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French Corvette
Astrolabe
|
History
|
France
|
Namesake
| Astrolabe
instrument
|
Builder
| Le Havre
|
Launched
| December 1781
|
Christened
| Autruche
|
Reclassified
| Frigate in 1784
|
Fate
| Wrecked on Vanikoro 1788
|
General characteristics
|
Class and type
| Fluyt
|
Displacement
| c. 500 tonnes
|
Length
| 38.7 m (127 ft)
|
Beam
| 8.5 m (28 ft)
|
Draught
| 5 m (16 ft)
|
Propulsion
| Sail
|
Complement
| |
Armament
| 12 6-pounders; 3 x 1-pounders and 20 swivel guns (as converted)
|
Armour
| Timber
|
Astrolabe
was a converted
flute
of the
French Navy
, famous for her travels with
Jean-Francois de Galaup, comte de Laperouse
.
She was built in 1781 at
Le Havre
as the flute
Autruche
for the French Navy. In May 1785 she and her sistership
Boussole
(previously
Portefaix
) were renamed and rerated as frigates, and fitted for round-the-world scientific exploration. The two ships departed from
Brest
on 1 August 1785,
Boussole
commanded by Laperouse and
Astrolabe
under
Paul Antoine Fleuriot de Langle
.
Disappearance
[
edit
]
The expedition vanished mysteriously in 1788 after leaving
Botany Bay
on 10 March 1788. Captain
Peter Dillon
in
Research
solved the mystery in 1827 when he found remnants of the ships
Astrolabe
and
Boussole
at
Vanikoro
Island in the
Solomon Islands
. Local inhabitants reported that the ships had been wrecked in a storm.
[
citation needed
]
Survivors from one ship had been massacred, while survivors from the other ship had constructed their own small boat and sailed off the island, never to be heard from again.
[1]
Legacy
[
edit
]
The fate of Laperouse, his ships and crew was a subject of mystery for some years.
Louis XVI
reportedly often inquired whether any news had come from the expedition, up to shortly before his execution. It is also notably the subject of a chapter from
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
by
Jules Verne
.
[2]
Objects recovered from the wreck are part of the collection of the
Maritime Museum of New Caledonia
.
[3]
See also
[
edit
]
Note
[
edit
]
Its crew included French priest
Louis Receveur
, the first
Catholic
and second non-indigenous person to be buried in
Australia
.
[
citation needed
]
References
[
edit
]