialist, dies at 36
- May 30 Carl Ludwig Junker, German composer, dies at 48
- Jun 17 Aga Mohammed Khan, cruel ruler of Persia, castrated & killed
- Jul 9 Edmund Burke, British author/parliament leader (Reflections), dies at 68
- Jul 11 Ienăchiţă Văcărescu, Wallachian writer (b. 1740)
- Jul 29 Christoph Rheineck, composer, dies at 48
- Aug 3 Jeffrey Amherst, English gov-gen of America, dies at 80
- Aug 12 Ignaz Franz Xaver Kurzinger, German composer, dies at 73
- Aug 22 Dagobert Sigmund von Wurmser, Austrian general, dies at 73
- Sep 10 Mary Wollstonecraft, English author and feminist (A Vindication of the Rights of Woman), mother of Mary Shelley, dies of septicaemia at 38
- Sep 18 Louis-Lazare Hoche, French revolutionary general, dies
- Sep 23 Johann Georg Roser, composer, dies at 57
- Oct 9 Elijah B Solomon Zalman, rabbi/Gaon of Vilna Latvia, dies at 77
- Oct 10 Carter Braxton, US plantation owner and signer of the US Declaration of Independence, dies at 61
- Oct 12 Pierre de Jelyotte, composer, dies at 84
- Nov 16 King Frederick William II of Prussia (b. 1744) Reigns 1786-97
- Nov 18 Jacques-Alexandre Laffon de Ladebat, French shipbuilder and merchant (b. 1719)
- Nov 29 Samuel Langdon, American President of Harvard University (b. 1723)
- Dec 1 Oliver Wolcott, US judge, signed US Declaration of Independence, dies at 71
- Dec 11 Richard Brocklesby, English physician (b. 1722)
- Dec 22 Giovanni Marco Rutini, Italian composer, dies at 74
- Dec 26 John Wilkes, English radical, journalist (The North Briton) and politician, dies at 72