FRENCH EXPEDITION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23690, 23 December 1938, Page 10

FRENCH EXPEDITION

AN ILL-STARRED VENTURE MARRIED COUPLES QUARREL (United Press Association) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) PARIS, Dec. 22. (Received Dec. 22, at 11 a.m.) It has been learned that the He de Bourbon was not short of food, but was in a plight as the result of a shortage of other supplies. A further wireless message from the trawler states that the women and children landed on an unnamed Indian Ocean island.

M. Horn de Boar apparently sold out his interests in the expedition at Reunion Island before proceeding to St. Paul, because quarrels among the married couples convinced him that it would be impossible to live amicably on St. Paul.

The He de Bourbon left Brittany in May carrying 48 members of an expedition to establish a lobster fishery and form a French colony at St. Paul. An S.O.S. reported that the vessel’s coal had run out and as a result of bad weather her position was critical. The expedition was under the command of M. Horn de Boar. Dissension among members of the expedition was serious. Each of five married couples, among whom there are two babies, were living in separate quarters. The expedition had intended to spend three years at the island. St. Paul acquired ill-repute as the result of the failure of an expedition in 1929, the members of which died from disease.