- Jan 4 Ange-Jacques Gabriel, French architect (Ecole Military), dies at 83
- Jan 28 Jean-Baptiste-Bourguignon d'Anville, French geographer and cartographer, dies at 84
- Feb 9 Joseph Aloysius Assemani, Syrian orientalist (b. 1710)
- Feb 10 Friedrich Christoph Oetinger, German Lutheran theologian, dies at 79
- Mar 17 Daniel Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician and physicist (10 time French award), dies at 82
- Apr 7 Taksin, King of Siam (1767-82), dies at 47
- Apr 12 Metastasio, Italian poet and librettist (b. 1698)
Anne Bonny
Apr 22 Anne Bonny, Irish pirate, dies in prison (date is approximate)
Anne Bonny
- Apr 27 William Talbot, 1st Earl Talbot, English politician (b. 1710)
- May 8 Marquis of Pombal, Prime Minister of Portugal (1756-1777), dies at 82
- May 15 Richard Wilson, Welsh landscape painter, dies at 67
- May 16 Daniuel Charles Solander, botanist, dies
- May 20 William Emerson, British mathematician (b. 1701)
Charles Watson-Wentworth
Jul 1 Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquis of Rockingham, British Prime Minister (Whig: 1765-66, 1782), dies in an influenza epidemic at 52
Charles Watson-Wentworth
- Jul 16 Louise Ulrike, queen of Sweden and wife of Adolf Frederik, dies at 61
- Aug 27 John Laurens, American soldier, diplomat, and abolitionist, killed in battle at 27
- Aug 29 Richard Kempenfelt, Royal Navy Admiral drowns (b. 1718)
- Sep 6 Martha Wayles Skelton Jefferson, wife of Thomas Jefferson (b. 1748)
- Oct 2 Charles Lee, British and U.S. general (b. 1732)
- Nov 22 John Barueth, vicar/pamphleter, dies
- Nov 22 John de Mol, porcelein manufacturer, dies
- Dec 27 Henry Home, Lord Kames, Scottish philosopher (b. 1697)