1861 births

Bernhard Gottfried Max Hugo Eberhard, Graf von Schmettow, usually shortened to Eberhard Graf von Schmettow, (17 September 1861 – 21 January 1935) was a German general of World War I.

Johann Peter Kirsch (3 November 1861 – 4 February 1941) was a Luxembourgish ecclesiastical historian and biblical archaeologist.

Colonel Marie Augstin Gaston Cros (known as Gaston Cros) (6 October 1861 – 10 May 1915) was a French army officer and archaeologist. He was born in Alsace and was displaced when that territory was incorporated into the German Empire. He joined the French Army as a lieutenant and saw action in Tonkin before spending several years surveying in Tunisia, receiving the honours of membership of Vietnamese and Tunisian orders and appointment as a chevalier of the Legion of Honour. In 1901 Cros was appointed head of the French archaeological expedition to Girsu, Iraq to continue the work of Ernest de Sarzec. His work over the next five years included the tracing of the 32.5 feet (9.9 m) thick city wall and for his work there received a letter of commendation from Gaston Doumergue, the Minister of Fine Arts, and the award of the Golden Palms of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques. Promoted to lieutenant-colonel, Cros served in the French protectorate of Morocco from 1913, seeing action in the Zaian War.
Upon the outbreak of the First World War Cros was recalled to metropolitan France and fought in defence of Paris at the First Battle of the Marne, leading an ad hoc unit of zouaves and tirailleurs. He was wounded and spent two days directing his troops from a horse-drawn carriage before he was forced to leave his command. On 15 September 1914 he was promoted to colonel and subsequently received command of the 2nd Moroccan Brigade which he led at the Battle of the Yser and the Second Battle of Artois. It was at Artois that he was killed in a German counter-attack. Cros' name is recorded alongside that of Colonel Pein, who commanded the 1st Moroccan Brigade at Artois, on the Moroccan Division Memorial at Vimy.

Émile Grumiaux (11 June 1861 in Boussu – 18 May 1932 in Liévin) was a French competitor in the sport of archery. Grumiaux competed in one event, winning the Sur la Perche à la Pyramide competition. He is now considered by the International Olympic Committee to have won a gold medal[1]. No scores are known from that competition.

Carl Legien (1 December 1861 – 26 December 1920) was a German unionist, moderate Social Democratic politician and first President of the International Federation of Trade Unions.

Jean Paul Vuillemin (13 February 1861 – 25 September 1932 in Malzéville) was a French mycologist born in Docelles.
He studied at the University of Nancy, earning his medical doctorate in 1884. In 1892 he obtained his doctorate in sciences at the Sorbonne, and from 1895 to 1932 he was a professor of natural history at the medical faculty in Nancy.He described the genera Spinalia and Zygorhynchus. The mushroom genus Vuilleminia (Maire) is named after him.
In 1889 he employed the term "antibiotic" when describing the substance pyocyanin.In 1901 he transferred the yeast-like fungus that was named Saccharomyces hominis by Otto Busse and Saccharomyces neoformans by Francesco Sanfelice to the genus Cryptococcus due to its absence of ascospores. The French Academy of Sciences awarded him the Prix Montagne for 1902.In 1912 Vuillemin created the genus Beauveria to honor Jean Beauverie for his work the previous year on the type species - B. bassiana - transferring it from Botrytis.

Camille François Sauvageau (12 May 1861 – 5 August 1936) was a French botanist and phycologist.Sauvageau was born in Angers. He studied at the University of Montpellier, receiving his degree in natural sciences in 1884. Afterwards he served as an assistant to Charles Flahault (1884–1888) in Montpellier and to Philippe Van Tieghem (1885–1891) in Paris. In 1891 he received his doctorate in Paris with the thesis Sur les feuilles de quelques Monocotylédones aquatiques (On the leaves of some aquatic monocots). In 1892 he attained a professorship at the University of Lyon, later serving as a professor of botany at the Faculty of Sciences of Bordeaux (1901–1932).He is known for his investigations of Phaeophyceae, being a taxonomic authority of numerous brown algae species. In 1926 he described the order Sporochnales.His name was lent to the mycological genus Sauvageautia Har., 1892 (now a synonym of Urosporella G.F.Atkinson, 1897) as well as to the algae genus Sauvageaugloia (Hamel ex Kylin, 1940).The French Academy of Sciences awarded him the Prix Montagne for 1904.

Ernest Mosny (4 January 1861 – 25 April 1918) was a French physician and hygienist born in La Fère, Aisne.Mosny served as médecin des hopitaux in Paris, and was a member of the Académie de Médecine and the Conseil supérieur d'hygiène.
He is remembered for his work in the field of microbiology. With Joaquín Albarrán (1860–1912) he performed a series of tests in an attempt to find an antidote to the colon bacillus. Eventually the two scientists developed a vaccine that achieved a high degree of immunity in dogs and rabbits. In 1912 with biologist Edouard Dujardin-Beaumetz (1868–1947), he studied the effects of bubonic plague in two Alpine marmots during hibernation. Reportedly, the marmots were able to survive 61 and 115 days after being injected with the disease.In 1911 Mosny reported the first successful embolectomy, a direct arterial surgical procedure that was performed on the femoral artery.

Gustave-Édouard Laguesse (23 April 1861 – 6 November 1927) was a French pathologist and histologist born in Dijon.
In 1885 he received his medical doctorate in Paris and from 1891 performed scientific research in Lille. In 1896 he became a professor of histology.Laguesse is remembered for his histopathological work involving the pancreas. In 1893 he named the small cellular clusters of the pancreas the "Islets of Langerhans", in honor of their discoverer Paul Langerhans (1847-1888). At the time of its discovery, Langerhans provided an excellent description of the structures, but offered no further conclusions as to their function. Laguesse postulated that the Islets of Langerhans produced secretions that played a regulatory role in digestion. Laguesse's research was considered a major step on the path of discovery of a new hormone in the early days of endocrinology.

Gustave Émile Haug (19 June 1861 - 28 August 1927) was a French geologist and paleontologist known for his contribution to the geosyncline theory.