Jules Dumont D'Urville - Voyage of The Coquille

Voyage of The Coquille

On his return from the voyage of the Chevrette, Dumont was sent to the naval archive where he came across Lieutenant Louis Isidore Duperrey, an acquaintance from the past. The two began to plan an expedition of exploration in the Pacific, an area from which France had been forced out of during the Napoleonic Wars. France considered it might be able to regain some of its losses by taking over part of New South Wales. In August 11, 1822 the ship Coquille sailed from Toulon with the objective of collecting as much scientific and strategic information as possible on the area to which it was dispatched. Duperrey was named Commander of the expedition because he was four years older than Dumont. He found the Adélie penguins and named them after his wife.

René-Primevère Lesson also travelled on the Coquille as a naval doctor and naturalist. On the return to France in March 1825, Lesson and Dumont brought back to France an imposing collection of animals and plants collected to the Falkland Islands, on the coasts of Chile and Peru, in the archipelagos of the Pacific and New Zealand, New Guinea and Australia. Dumont was now 35 and in poor health. On board the Coquille, he had behaved as a competent official, but rather abrupt, little inclined to socialise and with a sometimes embarrassing lack of interest in his physical condition and medical and hygiene advice. On the return to France, Duperrey was promoted to commander, while Dumont was demoted to a lower rank, even after having been on his best behaviour. This greatly disturbed Dumont in subsequent years.