Gamelin, Jacques Felix Emmanuel

Jacques Felix Emmanuel Gamelin was born on October 13, 1768 in Honfleur ( Calvados ). In 1785 he entered the Royal Navy as a volunteer, sailed off the western coast of Africa .

In 1792, Gamelin, as the helmsman, took part in the campaigns of the French fleet in the Mediterranean Sea and fought against Nice and Cagliari .

In August 1794, Gamelin passed the officer exam and, in the same year, as a member of the squadron of Admiral Villard de Zhuayeza , participated in many of her battles with the British and Dutch. When boarding the English battleship “Bervick” on March 7, 1795, Gamelin was wounded. In contrast to the capture of the English ship "Cenceur" and the defeat of a merchant convoy of thirty ships, on October 7, 1795, Gamelin was promoted to lieutenant of the fleet.

Made on November 21, 1796, Captain 2nd Rank, Gamelin was appointed commander of the frigate "La Revolution" and participated in the Irish Expedition of 1797, and in 1800 he joined the expedition of Captain 1st Rank Boden to explore South Australia . During the expedition, Bodin died, and Gamelin took his place.

Returning to France in 1803, Gamelin was promoted to 1st rank captain in September. The success of the expedition drew the attention of Napoleon, who soon appointed Gamelin as the head of the gunboat detachment of the Bois de Boulogne .

The war with Austria that broke out in 1805 upset the plan of attack on England, and Gamelin was appointed commander of the newly built in Le Havre frigate "Venus", with whom he secretly went to the island of St. Mauritius in the East Indian Waters, where he engaged in privateer operations and soon became a thunderstorm of the English commercial fleet. In the battle of Grand Port (in 1810), commanding a detachment of three frigates and a brig, Gamelin captured the English frigate "Iphigenia". A month later, Gamelin, in his frigate, attacked the English 40-gun frigate “Ceylon” near Port Napoleon and, after a short battle, captured it, but the same day, attacked by three enemy ships, was forced to retreat.

Upon returning to France in February 1811, Jacques Felix Emmanuel Gamelin was promoted to rear admiral , granted the title of baron and the Order of the Legion of Honor , then was appointed commander of the Scheldt estuary squadron. During the war, the Sixth Coalition defended the coast of Belgium and France against the British.

Having received the Brest squadron in 1814, Gamelin remained in service even after the accession of Louis XVIII and was soon appointed chief of staff under the commander of the Toulon squadron. At the beginning of 1823 he was granted the title of Great Commander of the Legion of Honor.

During the Spanish expedition of the French in 1823, Gamelin commanded one of the squadrons near Cadiz , but his upset health prevented him from taking an active part in the war.

The last years of his life, he held administrative posts in the Ministry of the Sea, in particular, was the head of the service of marine cartographers.

Jacques Felix Emmanuel Gamelin died in the city of Paris on April 23, 1839. Subsequently, his name was embossed on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris .

His nephew Ferdinand Alfons Gamelin was also an admiral of the French fleet and under Napoleon III he served as naval minister.

• Gamelin, Jean-Felix-Emmanuel, Baron // Military Encyclopedia : [18 vol.] / Ed. V.F. Novitsky [et al.]. - SPb. ; [ M. ]: Type. t-va I. D. Sytin , 1911-1915.
• Charles Mullié . Biographie des célébrités militaires des armées de terre et de mer de 1789 à 1850, 1852. - Vol. 2.