Baudin Expedition To Australia

Baudin Expedition To Australia

The Baudin expedition of 1800 to 1803 was a French expedition to map the coast of Australia. Nicolas Baudin was selected as leader in October 1800. The expedition started with two ships, Géographe, captained by Baudin, and Naturaliste captained by Jacques Hamelin, and was accompanied by nine zoologists and botanists, including Jean Baptiste Leschenault de la Tour, François Péron and Charles-Alexandre Lesueur.

In May 1801, the expedition reached Australia, being the first to explore and map the western coast, and a part of the southern coast.

A lot of Western Australian places still have French names today: Baudin Beach, Peron Peninsula, Faure Island, Gantheaume Point.

In April 1802 they encountered the British ship Investigator captained by Matthew Flinders, also engaged in charting the coastline, in Encounter Bay in what is now South Australia. They later stopped at the British colony of Sydney for supplies.

From Sydney, the expedition headed to Tasmania, before continuing north to Timor. On their way home the ships stopped in Mauritius, where Baudin died of tuberculosis. The expedition finally came back in France in 1804.

The French had peaceful relationships with all Aboriginal peoples they met. They notably produced precious ethnological studies of Tasmanian Aboriginals, who were decimated following the British colonization of Tasmania early in 19th century.

An inscription was left by members of Géographe on Kangaroo Island, Australia, in 1803.

According to researchers from the University of Adelaide, during this expedition Baudin prepared report for Napoleon on ways to invade and capture the British colony at Sydney Cove.