Famous People Who Died In 1896

Jose Rizal was a Filipino polymath and nationalist. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal turned towards writing and inspired the Philippine Revolution through his writings. The revolution eventually led to Philippine independence and Rizal became a national hero. His life has inspired several biographical films and TV series.

Alfred Nobel was a Swedish chemist, engineer, and inventor. A prolific inventor, he held 355 different patents. Most popular as the inventor of dynamite, he was concerned with how he would be remembered after his death and bequeathed his fortune to the Nobel Prize institution. A wide traveler, he was proficient in several languages.

Clara Wieck Schumann was a German pianist, teacher, and composer. One of the most famous pianists of the Romantic era, Schumann changed the way concerts were conducted during her time and made a long-lasting impression as a pianist. She also influenced other pianists through her teaching; among her students were famous English pianist, Mathilde Verne.

William Morris was a British poet, novelist, textile designer, translator, and socialist activist. He played a major role in reviving the traditional British textile arts and the various methods of production. As a novelist and poet, Morris helped establish the fantasy genre, which is prevalent today. He is counted among the most important cultural figures of the Victorian era.

Marcelo H. del Pilar was a Filipino lawyer, writer, freemason, and journalist. Along with Graciano López Jaena and José Rizal, Del Pilar became known in Spain as the leaders of the Reform Movement. He is considered the Father of Philippine Journalism for his 66 editorials and 150 essays. He is also regarded as the Father of Philippine Masonry.

Henry Parkes was a politician who served as the premier of the Colony of New South Wales. Serving at different time periods throughout the 1870s and 1880s, Parkes was the longest non-consecutive premier in the Colony of New South Wales history. Considered the Father of Federation, Parkes was described as the most commanding figure in Australian politics by The Times.

Austrian composer Anton Bruckner was born to a schoolmaster father who was also an organist. Bruckner learned to play the violin by 4. In spite of being a musical legend, he often criticized his own work and re-worked on his pieces, leading to many versions of the same piece.

Paul Verlaine was a French poet best remembered for his association with the Decadent movement and the Symbolist movement. He is regarded as one of the most important representatives of the fin de siècle in French and international poetry. His poetry served as an inspiration for composers like Gabriel Fauré, who composed several mélodies based on Verlaine's poems.

German aeronautical engineer Otto Lilienthal became the first known person to use gliders for a successful flight. A mechanical engineer, he owned a shop and flight factory and developed gliders, with which he completed around 2,000 flights. Lilienthal, however, died after breaking his back in a glider crash.

Mathew Brady was an American photographer who captured the American Civil War through his lenses. One of the earliest photographers in the history of the US, Brady is credited with taking pictures of prominent personalities like Abraham Lincoln, William McKinley, and Andrew Jackson. Dubbed the father of photojournalism, Mathew Brady was the most renowned American photographer during the 19th century.   

August Kekulé was a German organic chemist. Regarded as one of the most important chemists in Europe, Kekulé is credited with founding the theory of chemical structure, including the Kekulé structure of benzene. Kekulé is also credited with teaching future Nobel Prize winners, Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff Jr., Hermann Emil Louis Fischer, and Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer.

British doctor John Langdon Down was pushed to assist at his father’s shop at 14. He gained an interest in medicine after apprenticing with a London surgeon. A pioneer in the treatment of mentally challenged patients, he is remembered for his study of what is now known as Down syndrome.

Prince Henry of Battenberg was a morganatic descendant of the Grand Ducal House of Hesse. He was the son of Prince Alexander of Hesse and by the Rhine, and his wife, Countess Julia von Hauke. He married Queen Victoria's youngest child, Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom, and became a member of the British Royal Family. 

Physicist Hippolyte Fizeau is best remembered for conducting the Fizeau experiment, named after him, which measured the speed of light. His other achievements include his contribution to the discovery of the Doppler effect and his description of the capacitor to improve the efficiency of the induction coil.

Ferdinand von Mueller was a German-Australian geographer, physician, and botanist. He is credited with founding the National Herbarium of Victoria, the oldest scientific institution in Victoria. He is also credited with naming several Australian plants. Such is his popularity that many plants, animals, journals, and places in Australia are named after him. 

German statistician Ernst Engel conducted an interesting study on over 150 Belgian families to come to the conclusion that the lower a family’s income, the greater is their expense on food. His revelation came to be known as the Engel curve, or the Engel’s law. He was also part of various statistical departments.

Emil Heinrich Du Bois-Reymond was a German physiologist and physician. He is credited with developing experimental electrophysiology and co-discovering nerve action potential. He was also a renowned teacher and is known for his association with the University of Berlin where he served as a professor.

Edmond de Goncourt was a French writer, book publisher, art critic, and literary critic. He is credited with founding the popular French literary organization, the Goncourt Literary Society. Between 1856 and 1875, he published essays on 18th-century art, which helped revive appreciation for the Late Baroque.

Archduke Karl Ludwig of Austria was the younger brother of both Maximilian I of Mexico and Franz Joseph I of Austria. Ludwig is remembered as the father of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria whose assassination in Sarajevo is widely regarded as the most immediate cause of the First World War. Ludwig's grandson Charles I was the last emperor of Austria.

James Henry Greathead was a civil and mechanical engineer best remembered for his work on the Liverpool overhead railway, Winchester Cathedral, and the London Underground railways. He is also credited with inventing the Greathead Shield, Greathead Injector Hydrant, and Greathead Grouting Machine.

José Asunción Silva was a Colombian poet who is often counted among the most prominent forerunners of modernism. Among his most important work is The Book of Verses. Jose Asuncion Silva's works were recognized and appreciated only after his death as he committed suicide at the age of 30 due to poverty.

Sister Mary Irene FitzGibbon, popularly known as Sister Irene, is best remembered as the founder of the New York Foundling Hospital, a first-of-its-kind hospital that catered to abandoned infants, especially those born of unwed mothers. She also introduced pioneering programs for adoption and for arrangement of foster homes.

Karl Verner was a Danish linguist best remembered for publishing Verner's Law in 1876. He received the prestigious Bopp Prize in 1877. In 1888, Karl Verner was made a fellow at the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters.

Being the son of a physician, geographer Gerhard Rohlfs was expected to take up medicine but was more interested in exploring uncharted territories and thus joined the French Foreign Legion. Best known for his journeys across North Africa, he had initially learned Arabic to travel to Morocco disguised as an Arab.

Mirza Reza Kermani was an Iranian activist and follower of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani. He is best remembered for killing King Nasser-al-Din. Kermani, along with other followers of al-Afghani, was demanding a just rule from the Qajar dynasty before killing the king. Mirza Reza Kermani was captured and executed in public by hanging on August 10, 1896.

German philanthropist and businessman Maurice de Hirsch was born into an affluent family of bankers and was later associated with Bischoffsheim & Goldschmidt. He is remembered for his remarkable charitable contribution to various educational initiatives and for the settlement of Jewish refugees, the most notable being the fund for Russian Jews.

A qualified jurist, Thomas Hughes was also a renowned author, known for his iconic semi-autobiographical novel Tom Brown’s School Days. He also co-founded the Working Men’s College, as a result of his association with the Christian Socialist movement. He was also a Liberal Party MP, representing Lambeth and Frome.