Nicolas Baudin

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Nicolas Baudin : biography

17 February 1754 – 16 September 1803

Belle Angélique Expedition

In Paris, Baudin visited Antoine de Jussieu at the Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle in March 1796 to suggest a botanical voyage to the Caribbean, during which he would recover the collection of specimens he had left in Trinidad. The proposal was accepted by the Museum and French government, and Baudin was appointed commander of an expedition in the ship, the Belle Angélique, with four assigned botanists, René Maugé, André Pierre Ledru, Anselme Riedlé and Stanislas Levillain. The Belle Angélique cleared Le Havre on 30 September 1796 for the Canary Islands, where the ship was condemned as unseaworthy. The expedition sailed from the Canaries in a replacement vessel, the Fanny, and reached Trinidad in April 1797. The island had just been captured from the Spanish by the British, who refused to allow Baudin to recover his collection of natural history specimens. Baudin took the Fanny to St. Thomas and St. Croix, and then to Porto Rico, specimens being collected in all three islands. At St Croix, the Fanny was replaced by a newly purchased ship, which was renamed the Belle Angelique.Madeleine Ly-Tio-Fane, "A reconnaissance of tropical resources during Revolutionary years: the role of the Paris Museum d’Histoire Naturelle", Archives of Natural History, vol.18, 1991, pp.352–355. The expedition returned to France in June 1798 with a large collection of plants, birds and insects, which was incorporated into Napoleon Bonaparte’s triumphal procession celebrating his recent Italian victories.André Pierre Ledru, Voyage aux iles de Teneriffe, la Trinite, Saint-Thomas Sainte-Croix et Porto Ricco, Paris, Bertrand, 1810; Nicolas Baudin, Voyage aux Antilles de La Belle Angélique, édition établie et commentée par Michel Jangoux, préface du contre-amiral Georges Prud’homme, Paris, PUPS, coll. « Imago mundi-Textes », 2009.

Géographe

]] On 24 July 1798, at the suggestion of the Ministry of Marine, Baudin presented to the Assembly of Professors and Administrators of the National Museum of Natural History a plan for a hydrographic survey expedition to the South Seas, which would include a search for fauna and flora that could be brought back for cultivation in France. The expedition would also have the aim of promoting the economic and commercial interests of France in the regions to be visited. The expedition would require two well-equipped ships, which would carry a team of astronomers, naturalists and scientific draughtsmen over whom Baudin as commander would have absolute authority. The first part of the voyage would be devoted to a thorough exploration of the coast of Chile and the collection of animal, bird and plant specimens suitable for acclimatization in France, followed by a survey of the coasts from Peru to Mexico. The expedition would then continue into the Pacific Ocean, including a visit to Tahiti and the Society Islands, and would be completed with a survey of the yet unexplored south west coast of New Holland (Australia).Baudin aux Citoyens Professeurs et Adminitstrateurs du Museum nationale d’histoire naturelle à Paris, 6 Thermidor An VI [24 Juillet 1798], Archives nationales, Paris, AJXV 569, ff.178-179; cited in Madeleine Ly-Tio-Fane, "A reconnaissance of tropical resources during Revolutionary years: the role of the Paris Museum d’Histoire Naturelle", Archives of Natural History, vol.18, 1991, pp.333–362, p.358. After considering this extensive proposal, the French government decided to proceed with an expedition confined to a survey of western and southern New Holland (as Australia was called at the time).