1853 manuscript

New Caledonia in 1853 manuscript

A manuscript account of New Caledonia written seven years be fore the French took possession of the territory in 1853 was among the documents bought by the Library of the University of Hawaii at the sale in Paris re cently of manuscripts and other valuable Pacific items owned by Father Patrick O’Reilly More than a third of the 201 items auctioned at the sale were acquired by the four member libraries of the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau, The manuscript account of New Caledonia in 1846 was one of 12 items bought by the University of Hawaii Library. It is a document of 80 pages written by Francois Leconte, commandant of the French naval station in the Pacific and captain of the frigate Seine.

The Seine, with a crew of 200 men, was wrecked on a reef on the east coast of New Caledonia on July 3, 1846. While awaiting rescue, Leconte took the opportunity to ex plore the countryside and to in terrogate the Marist missionaries who were his hosts. The result was a valuable account of the ceremonies, social life, wars, burials, fishing methods, pottery, etc., of New Cale donia at that time.

Although Leconte’s manuscript was published in Brest in 1851 in the author’s Memoires pittoresques d'un officier de marine, copies of that book are now exceedingly scarce as a large stock of them was destroyed by fire.

No copies are known to exist in Aus tralia.