Historical Events
- Aug 1 Battle of Little Rock, Arkansas; start of Chattanooga campaign
- Aug 1 Cavalry action near Brandy Station-End of Gettysburg Campaign
- Aug 3 Governor Seymour asks President Lincoln to suspend draft in New York
- Aug 8 American Civil War: Tennessee's "military" Governor Andrew Johnson frees his personal slaves. Celebrated as a holiday by Tennessee African Americans (early 20th century)
- Aug 9 Skirmish at Calfkiller Creek, Tennessee - Union troops attack Confederate scouts
- Aug 11 Cambodia becomes French protectorate
- Aug 12 1st cargo of lumber leaves Burrard Inlet (Vancouver, BC)
- Aug 15 Confederate submarine "CSS H.L. Hunley" arrives in Charleston on railroad cars from Mobile, Alabama, where it was built [1]
- Aug 15 The Anglo-Satsuma War begins between the Satsuma Domain of Japan and the United Kingdom (Traditional Japanese date: July 2, 1863).
- Aug 16 Chickamauga campaign of the US Civil War begins in Georgia
- Aug 17 Federal batteries & ships attacked Fort Sumter in South Carolina
Lawrence Massacre
Aug 21 Lawrence Massacre [Quantrill's raid]: 450 Confederate guerrillas led by William Quantrill with William T. Anderson and Frank James attack the Unionist town of Lawrence, Kansas, killing more than 150 unarmed men and boys
- Aug 26 Battle of Rocky Gap, West Virginia (White Sulphur Springs): Colonel George S. Patton's Confederate forces defeat Union brigade advance
Famous Birthdays
- Aug 1 Gaston Doumergue, 60th Prime Minister of France (1913-14 and 1934) and 1st protestant French President (1924-31), born in Aigues-Vives, France (d. 1937)
- Aug 11 Árpád Szendy, Hungarian pianist, composer, and educator, born in Szarvas, Hungary (d. 1922)
- Aug 14 Ernest Thayer, American poet who wrote the famous baseball poem "Casey", born in Lawrence, Massachusetts (d. 1940)
- Aug 15 Alexei Krylov, Russian engineer and mathematician, born in Alatyrsky District, Russia (d. 1945)
- Aug 17 Gene Stratton-Porter, American author and naturalist (d. 1924)
- Aug 24 Dragutin Lerman, Croatian explorer, born in Požega, Croatia (d. 1918)
- Aug 30 Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky, Russian photographer and chemist, born in Muron, Russia (d. 1944)
Famous Deaths
- Aug 5 Adolf Friedrich Hesse, German composer, dies at 53
- Aug 8 Angus MacAskill known as 'Giant MacAskill', circus performer (b.1825)
- Aug 13 Eugène Delacroix, French painter and etcher (Journal), dies at 65
- Aug 14 Colin Campbell, British officer (Cawnpore), dies at 70
- Aug 18 Thomas Welsh, US Union brigadier general (Antietam), dies at 39
- Aug 26 John Bz. Floyd, American Governor (Virginia), Secretary of War (1857-60) and Confederate general, dies of failing health at 57
