Deaths in History on April 2

Comte de Mirabeau (1749-1791)

Comte de Mirabeau, French revolutionary (influential member of the National Constituent Assembly), dies of natural causes at 42

1801 Thomas Dadford Junior, British canal engineer (b. circa 1761)
1817 Johann Heinrich Jung, German author (Heinrich Stillings Leben), dies at 76
1827 Ludwig Heinrich Bojanus, German physician and naturalist (b. 1776)
1831 Charles Felix, blind King of Sardina (1821-31), dies at 74
1845 Philip Charles Durham, Royal Navy Admiral (b. 1763)
1852 Theodor Althaus, writer, dies
1864 Princess Hildegard of Bavaria, seventh child and fourth daughter of Ludwig I of Bavaria and Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen, dies at 38
1865 A. P. Hill, Confederate general, killed in action at 39
1865 Richard Cobden, founder Anti-Corn-Law League, dies at 60

Samuel Morse (1791-1872)

American painter and inventor of the electric telegraph and Morse Code, dies at 80

1876 Paul van Vlissingen, Dutch ship owner, dies at 78
1890 Marinus Frederik Andries Gerardus Campbell, Dutch bibliographer, dies at 70
1892 Willem J d'Ablaing van Giessenburg, Dutch baron and genealogist, dies at 79
1902 Esther Morris [Esther Hobart McQuigg], American suffragist, anti-slavery activist, and 1st female justice of the peace in the US, dies at 87
1910 Boyd Alexander, English explorer and ornithologist (Niger to the Nile), murdered in a dispute with locals in Africa at 37
1910 Friedrich von Bodelschwingh, German theologist, dies at 79
1914 Paul von Heyse, German writer, Nobel laureate (b. 1830)
1922 Hermann Rorschach, Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst (inkblot test - Rorschach test), dies at 37
1924 Johannes Eugenius Bülow Warming, Danish botanist (plant ecology, environment-organism interactions), dies at 82
1928 Theodore W. Richards, American chemist (1st American to win the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for atomic weights 1914, awarded 1915), dies at 60
1930 Zewditu, Empress of Ethiopia (1916-30), dies at 53
1932 Bill Pickett, American rodeo performer (invented bulldogging), dies after being kicked in the head by a bronco at 61
1936 Jean-Baptiste Eugène Estienne, French general (Father of The Tank), dies at 75
1937 Nathan Birnbaum, Austria philosopher (Zionism), dies at about 72
1938 Alice Berend, writer, dies
1941 Pál Teleki, prime minister of the Kingdom of Hungary (1920-1 and 1939-41), dies at 61
1948 Sabahattin Ali, Turkish poet, author and journalist (Esirler, Içimizdeki Şeytan), killed at 41
1952 Bernard Lyot, French astronomer (Coronagraph, Lyot-filter), dies at 55
1953 Jean Epstein, French director (Vive la Vie), dies at 56
1956 Albert Marie Leon Adolphe de Bassompierre, Belgium ambassador to Tokyo (1921-39), dies at 82
1956 Philippo de Pisis, Italian painter, dies at 59
1958 Josei Toda, Japanese second president of the Buddhist association Soka Gakkai (b. 1900)
1966 C. S. Forester, English historical novelist (Horatio Hornblower), dies at 66
1972 Franz Halder, German general (b. 1884)

Georges Pompidou (1911-1974)

French President (1969-74) and Prime Minister (1962-68), dies in Paris at 62

1995 Hannes Alfven, physicist (Nobel prize), dies at 86
2000 Tommaso Buscetta, Sicilian mafioso and pentito (b. 1928)
2001 Charles Daudelin, Canadian artist (b. 1920)
2002 Henry Slesar, American writer and playwright (The Edge of Night), dies at 74
2004 John Argyris, Greek aeronautical engineer (b. 1913)

John Paul II (1920-2005)

264th Roman Catholic Pope (1978-2005), dies of heart failure at 84

2006 Nina Schenk von Stauffenberg, German wife of Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg (b. 1913)
2009 Frank Springer, American comics artist (The Adventures of Phoebe Zeit-Geist), dies at 79
2010 Thomas J. Moyer, American judge and Chief Justice of the Ohio Supreme Court (1987-2010), dies at 70
2012 Elizabeth Catlett, African-American sculptor and print maker (Mother and Child), dies at 96
2014 Urs Widmer, Swiss writer, dies at 75
2015 Robert Schuller, American Christian televangelist (Glass Cathedral, Hour of Power), dies at 88