Key Figures
The key figures of 1778 — revolutionary leaders, French allies, Enlightenment philosophers, and the statesmen who died that year.
Every Key Figures article in the 1778 knowledge base. Use the topic filters to narrow by sub-topic.
Joseph Banks (1743–1820)
Sir Joseph Banks was a British naturalist, explorer, and botanist who transformed 1778 into a tur...
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau died on July 2, 1778, at Ermenonville, the château of Marquis René-Louis de...
Voltaire (1694–1778)
Voltaire, born François-Marie Arouet on November 21, 1694, died on May 30, 1778, in Paris at the ...
William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham (1708–1778)
William Pitt the Elder, 1st Earl of Chatham, was the dominant British statesman of the mid-eighte...
John Paul Jones (1747–1792)
John Paul Jones (1747–1792) was an American naval commander whose 1778 Ranger raids on British so...
Comte d'Estaing (1729–1794)
Jean-Baptiste Charles Henri Hector, comte d'Estaing, born November 24, 1729, was a French admiral...
Baron Friedrich von Steuben (1730–1794)
Friedrich Wilhelm Rudolf Gerhard August, Freiherr von Steuben, was a Prussian-born military offic...
General William Howe (1729–1814)
British Commander-in-Chief in North America 1775–1778, whose pursuit of a conventional campaign s...
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1809)
Virginia legislator Thomas Jefferson drafted 126 bills between 1776 and 1779, reshaping the state...
Robert Morris (1734–1806)
Robert Morris Jr. was born on January 20, 1734, in Liverpool, England, the son of a tobacco facto...
Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814)
Mercy Otis Warren was the most prominent female political voice of 1778, a year in which she publ...
Martha Dandridge Custis Washington (1731–1802)
Martha Washington joined her husband at Valley Forge's winter encampment in 1778, providing pract...
Marquis de Lafayette (1757–1834)
French aristocratic volunteer who wintered at Valley Forge, escaped a British trap at Barren Hill...
Maria Carolina of Austria and Naples (1752–1814)
Maria Carolina ascended to effective co-rule of the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily in 1778 followin...
King Louis XVI (1754–1793) in 1778
France's 24-year-old monarch, guided by his foreign minister Vergennes, made the pivotal 1778 dec...
John Hancock (1737–1793)
Boston merchant and patriot who presided over the Continental Congress 1775–1777, returned briefl...
Henry Laurens (1724–1792)
Merchant and politician Henry Laurens served as Continental Congress President in 1778, handling ...
George Washington (1732–1799)
George Washington, born February 22, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Virginia, was the Commander-in...
King George III (1738–1820) in 1778
Britain's monarch navigated 1778 as the year France entered the Revolutionary War, facing strateg...
José Moñino y Redondo, Count of Floridablanca (1728–1808)
Spanish statesman José Moñino y Redondo, Count of Floridablanca, became Spain's chief minister in...
Comte de Vergennes (1717–1787)
French Foreign Minister Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes, architected the Franco-American alli...
Catherine II 'The Great' (1729–1796)
Russian Empress Catherine the Great wielded decisive diplomatic influence in 1778, mediating the ...
Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790)
Benjamin Franklin (January 17, 1706 – April 17, 1790) was an American polymath, inventor, diploma...
Benedict Arnold (1741–1801)
Major General of the Continental Army whose 1778 service spanned the Battle of Monmouth and the P...
Abigail Adams (1744–1818)
Abigail Adams emerged in 1778 as a model of independent domestic and financial management amid wa...