France. Marine

Jean-Baptiste-Charles-Henri-Hector d'Estaing was born in Ravel, France, on November 24, 1729, the son of Charles-François d'Estaing, the Marquis de Salliant, and Marie-Henriette Colbert de Maulevrier. He served as a military officer during the War of Austrian Succession and the Seven Years' War. He spent most of the latter conflict in India, where he was promoted to lieutenant general in 1762, and was governor of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) from 1764-1766. D'Estaing was promoted to vice admiral in 1777 and commanded the first French military expedition to aid the rebelling North American colonists in 1779. After spending time along the coast of New England and in the Caribbean in 1778 and 1779, the fleet sailed to Georgia, where d'Estaing helped lead an unsuccessful attack on Savannah. Following the defeat in Georgia, he returned to France, where he took part in the siege of Gibraltar and held various military positions before his promotion to admiral in 1792. Despite his sympathy toward the French revolutionary cause, d'Estaing remained loyal to the aristocracy and was executed on April 28, 1794. He and his wife, Marie-Sophie Rousselot, had one child.

From the guide to the Charles Henri, comte d'Estaing signal book, Estaing, Charles Henri, comte d' signal book, ca. 1780, (William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan)

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