President Lincoln ( center right ) with, from left, Generals Sherman, Grant and Admiral Porter – 1868 painting of events aboard the River Queen ( steamboat ) | River Queen in March, 1865

* Mary Hunter Austin ( 1868 – 1934 ), American writer

* 1868 – Akiyama Saneyuki, Japanese naval commander ( d. 1918 )

* 1868 – Hong Beom-do, Korean activist ( d. 1943 )

* 1868 – Paul Claudel, French poet ( d. 1955 )

* 1868 – A massive earthquake near Arica, Peru, causes an estimated 25, 000 casualties, and the subsequent tsunami causes considerable damage as far away as Hawaii and New Zealand.

* 1868 – Constantine I of Greece ( d. 1923 )

* 1917 – Scott Joplin, American musician and composer ( b. 1868 )

* 1868 – Ladislaus Bortkiewicz, Russian mathematician ( d. 1931 )

* 1868 – French astronomer Pierre Janssen discovers helium.

* 1786 – Ludwig I of Bavaria ( d. 1868 )

* 1868 – Nikolaos Levidis, Greek target shooter

During the Tokugawa period ( 1600 – 1868 ) the Ainu became increasingly involved in trade with Japanese who controlled the southern portion of the island that is now called Hokkaido.

* 1868 – The Abyssinian War ends as British and Indian troops capture Maqdala.

* 1868 – Edgar Lee Masters, American author ( d. 1950 )

The dethroning of queen Isabel II meant a vacuum that was profited by the Bank of New York and some Cubans opposed to the projected extension of the 1837 Abolition Act to finance a Texas style " independence " revolution known as the Cuban 10 Years War ( 1868 – 78 ) lost by the Cubans.

* 1868 – Peter Behrens, German architect and designer ( d. 1940 )

* 1794 – Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius, German botanist ( d. 1868 )

August Horch ( 12 October 1868 – 3 February 1951 ) was a German engineer and automobile pioneer, the founder of the manufacturing giant which would eventually become Audi.

* Charles Aubrey Eaton ( 1868 – 1953 ), clergyman and politician who served in the United States House of Representatives, representing the from 1925 – 1933, and the from 1933-1953.

* 1868 – Hugo Eckener, German pilot and businessman ( d. 1954 )

* 1868 – Former Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu surrenders Edo Castle to Imperial forces, marking the end of the Tokugawa shogunate.

* 1868 – Henry James O ' Farrell, Australian attempted assassin of Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha

* 1868 – John Bevins Moisant, American aviator ( d. 1910 )

* 1809 – Kit Carson, American frontiersman ( d. 1868 )

* 1920 – Horace Elgin Dodge, American automobile manufacturer ( b. 1868 )

* 1868 – Harvey Firestone, American automobile pioneer ( d. 1938 )

Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze ( May 24, 1816 – July 18, 1868 ) was a German American history painter best known for his painting Washington Crossing the Delaware.

* 1809 – William Sprague, American minister and politician from Michigan ( d. 1868 )

Here, he had met an American, Louise Burguelew Ennis, the daughter of a wholesale stationer ; entering a relationship, they were married in Manhattan on 25 November 1868.

* 1868 – Henrietta Swan Leavitt, American astronomer ( d. 1921 )

* 1868 – James Buchanan, American lawyer and politician, 15th President of the United States ( b. 1791 )

* 1845 – Tom Dula, American soldier ( d. 1868 )

* 1868 – The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution is certified, establishing African American citizenship and guaranteeing due process of law.

* 1868 – Florence Foster Jenkins, American soprano ( d. 1945 )

Christopher Houston " Kit " Carson ( December 24, 1809 – May 23, 1868 ) was an American frontiersman and Indian fighter.

From 1865 to 1868 he was secretary of the American Union Commission ( later called the American Freedmen's Bureau ).

* 1953 – Jesse Burkett, American baseball player ( b. 1868 )

* 1868 – Sumner Paine, American shooter ( d. 1904 )

* 1868 – Robert Millikan, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate ( d. 1953 )

* 1868 – Jesse Chisholm, American pioneer of the Chisholm Trail ( b. 1805 )

* 1868 – American Indian Wars: Battle of Washita River – United States Army Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer leads an attack on Cheyenne living on reservation land.

* 1868 – John Nance Garner, American politician ( d. 1967 )