In September 1791, the French Assembly decided to send an expedition in search of
Jean-François de La Pérouse, who had not been heard of since leaving
Botany Bay in March 1788. Bruni d'Entrecasteaux was selected to command this expedition. He was given a frigate, (500 tons), with Lieutenant Jean-Louis d'Hesmity-d'Auribeau as his second-in-command and
Élisabeth Rossel among the other officers. A similar ship, , was placed under
Jean-Michel Huon de Kermadec, Although Peyroux's proposal fell on deaf ears at the time, it may have influenced d'Entrecasteaux's choice of the location to investigate. An inset map of Frederick Henry Bay, the place recommended by Peyroux for a settlement, was included in the map of Van Diemens Land prepared by C. F. Beautemps-Beaupré, the hydrographer with the d'Entrecasteaux expedition. On 28 February d'Entrecasteaux sailed from Van Diemen's Land towards
Tonga, sighting
New Zealand and the
Kermadec Islands en route. At Tonga, he found that the local people remembered
Cook and
Bligh well enough, but knew nothing of La Pérouse. He then sailed back to New Caledonia, where he anchored at Balade. The vain search for La Pérouse then resumed with
Santa Cruz, then along the southern coasts of the Solomon Islands, the northern parts of the
Louisiade Archipelago, through the
Dampier Strait, along the northern coast of
New Britain and the southern coast of the Admiralty Islands, and thence north of
New Guinea to the Moluccas. By this time, the affairs of the expedition had become almost desperate, largely because the officers were ardent royalists and the crews equally ardent revolutionaries. Kermadec had died of
tuberculosis in Balade harbour, and on 21 July 1793, d'Entrecasteaux himself died of
scurvy, off the
Hermit Islands, part of the
Bismarck Archipelago in
Papua New Guinea. Commands were re-arranged, with Auribeau taking charge of the expedition, with Rossel in Kermadec's place. The new chief took the ships to
Surabaya in east
Java. Here it was learned that a republic had been proclaimed in France, and on 18 February 1794 Auribeau handed his vessels to the Dutch authorities so that the new French Government could not profit by them. Auribeau died a month later and Rossel sailed from Java in January 1795 on board a Dutch ship, arriving at
Table Bay in April 1795. There his ship sailed unexpectedly with the expedition's papers, leaving him behind, but this vessel was captured by the British. Rossel then took passage on a brig-of-war, but this too was captured by the British. After the
Peace of Amiens in 1802, all the papers of the expedition were returned to Rossel, who was thus enabled to publish a narrative of the whole enterprise. ==Australian places named after him==