Guay-Trouin, Rene Du

, a French naval officer, born at St. Malo in 1673, was the son of a merchant who had been French consul at Malaga, and who commanded armed vessels, either for war or trade, as circumstances required. Young Du Guay, led by his example, went on board a privateer, and performed a number of heroic actions. In 1691, when he was only in his eighteenth year, he had the command of an armed sloop, carrying fourteen guns, with which he obtained much success on the coast of Ireland. Three years after he entered the river of Limerick, and carried off several vessels but falling in with four English ships, he was obliged to yield, and was taken a prisoner into Plymouth. In confinement he won the aifootions of a female, who enabled him to make his escape, and in a short time he appeared again on the coast of England, where he captured some prizes. In 1695 he took three |

rich vessels on the Irish coast, and two Dutch ships on th coast of Spain: these successes were followed by others still more important. In 1696 he fell in with baron de Wassenaer, who with three ships was escorting a fleet of merchant-men, and took the baron with a part of his convoy. He presented, in person, his prisoner to the king, and thereupon was removed to the royal navy, and appointed to the command of a frigate. In a few years afterwards he was made captain of a fifty-four gun ship, with which, it is said, he took an English man-of-war of seventytwo gnus. So brilliant was his career of success, that in 1709 he was rewarded with letters of noblesse, the preamble to which records his having captured more than 300 merchant ships, and 20 ships of war. The most important f all his exploits was the taking of Rio Janeiro in 1711, which occasioned a loss to the Portuguese of at least a million sterling. A pension was now forced on him, he having in 1707 refused one that was then offered, requesting that it might be granted to his second captain, whose thigh had been shot off. “I,” said the gallant officer, “am sufficiently rewarded, if I obtain the advancement of my friends. 7 ' In 1728 he was made commander of the order of St. Louis, and lieutenant-general, and in 1731 went at the head of a squadron to curb the insolence of Algiers and Tunis, and promote a good understanding between France and Tripoli. After many other important services, he died at Paris Sept. 27, 1736, leaving” Memoirs," partly written by his own hand, and partly by a nephew, which were printed in one vol. 4to. 1740. ¹