Nicholas Baudin
| Nicolas Baudin | |
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| Born | 17 February 1754 Saint-Martin-de-Ré, Île de Ré, France |
| Died | 16 September 1803 (aged 49) Mauritius |
| Nationality | French |
| Occupation | explorer, cartographer, naturalist, hydrographer |
Nicolas Thomas Baudin (17 February 1754 – 16 September 1803) was a French explorer, cartographer, naturalist and hydrographer.
Born a commoner in Saint-Martin-de-Ré on the Île de Ré, Baudin joined the merchant navy at the age of 15 and the French East India Company at the age of 20. He then joined the French navy and served in the Caribbean as an officier bleu during the American War of Independence of 1775-1783.
In 1785 Baudin was captain of Caroline, taking Acadian settlers from Nantes to La Nouvelle Orléans. In New Orleans local merchants contracted him to take a cargo of wood, salted meat, cod and flour to Isle de France (now Mauritius), which he did in Josephine (also called Pepita), departing New Orleans on 14 July 1786 and arriving at Isle de France on 27 March 1787. In the course of the voyage, Josephine had called at Cap‑Français in Haiti to make a contract to transport slaves there from Madagascar; while in Haiti he also encountered the Austrian botanist Franz Josef Maerter, who apparently informed him that another Austrian botanist, Franz Boos, was at the Cape of Good Hope awaiting a ship to take him to Mauritius. Josephine called at the Cape and took Boos on board. At Mauritius, Boos chartered Baudin to transport him and the collection of plant specimens he had gathered there and at the Cape back to Europe, which Baudin did, Josephine arriving at Trieste on 18 June 1788. The Imperial government in Vienna was contemplating organizing another natural-history expedition, to which Boos would be appointed, in which two ships would be sent to the Malabar and Coromandel coasts of India, the Persian Gulf, Bengal, Ceylon, Sumatra, Java, Borneo, Cochin China, Tongking, Japan and China. Baudin had been given reason to hope that he would be given command of the ships of this expedition.
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