Historical Events
- Dec 8 5,000 armed Boers gather in Paardekraal, South Africa
- Dec 16 Beginning of the First Boer War between British Empire and Boer South African Republic
- Dec 16 Transvaal region declares itself as the Republic of South Africa
- Dec 20 Battle at Bronker's Spruit, Transvaal: Farmers beat Britten
- Dec 20 NY's Broadway lit by electricity, becomes known as "Great White Way"
Famous Birthdays
- Dec 1 Akiba Rubinstein, Polish chess player (openings theorist), born in Stawiski, Congress Poland (d. 1961)
- Dec 3 Fedor von Bock, German field marshal (commander in the German occupation of Austria, invasions of Poland, France, and Russia during WWII), born in Cüstrin, Province of Brandenburg, German Empire (d. 1945)
- Dec 4 Garfield Wood, American inventor, motorboat builder and racer (world water speed record x 5; first to travel over 100 mph on water), born in Mapleton, Iowa (d. 1971)
- Dec 5 Alexander Schmuller, Russian-Dutch violinist and conductor, born in Mazyr, Belarus (d. 1933)
- Dec 10 Fred Immler, German actor (Zapata's Gang, Madame DuBarry), born in Germany (d. 1965)
- Dec 19 Nemesio Otaño, Spanish organist, choral director, educator, and composer (Basque Suite), born in Azcoitia, Spain (d. 1956) [1]
- Dec 24 Johnny Gruelle, American cartoonist, children's book writer and creator of Raggedy Ann, born in Arcola, Illinois (d. 1939)
- Dec 28 Christian Frederik Leipoldt, South African physician, writer and poet, born in Worcester, South Africa (d. 1947)
- Dec 29 Jean-Fernand Vaubourgoin, French composer (Ophellia), born in Bordeaux, France (d. 1952)
- Dec 30 Alfred Einstein, German-American musicologist and nephew of Albert Einstein, born in Munich, Germany (d. 1952)
George C. Marshall (1880-1959)
Dec 31 American general and US Secretary of State (1947-49) who authored the Marshall Plan (Nobel 1953), born in Uniontown, Pennsylvania
Famous Deaths
- Dec 2 Josephine Lang, German composer, dies at 65
- Dec 8 Charles Fisher, Canadian politician and jurist (Premier of the Colony of New Brunswick 1854-56, 1857-61), dies at 72 [1]
- Dec 11 Oliver Winchester, American politician and rifle maker (Winchester Repeating Arms Company), dies at 70
- Dec 12 Michel Chasles, French mathematician (geometry), dies at 83
- Dec 15 Carlo Boncompagni di Mombello, Italian minister of Justice, dies at 76
George Eliot (1819-1880)
Dec 22 British novelist (Adam Bede; Middlemarch; Silas Marner), dies of kidney disease on her 61st birthday
