Marion Bay, Forestier Peninsula, Tasmania
In 1766 the British navy sent two ships under Wallis and Carteret to the south Pacific in search of the fabled southern continent, and the French despatched Chevalier Louis de Bougainville with the same intention just three months later. While the French and the British found many islands in the Pacific, including Tahiti and Pitcairn, neither found the southern continent. The closest Bougainville came to Terra Australis was when he encountered the Great Barrier Reef adjacent to present-day Cooktown in far north Queensland. On his return home in 1769 Bougainville published an account entitled A Voyage Round The World, that increased French interest in the Pacific.
In 1771, two expeditions left Ile de France (Mauritius) for the Indian Ocean in search of Gonneville's Land. One, led by Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, sailed to Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) and as far as New Zealand, alerting France to their worth though as the names suggest, both had been earlier discovered by the Dutch, in this case by Abel Tasman. The other, a two-ship expedition was led by Y.J. de Kerguelen and it included as second in command, Francois Alesne de St Allouarn. The ships separated and Kerguelen, upon discovering what he thought to be Gonneville's Land, hurried home to announce the discovery of what he called France Australe.
Later, it proved to be a barren island that now bears his name. In the meantime St Alouarn in Le Gros Ventre continued the search for Gonneville's Land. Unsuccessful, he then made for the coast of New Holland, and in landing on Dirk Hartog Island at Dampier's Shark Bay, Saint Alouarn annexed the coast for France in March 1772.
Marc-Joseph Du Fresne sailed from France on the Mascurin in 1771 with the intention of returning Ahu-toru, the Tahitian whom Bougainville had taken to France in 1769. However during Ahu-toru's stay on Mauritius he contracted smallpox and died three weeks out to sea. du Fresne decided to return to the Cape of Good Hope for provisions and then continue on search of the Great Southern Land with his ship the Mascurin and the warship Marquis de Castries.
Two Mile Beach, North Bay, Forestier Peninsula, Tasmania
On 22 January, 1772 Du Fresne discovered the Arid Islands, later to be renamed the Crozet Islands, after du Fresne's second-in-command, Julien Crozet, and on 3 March he sighted Van Diemen's Land. In need of fresh water and timber to remast the Marquis de Castries, Marion Dufresne set a course for Van Diemen's Land. On 3 March 1772 his sailors sighted the coast, near High Rocky Point. Rounding the island's most southerly point on 5 March the Marquis de Castries and Mascarin anchored off Cape Frederick Hendrick - in waters now called Blackman Bay and North Bay on the ocean side of the peninsula to the east of Marion Bay - close to where Abel Tasman had anchored 130 years before. A crew member went ashore on Two Mile Beach, North Bay, and claimed Van Diemen's Land for France. Dufresne led a party ashore in two boats two days later.
They were the first French explorers to reach any part of Australia and apparently the first Europeans to encounter the Aborigines of Van Diemen's Land. Initially relations were cordial. When a third boat approached, however, a shower of stones was thrown and Marion Dufresne ordered a retreat. Following another hail of hatchets and stones, which wounded him and several of his party, he ordered a volley of shots to frighten off the attackers. He then sought another landing place but was again showered with missiles. One of his crew being speared in the leg, Marion Dufresne gave the order to fire and give chase. This time at least one Aborigine was killed. Marion recorded that one sailor found numbers of crayfish, lobsters and huge crabs,and the oysters there are good and abundant.
The act of possession took place on 5 March 1772, just 14 days before fellow Frenchman St Allouarn took possession of a part of mainland Australia whilst at Shark Bay on the Western Australian coast. Marion du Fresne's party were the first Frenchmen to make contact with the Tasmanian Aborigines and the first Europeans to set foot there since Abel Tasman in 1742. On 3rd December 1642, a carpenter on Hartog's expedition, Peter Jacobsen, had volunteered to swim ashore with a pole on which was the Prince's flag, which he planted on the shore of the bay. Thus Tasman took possession of the island for the Dutch not far from where Du Fresne would take possession of Tasmania for France 129 years later.
Marion's expedition stayed for 6 days searching for water and timber for masts before sailing on to New Zealand. There they anchored his ships, Marquis de Castries and Mascarin, in the Bay of Islands from May to July 1772. Relations with Maori deteriorated and Marion du Fresne and others of his company were killed. The survivors retreated to Mauritius. They never returned to Australian waters.
Marion Bay 17.2.1802, Freycinet. Named after Capt. Marion Du Fresne by Louis de Freycinet.
Cape Paul Lamanon Named by either Marion Du Fresne or Louis de Freycinet after Chevalier Paul Lamanon, a naturalist and philosopher on Marion Du Fresne's expedition's team. Lamanon would later sail from Brest, in August, 1785, with French explorer la Perouse in the frigates Boussole and Astrolabe. Lamanon would have been present at Botany Bay near Sydney in late January 1788 when the First Fleet, sent by the British government to establish the penal colony of New South Wales, arrived during the French expedition's sojourn there. The expedition left Botany Bay a few weeks later, never to be heard of again. A monument on Cape Paul Lamanon marks the spot where Peter Jacobsen came ashore in 1642.
Louis de Freycinet was part of Bruni D'Entrecasteaux's mission in sailing the shores of Australia in 1792 was to find out what had happened to la Perouse who had disappeared without trace after leaving Botany Bay in 1788.
