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Oscar Spate

Oscar Spate’s many publications include the award-winning Paradise Lost and Found.

Oscar Spate reviews 'An Officer of the Blue: Marc-Joseph Marion Dufresne: South Sea Explorer, 1724–1772' by Edward Duyker

October 1994, no. 165 01 October 1994
The title of this book has a faint dash of Ouida, but actually it signifies not a dashing cavalry regiment but the officiers bleus of the French navy under the Ancien Regime, who were not of the nobility and so socially inferior to their aristocratic colleagues, though often (or usually) superior as seamen. Duyker has written a good businesslike account of a remarkable career. The book is very wel ... (read more)