François Bigot

François Bigot (French pronunciation: ​[fʁɑ̃swa biɡo]; born Bordeaux, 30 January 1703; died Neuchâtel, Switzerland, 12 January 1778) was a French government official. He served as the Financial Commissary on Île Royale (nowadays Cape Breton Island) and as Intendant of New France. He was the last official ever to hold the latter position, losing it on the occasion of the conquest of 1760. He was subsequently accused of corruption and put on trial in France, and upon conviction was thrown into the Bastille for eleven months. Upon his release, Bigot was further sentenced to lifelong banishment. However, shortly after the judgement was made, Bigot escaped to Switzerland where he would live until his dying day.

Bigot was born at Bordeaux into a family that had attained nobility. He was the son of Louis-Amable Bigot (1663-1743), Conseilleur du Roi, Counsellor to the Parliament at Bordeaux and Receiver General to the King; by his wife, Marguerite de Lombard (1682-1766), daughter of Joseph de Lombard, Baron du Cubzagués, Commissioner of the Marine at Guyenne and a representative of an old and powerful Guyenne family. His paternal grandfather had become rich from his commercial activities; his father had a successful legal career and held several important government positions. Bigot was to receive, as would befit a gentleman's son, “a good education which included legal studies.” Nothing is known for certain of Bigot’s education, but historians believed he took a few courses in law at the Faculté de Droit in Bordeaux.

In 1723, at the age of twenty, when legal studies were normally completed, he used his influence within the French Royal Court to join "the commissary of the marine" as a chief scrivener. He served as a scrivener until 1728, when he was made a commissary. He became chief scrivener in 1729, and resident commissary of the Navy at Rochefort in 1732, at the age of 29. Rochefort was a port that saw many fleets kitted out and made ready for their voyages to the New World. This would be the last post that Bigot would hold in France for some time.

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