Deaths in History on December 25

Samuel de Champlain

1635 Samuel de Champlain, French explorer and founder of Quebec City, dies of a stroke at 61

1676 Matthew Hale, Lord Chief Justice of England (b. 1609)
1676 William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, English aristocrat and Royalist general in the English Civil War, dies at 83
1683 Kara Mustafa Pasha Turkish grand-vizier (1676-83) and Ottoman general, executed. (b. 1634)
1758 James Hervey, English clergyman (b. 1714)
1765 Václav Prokop Diviš, Czech theologian and natural scientist, dies at 67
1784 Yosa Buson, Japanese painter (b. 1716)
1824 Barbara Krudener, mystic visionary who renounced nobility, dies at 60
1824 Barbara Juliane, baroness von Krüdener, Baltic German religious mystic, author, and Pietist Lutheran theologian, dies at 60
1868 Linus Yale Jr., American portrait painter and inventor (Yale cylinder lock), dies at 47

1878 Anna Claypoole Peale, American painter of miniatures, dies
1880 Fridolin Anderwert, Swiss Federal Councillor, dies at 52
1895 Raul Pompeia, Brazilian writer (O Ateneu), dies at 32
1916 Albert Chmielowski, Polish Catholic Saint, dies at 71
1925 Sergei Yesenin, Russian lyric poet, dies at 30
1925 Karl Abraham, German psychoanalyst, dies at 48
1926 Yoshihito [Taishō], 123rd Emperor of Japan (1912-26), dies at 47
1927 Sergei D Sazonov, Russian Foreign minister (1910-16), dies at 66
1933 Francesc Macià, Catalonian statesman (b. 1859)
1935 Paul Bourget, French novelist and critic (b. 1852)
1938 Karel Čapek, Czech author, playwright and critic (R.U.R.), coined term "robot", dies of pneumonia at 48
1947 Gaspar G. Bacon, was Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts (b. 1886)
1950 Xavier Villaurrutia, Mexican poet (Nostalgia de la muerte), dies at 47
1950 Neil Francis Hawkins, British fascist (b. 1903)
1951 Harry T Moore, Florida NAACP official, killed by bomb
1953 Lee Shubert, American theatre producer (theatres in NY & LA named after him), dies at about 80
1954 Liberty Hyde Bailey, US botanist (Plantbreeding), dies at 96
1956 Robert Walser, Swiss writer, dies at 78
1957 Frederick Law Olmsted Jr, US landscape architect and advocate for wildlife conservation, dies at 87
1957 Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., American landscape architect, dies at 87
1961 Rheinhold Rudenberg, inventor of electron microscope, dies
1961 Otto Loewi, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1873)
1961 Owen Brewster, U.S. Senator from Maine (b. 1888)
1963 Tristan Tzara [Samuel Rosenfeld] Romanian-French poet (Approximate Man), dies at 67
1972 C. Rajagopalachari, India's freedom fighter and the first Governor General of independent India, dies at 94

1973 İsmet İnönü, Turkish statesman (b. 1884)
1973 Gabriel Voisin, French aviation pioneer (b. 1880)
1975 Gaston Gallimard, French publisher (Library Gallimard), dies at 94
1979 Jordi Bonet, Quebec muralist and sculptor (b. 1932)
1983 Joan Miro, Spanish painter and sculptor, dies at his home in Majorca at 90
1988 Ooka Shohei, Japanese novelist (b. 1909)
1988 Edward Pelham-Clinton, 10th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne (b. 1920)
1989 Barrel Regtien, student leader, dies
1989 Elena Ceausescu, wife of Romania's Communist dictator Nicolae, executed at 73

Nicolae Ceausescu

1989 Nicolae Ceausescu, Communist dictator of Romania, executed at 71

1989 Ton Regtien, Dutch student leader, dies at 51
1990 Marguerite N Wittenberg, entertainer, dies of cancer at 77
1991 Sal Provenza, entertainer, dies of lymphoma at 45
1992 Richard H Ichord, US leader of House Un-American Activities Committee, dies at 66
1992 Garrison H Davidson, US lt-gen commandant (West Point), dies
1992 Helen B M Fennell Joseph, English/South Afr anti-apartheid, dies at 87
1992 Monica Dickens, English/American journalist/author, dies at 77
1993 Pierre Victor Auger, French physicist (b. 1899)
1994 Pierre Dreyfus, French director of Renault (1955-75), dies at 87
1994 Zail Singh, Indian politician, (7th President of India 1982-87), dies of injuries from a motor accident at 78
1995 Emmanuel Levinas, philosopher, dies at 89
1996 Rupert John, gov-gen of Grenadines (1970-76), dies
1997 Anatoli Boukreev, mountaineer, dies at 39
1997 Giorgio Strehler, Italian opera and theatre director, dies at 76
1997 Laurence Gower, academic, dies at 84
1998 Hugh Martell, British Vice Admiral, dies at 86
2000 Willard Van Orman Quine, American philosopher and logician in the analytic tradition, dies at 92
2003 Nicholas Mavroules, American politician (b. 1929)
2004 Gennady Strekalov, Russian cosmonaut (b. 1940)
2005 Robert Barbers, Philippine senator (b. 1944)
2006 Hiroaki Hidaka, Japanese serial killer (b. 1962)
2010 Carlos Andrés Pérez, President of Venezuela (1974-79, 89-94), dies at 88
2012 Frank Calabrese Sr [Frankie Breeze], American mafia hitman, dies at 75
2014 Gleb Yakunin, Russian priest and dissident, dies at 80
2014 Mary Lyon, English geneticist (X-chromosome inactivation), dies at 89
2018 Nancy Roman, American, NASA's first chief of astronomy 'Mother of the Hubble', dies at 93