In 1766 Bougainville received from Louis XV permission to circumnavigate the globe.
He would become the 14th navigator, and the first Frenchman, to sail around the world.
Completion of his mission bolstered the prestige of France following its defeats during the Seven Years' War.
This was the first expedition to circumnavigate the globe with professional naturalists and geographers aboard.

Bougainville left Nantes on 15 November 1766 with two ships: Boudeuse (captain : Nicolas Pierre Duclos-Guyot) and the Étoile (commanded by François Chenard de la Giraudais).
This was a large expedition, with a crew of 214 aboard Boudeuse and 116 aboard Étoile.

Included in the party was the botanist Philibert Commerçon (who named the flower Bougainvillea) and his valet.
The ship's surgeon later revealed this person as Jeanne Baré, possibly Commerçon's mistress; she would become the first woman known to circumnavigate the globe.
Other notable people on this expedition were Count Jean-François de Galaup de la Pérouse (member of the crew); the astronomer Pierre-Antoine Veron; the surgeon of Boudeuse Dr. Louis-Claude Laporte; the surgeon of the Étoile Dr. François Vives; the engineer and cartographer aboard the Étoile Charles Routier de Romainville; and the writer and historian Louis-Antoine Starot de Saint-Germain.
In 1766 Bougainville received from Louis XV permission to circumnavigate the globe. He would become the 14th navigator, and the first Frenchman, to sail around the world. Completion of his mission bolstered the prestige of France following its defeats during the Seven Years' War. This was the first expedition to circumnavigate the globe with professional naturalists and geographers aboard.
Bougainville left Nantes on 15 November 1766 with two ships: Boudeuse (captain : Nicolas Pierre Duclos-Guyot) and the Étoile (commanded by François Chenard de la Giraudais). This was a large expedition, with a crew of 214 aboard Boudeuse and 116 aboard Étoile.
Included in the party was the botanist Philibert Commerçon (who named the flower Bougainvillea) and his valet. The ship's surgeon later revealed this person as Jeanne Baré, possibly Commerçon's mistress; she would become the first woman known to circumnavigate the globe. Other notable people on this expedition were Count Jean-François de Galaup de la Pérouse (member of the crew); the astronomer Pierre-Antoine Veron; the surgeon of Boudeuse Dr. Louis-Claude Laporte; the surgeon of the Étoile Dr. François Vives; the engineer and cartographer aboard the Étoile Charles Routier de Romainville; and the writer and historian Louis-Antoine Starot de Saint-Germain.
Louis Antoine de Bougainville