Events in History
- Aug 8 Beta Theta Pi is founded in Oxford, Ohio.
Historic Invention
Aug 19 Details of Louis Daguerre's 1st practical photographic process are released in Paris

Louis-Jacques Daguerre
- Aug 23 British capture Hong Kong from China
Birthdays in History
- Aug 4 Walter Pater, writer (Plato & Platoism), born in London, England
- 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 17 Thijs [Matthijs] Maris, Dutch painter/etcher
- Aug 19 Oskar Brefeld, German botanist and founder of modern mycology, born in Telgte, Germany (d. 1925)
- 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)