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11th November, 1729 was born Louis Antoine comte de Bougainville

Louis Antoine comte de BougainvilleLouis Antoine was born to a notary public, a member of the Paris city council. He studied at University College, and showed a great aptitude for mathematics. In 1754 published a treatise on the calculation of integrals that got some fame. 

Soon he becomes a lawyer, but quickly abandons that career to become a soldier. Bougainvillea comes in black Musketeers squad, becoming adjutant of General Montcalm de Saint-Veran and takes part in the expedition to Canada in 1756. 

In 1759 he received the rank of Colonel Bougainville. In 1763 Louis Antoine left the army and went to the fleet in the rank of captain of the first rank. On two ships, the "Eagle" and "Sphinx", Bougainville comes to the Malvinas Islands in the South Atlantic and organizes a colony. Three years later, on the orders of King Louis XV, the island passed to the Spaniards. Soon these islands passed to English and were renamed in the Falkland Islands.

In 1766 Bougainville takes a world tour. The ships la Boudeuse and l'Étoile sailed from Brest. After passing the Strait of Magellan, Bougainville goes to the southern seas. In April 1768 he arrives in Tahiti, then visited Samoa and Hebrides Islands, New Brittany (now the Bismarck Islands), New Guinea and Mauritius. Having passed the Cape of Good Hope, after two and a half years, he returned to Saint-Malo. 

Bougainville was arrested during the Terror, and released after the fall of Robespierre. Napoleon in 1799 made him a senator, and in 1804 he was awarded the title of Commander of the Legion of Honor, and in 1808 - Count of the Empire. 

In honor of Louis Antoine de Bougainville named: 

  • Bougainvillea (Bougainvillea COMM. EX JUSS.) - South American genus of flowering plants; 
  • Island of Bougainville in the Solomon Islands archipelago, consisting of (administratively a part of the State of Papua New Guinea). 
  • Bougainville Strait, which separates the island of Choiseul island of Bougainville.
This Day in History 11-11-2014