---
title: "European and American voyages of scientific exploration"
chunk: 5/11
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_and_American_voyages_of_scientific_exploration"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:39:10.846547+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

This expedition was organised to establish a permanent colonial presence in the South Seas before the British, concentrating on the mapping of the coast of the Australia and New Guinea. Nicolas Baudin died in Mauritius in 1803, another naturalist on the island of Timor, two other naturalists chose to stay on the island and two astronomers died of dysentery. Péron, assisted by his friend Lesueur, managed to gather a vast zoological collection. Naturaliste returned to France in 1803 with a part of the collections. Captain Baudin bought a schooner, the Casuarina, at the British settlement of Port Jackson in Australia. Baudin was replaced by Pierre Bernard Milius (1773–1829).

Commanders: Nicolas Baudin (1754–1803) (Le Géographe) and Jacques Hamelin (1768–1839) (Le Naturaliste).
Physician, surgeon (first doctor in the Navy) and biologist: Pierre François Keraudren (1769–1858) (Le Géographe).
Naturalists: Jean Baptiste Leschenault de la Tour (1773–1826), René Maugé Cely, Stanislas Levillain (1774–1801), François Péron (1775–1810), Jean-Baptiste Bory de Saint-Vincent (1778–1846) (left the expedition to Mauritius), Désiré Dumont, André Michaux (1746–1803)
Artist: Charles-Alexandre Lesueur (1778–1846) assisted by Nicolas-Martin Petit (1777–1804)
Astronomers: Pierre-François Bernier (1779–1803) and Frédéric de Bissy (1768–1803)
Cartographer: Charles-Pierre Boullanger
Geographer: Pierre Faure (1777–1855)
Mineralogist: Louis Depuch, Joseph Charles Bailly
Publications: F. Péron, Voyage of discovery to the southern lands (three volumes, Paris, 1807–1816); many species of birds are described by Louis Pierre Vieillot (1748–1831) in the New Dictionary of Natural History (1816–1819).

==== 1801–03: HMS Investigator ====

The first circumnavigation of Australia. The work of scientific observation was interrupted due to damage and many specimens transferred to HMS Porpoise were lost when it sank. The observations of Brown on the flora of this continent were the most extensive at this time.

Captain: Matthew Flinders (1774–1814).
Naturalist: Robert Brown (1773–1858)
Physician-naturalist: Hugh Bell
Mineralogist: John Allen
Astronomer: John Crosley
Artists: Ferdinand Bauer (1760–1826) and William Westall (1781–1850)
Publication: M. Flinders, A Voyage to Terra Australis, undertaken for the purpose of completing the discovery of that vast country and prosecuted in the years 1801, 1802 and 1803 ... (two volumes, 1814).

==== 1803–06: Nadezhda and Neva ====

The first Russian circumnavigation of the world was intended to establish a link with Russian possessions in America, the transport of goods at that time being via Siberia (a journey lasting about two years). The second objective, which was not achieved, was to establish trade and diplomatic links with Japan. This expedition took place during the rule of emperor Alexander I (1777–1825).
Nadezhda and Neva explored the Aleutian Islands, Sakhalin and discovered the mouth of the Love River. They also visited the Marquesas Islands and Hawaii. Baron von Langsdorff left the expedition in 1805 to explore the Interior of Alaska and California. Thirteen cases of natural history specimens were shipped to the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.

Captains: Adam Johann von Krusenstern (1770–1846) (Nadezhda) and Yuri Fyodorovich Lisianski (Neva)
Naturalist: Georg Heinrich von Langsdorff (1774–1852)
Physician-naturalist: Wilhelm Gottlieb Tilesius von Tilenau (1769–1857)
Publication: G. H. von Langsdorff, Bemerkungen auf einer Reise um die Welt in den Jahren 1803 bis 1807, von G. h. von Langsdorff, ... (Frankfurt am Main, two volumes, 1812).

==== 1815–18: Rurik ====
A Russian expedition funded by the Chancellor of Russia, count Nikolai P. Romanzof to investigate the Northeast Passage in the Bering Sea. The coast of Alaska was studied and the South Pacific, also the cartography of 36 islands including the Marshall Islands. Also natural history collections made.

Captain: Otto von Kotzebue (1787–1846)
Naturalist: Adelbert von Chamisso (1781–1838)
Physician-naturalist: Johann Friedrich von Eschscholtz (1793–1831)
Publication: J.F. Eschscholtz, Entdeckungs – Reise in die Süd – See und nach der Berings – Strasse zur Erforschung einer nordöstlichen Durchfahrt, unternommen in den Jahren 1815, 1816, 1817 1818 und, auf Kosten… a… Grafen Rumanzoff, auf dem Schiffe ″Rurick″, unter dem Befehle of the Lieutenants… Otto von Kotzebue… (three volumes, Weimer, 1821).

==== 1817–20: L'Uranie and La Physicienne ====

A French expedition exploring Western Australia and islands of Timor, Molucca, Samoa and Hawaii. L'Uranie visited Rio de Janeiro to take a series of pendulum measurements as well as other observations, not only in geography and ethnology, but in astronomy, terrestrial magnetism, and meteorology, and for the collection of specimens in natural history.

Commander: Commander Louis Claude de Saulces Freycinet (1779–1842)
Second: Louis Isidore Duperrey (1786–1865)
Physician-naturalist: Joseph Paul Gaimard (1796–1858) and Jean René Constant Quoy (1790–1869)
Botanist: Charles Gaudichaud-Beaupré (1789–1854)
Illustrator: Jacques Arago (1790–1855), Adrien Taunay the Younger (1803–1828)
Publication: de Freycinet, L. Voyage autour du Monde...exécuté sur les corvettes de L. M. "L'Uranie" et "La Physicienne," pendant les années 1817, 1818, 1819 et 1820. Paris. pp. 192–401. J. Arago, Drive around the world during the years 1817, 1818, 1819 and 1820, on the corvettes of the King the Urania and physicist, commissioned by Mr. Freycinet, by Js. Arago, designer of the expedition (Paris, 2 volumes, 1822).

==== 1819–21: Le Rhône and La Durance ====
One of the missions of this expedition was to take plants from Java and the Philippines to French Guiana. The botanist Samuel Perrottet (1793–1870) settled in Guyana to investigate the acclimatisation of plants transplanted from Asia. La Durance returned to France in 1820, Le Rhône the following year.

Captain: Pierre Henri Philibert (1774–?)
Botanist: George Samuel Perrottet (1793–1870)

==== 1822–25: La Coquille ====
Louis Isidore Duperrey commanded the expedition in La Coquille with Jules Dumont d'Urville as second in command.  The naturalists appointed to the expedition were the surgeon, pharmacist and zoologist René Primevère Lesson and surgeon-major Prosper Garnot. Doctor Garnot had a severe attack of dysentery and was sent back on the Castle Forbes with some of the specimens collected in South America and the Pacific. The specimens were lost when the ship was wrecked off the Cape of Good Hope in July 1824. Garnot and Lesson wrote the zoological section of the voyage's report.