Joseph Paul Gaimard

Joseph Paul Gaimard was a French naval surgeon, naturalist and explorer. Born at Saint-Zacharie on 31 January 1793, he studied medicine at the naval medical school in Toulon and qualified as a naval surgeon. With Jean René Constant Quoy he served as naturalist on the Uranie under Louis de Freycinet from 1817 to 1820 and on the Astrolabe under Jules Dumont d'Urville from 1826 to 1829. He also studied cholera in Europe and co-authored a report on the epidemic in Russia, Prussia and Austria in 1831 and 1832. He was scientific leader of the French expedition of La Recherche to Iceland and Greenland in 1835 and 1836, which also searched for the missing explorer Jules de Blosseville, and of the expedition to Lapland, Spitsbergen and the Faroe Islands from 1838 to 1840. The reports of these voyages ran to many volumes, and several animal and plant species were named in his honour. He died on 10 December 1858. His standing as a healer rests on his naval medical training and his cholera study, while much of his fame comes from natural history and exploration.