The French Southern and Antarctic Lands, or TAAF, allow France to be the second maritime power in the world after the United States. Today, they constitute a huge nature reserve protecting an extraordinary diversity of bird and marine mammal species.
The exploitation of the French southern lands in the nineteenth century
However, there was a time when France wanted to colonize and exploit these desolate lands. There was whaling and elephant seal hunting for oil. The hunting of sea lions on Amsterdam Island also decimated most of this mammal colony.
The attempts to colonize the islands
Alongside these well-established activities, Daniel Floch also evokes the shepherds who were sent to Kerguelen to settle there and compete with the magnificent sheep farms of Australia, New Zealand, Africa and South America. Some died on the spot with their sheep, the others were repatriated in extremis, sounding the death knell of this unsuccessful attempt.
The history of Saint Paul Island
In Saint-Paul, a lobster factory was created from scratch in the middle of the Indian Ocean, a small miracle of the industrial revolution. Daniel Floch's story brings back to life for the readers these tough Breton sailors who left for the other side of the world in more than precarious conditions, with the promise of a better future, good pay and adventure too.
"This island Saint-Paul, the cursed one of the austral lands, I liked to populate it, during my gray hours of watch, with multicolored birds. It was said to be arid and I enriched it with palms and I lent it large golden fruits. I knew it was abandoned, deserted, but I cherished the hope of discovering there, in the cool of a clearing, some forgotten wild woman, a girl from paradise, dressed in flowers and speaking the language of the springs" wrote Roparz Broudic.
However, all they got was oblivion, disease, death and desolation.
A story to keep in memory these "Forgotten"
This book allows us to keep track of these men and women, who are part of the little known history of maritime France. The history of these distant lands that have excited envy with promises of wealth.
Today, these lands preserve the traces of these passages. Scientists and archaeologists criss-cross the shores and bear witness to the living conditions that the unfortunate people stranded there, voluntarily or not, have experienced.
The forgotten ones of Saint-Paul Island, Crozet and Kerguelen
- Daniel Floch
- Editions Maritimes & d'Outre-Mer, Sea stories
- 250 pages
- size 10,7 x 17,6 cm
