Benjamin Disraeli was a British Prime Minister, parliamentarian, Conservative statesman and literary figure. Starting from comparatively humble origins, he served in government for three decades, twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdo...

Louis-Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique, Grande messe des morts (Requiem), Les Troyens, and La damnation de Faust. Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orche...

Charles Goodyear was the inventor of vulcanization, a process that makes rubber harder, less soluble, and more durable. It is at the heart of rubber compounding, which played a key role at the onset of the Industrial Revolution. Goodyear ob...

Ghalib was the prominent Urdu and Persian-language poet during the last years of the Mughal Empire. He used his pen-names of Ghalib (means "dominant") and Asad (means "lion"). His honorific was Dabir-ul-Mulk, Najm-ud-Daula. During his l...

Dost Mohammad Khan was the founder of the Barakzai dynasty and one of the prominent rulers of Afghanistan during the First Anglo-Afghan War. With the decline of the Durrani dynasty, he became Emir of Afghanistan from 1826 to 1839 and then f...

William II (Willem Frederik George Lodewijk van Oranje-Nassau) was King of the Netherlands, Grand Duke of Luxembourg, and Duke of Limburg from 7 October 1840 until his death. On 7 October 1840, on his father's abdication, he acceded the thr...

Charles Babbage was an English mathematician, analytical philosopher, mechanical engineer and (proto-) computer scientist who originated the idea of a programmable computer. Parts of his uncompleted mechanisms are on display in the London S...

Leopold I was a German prince who became the first King of the Belgians following the country's independence in 1830. He reigned between July 1831 and December 1865. Born into the ruling family of the small German duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Sa...

General Gregor MacGregor was a Scottish soldier, adventurer and confidence trickster who attempted from 1821 to 1837 to draw British and French investors and settlers to "Poyais", a fictional Central American territory that he claimed to ru...

Martin Van Buren was the first President (1837-1841) not born a British subject, or even of British ancestry. The Van Burens were a large, struggling family of Dutch descent. Martin's father, Abraham Van Buren -- a supporter of Thomas Jeffe...

Aleksander Pavlovich Romanov or Tsar Alexander I (The Blessed), was Emperor of Russia from 1801-1825 and King of Poland from 1815–1825. The son of the Grand Duke Paul Petrovich, afterwards Paul I, and Maria Fedorovna, daughter of the Duke o...

Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. Her realism, biting irony and social commentary have gained h...

Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 Dec, 1770) was a German composer and pianist; his music is amongst the most performed of the classical music repertoire, and he is one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music. His...

Anna Maria "Marie" Tussaud was a French artist known for her wax sculptures and Madame Tussauds, the wax museum she founded in London. In 1835, after 33 years touring Britain, she established her first permanent exhibition in Baker Stre...

Charles Cornwallis, 1st Marquess Cornwallis KG, PC, styled Viscount Brome between 1753 and 1762 and known as The Earl Cornwallis between 1762 and 1792, was a British Army officer and colonial administrator. In the United States and the...