Events

• February 14 - Henry Pelham becomes British Prime Minister
• February 21 - - The premiere in London of George Frideric Handel's oratorio, Samson.
• September 13 - Treaty of Worms (1743) - a treaty between Great Britain, Austria and Sardinia
• Battle of Dettingen

Ongoing events

• War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748)

Births

• January 25 - Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, German philosopher
• February 13 - Sir Joseph Banks, British naturalist and botanist
• February 19 - Luigi Boccherini, Italian classical music performer (d. 1805)
• February 23 - Mayer Amschel Rothschild, German-born banker (d. 1812)
• March 4 - Johann David Wyss, Swiss author (d. 1818)
• April 13 - Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (d. 1826)
• May 17 - Seth Warner American revolutionary hero
• August 26 - Antoine Lavoisier, French chemist
• September 11 - Nikolaj Abraham Abildgaard, Danish painter
• September 17 - Marquis de Condorcet, mathematician, philosopher, and political scientist
• José Fernando de Abascal , Spanish viceroy of Peru

Deaths

• January 29 - Cardinal André-Hercule de Fleury, Bishop of Fréjus, chief minister of France under Louis XV