There is some good news awaiting Nicolas Baudin on Isle de France. Le Naturaliste made it safely there six months earlier with the loss of only one animal – a turtle – and, all going well, is most likely home in France by now. But that is cold comfort indeed. Baudin is gravely ill.
He is taken to the home of the woman rumoured to be his lover, Madame Alexandrine Kerivel, widowed three years earlier when her husband, Pierre, was lost at sea. There, in his final days, Baudin reveals a previously unknown penchant for black humour, showing visitors a jar containing pieces of lung he has coughed up, and telling them it proves that man can live without lungs.
Despite the tender care of Alexandrine Kerivel, Nicolas Baudin dies of tuberculosis on 16 September 1803, at 49 years old. None of his crew attend his funeral.
Baudin’s burial place is unknown, although some say his grave lies somewhere in an old neglected and vandalised Port Louis cemetery, by the sea, and that Alexandrine, who died 20 years later, is buried by his side.
As Baudin’s resting place is lost, so too are his contributions to science and exploration. His nemesis, François Péron, is determined not only to blacken his late commander’s name but to effectively write him out of the official history of the expedition. So effective will Péron’s efforts be that Napoleon, on reading Péron’s version of events, will reputedly say that if Baudin had not died he would have had him hanged.
For the moment, though, Péron has an urgent matter to attend to before Le Géographe departs on the last leg of the voyage home. Eight days after the ship docked at Port Napoleon, General Charles-Mathieu Decaen, Napoleon’s newly appointed governor, arrived.
He is here by default. After the signing of the Treaty of Amiens, Napoleon sent him to India to govern British possessions which, under terms of the treaty, were to be surrendered to France. When Decaen arrived, however, the British governor-general of India, Lord Richard Wellesley, flatly refused to surrender any territory to the French. Richard proved equally as obdurate as his younger brother Arthur – destined to win fame as the Duke of Wellington, victor of Waterloo – and Decaen had no choice but to turn tail. As consolation, he was offered governorship of Isle de France.
Péron hurriedly completes and delivers his secret report on Port Jackson to the new governor, well aware that in doing so he is preaching to the choir.
The general, an old warhorse, haughty and irascible, despises the British. A successful commander in Napoleon’s European campaigns, Decaen at one time rivalled Bonaparte in popularity, which might explain why Napoleon has posted him as far from France as possible.
Péron’s report begins: ‘Citizen Captain-General, 15 years ago, England transported, at great expense, a large population to the eastern coast of New Holland. At that time, this vast continent was almost entirely unknown. These southern lands and the numerous archipelagos of the Pacific were invaded by the English, who had solemnly proclaimed sovereignty over the whole dominion extending from Cape York to the southern extremity of New Holland.
‘Note especially in this respect that in the formal deed of annexation no exact boundary was fixed on the Pacific Ocean side. This omission seems to have been the result of astute policy. The English government thus prepared itself an excuse for claiming, at the right time and place, all the islands which in the future may be, or actually are, occupied by the Spaniards – who thus find themselves England’s next-door neighbours.
‘So, general, a project of encroachment alarmed, as it must, all the nations of Europe. The sacrifices made by England to maintain this colony redoubled their suspicions. Europe was still ignorant of the nature of the English settlement. Its object was unknown. Its rapid growth was not even suspected.’1
All that is set to change, says Péron, thanks to the far-sightedness of Napoleon Bonaparte. The primary aim of the Baudin expedition was not scientific but political, and the pursuit of natural history merely a cover for the gathering of military intelligence.
‘Always vigilant in regard to whatever may humiliate the eternal rival of our nation, the First Consul [Napoleon Bonaparte], soon after the revolution of 9 November 1799 [the coup that won Bonaparte dictatorial powers as First Consul of the French Republic], decided upon our expedition. His real object was such that it was vital to conceal it from the governments of Europe, and especially from the Cabinet of Saint James [the British government]. We must have their unanimous consent, and to obtain this it was necessary that – strangers in appearance to all political designs – we should occupy ourselves only with natural history collections.’2
Revealing his contempt for Nicolas Baudin, Péron asks General Decaen to consider why command of such an important mission, which was bound to bring greater glory to the French government, was entrusted to ‘a man utterly unfitted in all possible respects’.3
The right man for the job – says he, untrammelled by anything resembling modesty – was himself. He assures the general that of all the expedition members he was best able to gather strategic information while avoiding suspicion.
Indeed, his status as a scientist, an affable air and cultivated French manners allowed him an easy entrée to the cream of colonial society, including Governor Philip Gidley King, Lieutenant-Governor William Paterson, top civil servants, military officers, doctors and clergy.
‘I have, in short, known at Port Jackson all the principal people of the colony, in all vocations, and each of them has furnished, unsuspectingly, information as valuable as it is new.’4
Péron’s report, if occasionally repetitive, with a tendency to hyperbole, is nevertheless an interesting read, but it is surely its conclusion that leaves Decaen dreaming of a France in the south; a glittering prize that is his for the taking; a dream he decides to share with Napoleon Bonaparte.
‘I wish to point out the impossibility for France of retarding the rapid progress of the colony of Port Jackson, or of entering into competition with its settlers in the trades of sealing, whaling, etc.,’ Péron writes. ‘But it would take too long to discuss that matter. I believe I ought to confine myself to telling you that, in my opinion, and that of all those among us who have more particularly occupied themselves with investigating the workings of that colony, is that it should be destroyed as soon as possible. Today, we could destroy it easily. We shall not be able to do so in 25 years’ time.’5
Leaving behind the Casuarina, which arrived a week after Baudin, Le Géographe departs Isle de France for Europe on 16 December 1803 – coincidentally, the day before Matthew Flinders arrives and is detained there. General Decaen has appointed as commander of Le Géographe Lieutenant Pierre Milius, formerly second-in-command of Le Naturaliste. Milius, who left the Baudin expedition at Port Jackson in 1802 due to illness and had since made his way to Isle de France by way of China.
Decaen adds to Milius’s collection a black panther as a gift for Josephine, and sends him on his way.