MAURITIUS ISLAND DISCOVERY
History
The French Period ( 1715 – 1810 )
Abandoned by the Dutch , the island became a French colony when , in September 1715 , Guillaume Dufresne d ’ Arsel landed and took possession of this precious home port located on the route to India . He named the island « Isle de France », but French occupation only started in 1721 . A few years later , in 1735 , with the arrival of the most illustrious of the French governors , Mahé de La Bourdonnais , Isle de France began to develop effectively .
Mahé de La Bourdonnais made Port Louis a naval base and a ship-building centre . Under his governorship , many buildings were built , many of which are still here today , such as part of Government House , the Château de Mon Plaisir in Pamplemousses , the Line Barracks in Port Louis . The island was under the administration of the French East India Company until 1767 . From then on , and until 1810 , the administration of the island was entrusted to officials appointed by the French government , with the exception of the brief French Revolution period , during which the inhabitants of the island set up a governing body that was virtually independent of France .
During the Napoleonic wars , Isle de France became a base from which French corsairs organised successive raids on British merchant ships . These attacks continued until 1810 , when a large English expedition was sent to take possession of the island . A first attack was thwarted by the French at Grand Port , in August 1810 . But the main attack , launched in December of the same year from Rodrigues Island , ( captured a year earlier by the British ) was successful . Indeed , the English landed in large numbers in the North of Mauritius and quickly overthrew the French , who surrendered . In accordance with the Treaty of Paris of 1814 , Isle de France , which took back its initial name of « Mauritius », was definitively ceded to Great Britain , along with its dependent territories , which then included Rodrigues Island and the Seychelles . In the Act of French capitulation , signed by both parties , the British guaranteed that they would respect the French language , customs , laws and traditions of the inhabitants of Mauritius .
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