Pre-war Auboyneau was born in Constantinople, where his father was director of the
Ottoman Bank. He entered the
École navale in 1917 at age 17. From March to November 1918 he took part in patrols along the
English Channel as an ensign on board the
torpedo boat Typhon. He then served in the Middle East and the Far East for ten years, commanding the hydrographic vessel
Alidade, then the gunboat
Doudart de Lagrée on the Yangtze. After some time in France in the Naval Ministry, he entered the École de guerre navale, leaving it as deputy chief of staff for France's Atlantic torpedo-boat fleet. As a captain, he was then made deputy chief of staff to France's Far East naval forces at
Saigon, where he found himself on the declaration of war in 1939. He was then charged with several liaison missions to the
Royal Navy.
Second World War At the time of the
Armistice, he was a liaison officer on board
HMS Warspite and played an important role in the delicate negotiations between Admiral
Andrew Cunningham and Admiral
René-Émile Godfroy for the fate of the
Force X, becoming the main architect of compromise signed between the two admirals, which decided on the status of the French squadron in Alexandria. He then traveled to London to join the forces of
Free France, arriving on 20 July 1940. in London.|left He was sent to command the , which he re-armed. After several missions in the Atlantic, he was promoted to
capitaine de vaisseau and made commander of Free France's naval forces in the Pacific, with his flag on
Triomphant. He was in Australia at the time of Japan's entry into the war and took part in several operations in the South Pacific with the Australian fleet, most notably a raid near a Japanese naval base to evacuate the garrisons of the
Nauru Island and
Ocean Island. Returning to London in April 1942, he was made commander of all Free France's naval forces and national commissioner for the navy. He inspected French naval units in Equatorial Africa, the Levant,
Madagascar and
Djibouti. At the start of the campaign in North Africa, he was made chief of the naval staff, then major general within General
Henri Giraud's supreme civil and military command. This made him one of the main architects of the merger of Free France's naval forces and Vichy France's North African fleet. He then left that role to command the 3rd Cruiser Division, heading it for
Operation Dragoon in August 1944. In 1945, he became a vice admiral and was put in command of France's naval forces in the Far East, where he transported and supported General
Leclerc's troops in South
Annam and led the landings at
Tonkin.
Post-war He was a member of the superior counsel for national defence and a member of the superior counsel for the Navy. He was then made inspector general of naval forces and naval aviation. From 1952 to 1955, he commanded France's naval forces in the Far East and from 1955 to 1960 its naval forces in
Algeria. Auboyneau's chauffeur Vincent Fusco saved him from an assassination attempt on rue Dupuch in Algiers in 1957. Auboyneau was one of those who on 13 May 1958 led to
Charles de Gaulle's return during the
May 1958 crisis. In 1960, he joined the Conseil d’État as an extraordinary counsellor. He died in Paris in 1961 and his funeral took place in the
Église Saint-Louis-des-Invalides, with de Gaulle presiding. He was buried at
Marly-le-Roi. ==References==