The support France was ready to give Irish republicans in 1796 was founded more out of self-interest in dealing what would have been a devastating blow to the British rather than particular support for the Irish desire to break free of British rule. There had been a modest attempt to invade Ireland in 1759, during the Seven Years War, but it had failed because of poor weather and had led to the capture of the French landing party. This was hardly an encouraging omen for the success of a similar endeavour thirty-seven years later and, indeed, it was again the intervention of nature which brought about the abject failure of this mission.

Nonetheless, for France, which had been intermittently at war with Great Britain throughout the eighteenth century, supporting a popular rising in Ireland against British rule appeared to become a realistic possibility with the formation of a determined pro-republican movement, whose leaders included some members of the Protestant Ascendancy. The most notable of the latter was Lord Edward Fitzgerald (1763-1798), a younger son of one of Ireland’s largest landowners, the duke of Leinster and a brilliant young lawyer of French Huguenot descent, Theobald Wolfe Tone, known as Wolfe Tone (1763-1798).

The French Revolution had inspired Tone to declare himself a “Democrat” and in his memoirs he displays strong support for a popular government and hostility to the aristocracy, although he was sufficiently pragmatic to accept the latter’s support when offered. After the failure of the Society of United Irishmen, who included both “dissenters” like Tone, and some Catholics, to negotiate with the government in Westminster, a more radical approach seemed to give the only chance of success. Despairing of achieving a material change through peaceful means, Tone decided on a new course of action and, in the summer of 1795, he and his young family left Ireland for America, buying a farm near Princeton to ensure his family a safe and stable future. The United States capital then being Philadelphia, he met there several times with the French minister, Pierre Adet (1763-1834), putting forward the case for French support for the Irish republicans whom, he assured Adet, would be forever a grateful ally of the French republic. This proposal met with some support and Adet advised Tone to intercede directly with the French government in Paris, giving him a letter in cypher for him to deliver, attesting to his qualifications and endorsing his proposal.

Once the family was established, Tone sailed for France, on 1 January 1796, a journey that took thirty-one days to Le Havre, and following a few days rest, on to Paris. Once in the capital he met, as soon as he was able to obtain an audience, with the American minister plenipotentiary, the future president, James Monroe, and, a few days later, with the French minister of foreign affairs, Charles Delacroix (father of the artist Eugène Delacroix) to whom he delivered Adet’s letter. The next day he returned to the ministry, where M. Delacroix informed him that the letter had been well-received and he was sent to meet Nicolas Madget, the chief translator to the ministry of foreign affairs. Tone argued that if an army of 20,000 men could be landed there would soon be another 300,000 Irish coming to join it; such was the response he was first met with that there was even a proposal the future Irish republic should name Tone as minister plenipotentiary to France. This was declined by Tone, although he admitted to being flattered by the suggestion, affirming that he would be proud to accept such a post should their ambition for revolution prove successful.

To his dismay, the initial enthusiasm was not followed by the generosity he had hoped for; he was offered instead just 2,000 troops and arms for 20,000, to be distributed to the rebels upon landing in Ireland. The navy, it was pointed out, had been decimated by the depredations wrought upon it during the revolution, as many of the officers had emigrated or been sent to the guillotine, while there had been little investment in new ships or maintenance of the existing fleet. Tone attempted bargaining, saying that 5000 men was the bare minimum needed to achieve a successful outcome and such a reduced number would have to land in the north of the country, near Belfast, rather than attack the capital. The French responded that they would add Irish prisoners of war, who would thereby gain their freedom in return for committing to the expedition, after testing their support for the republican cause. Delacroix pointed out that 5000 men would need at least twenty ships to carry them and to equip and prepare such a number would immediately draw the attention of the British navy, which controlled the channel. There was also some ambivalence over whether the government would consent to Generals Pichegru or Jourdan, the names first put forward, being given command of the invasion force.

Monroe now advised him to take a different tack and go straight to the “comité executif”, and speak with the regicide and former army officer, Lazare Carnot, one of the five members of the directory, who spoke English – Tone’s lack of fluent French had been a handicap. Carnot asked him to put the details of his request in writing; his first draft initially received a positive response from the members of the Directory, all of whom he met the next day, but frustrating negotiations with Delacroix continued for weeks, with no change in the French position. Carnot suggested that General Clarke (whose Irish father had emigrated to France) might be a suitable leader of the French forces, but Tone was initially unimpressed and considered his knowledge of Ireland far out of date. Nonetheless he was the appointed official with whom Tone had to negotiate over the next few weeks, then months, through April into May, and finally in June, when the plans seemed to be agreed. Tone was particularly pleased to have been promised a commission in the French army as a colonel of dragoons, assuring him a salary that would relieve his desperate financial position after five months of living in Paris from his own meagre resources. When he finally received his commission on 19 June it was with the rank of chef de brigade, in the regular army, which was the equivalent of colonel with the same salary.

Meanwhile Fitzgerald and Arthur O’Connor (1763-1852) had met with General Lazare Hoche, who had recently defeated a royalist invasion supported by the British, and had been put in command of the army which would brutally suppress the anti-republican rising in the Vendée. Hoche and Tone soon got on well as the French commander was clearly ready to make this enterprise a success, immediately telling Tone he would press for not less than 10,000 troops and hopefully as many as 15,000. Nonetheless, Tone continued to be frustrated, particularly during his discussions with Clarke, who suggested that rather than a popular “democratic” republic, the Irish might establish an aristocratic republic, like that of Genoa or Venice, or even a monarchy with George III’s second son, the duke of York as king. This, Tone pointed out, would have no popular support, whereupon Clarke suggested the duke of Leinster, whose brother Edward was a fellow member of the United Irishmen. These discussions ended without a clear conclusion as to what kind of regime would replace British rule but it was made clear that Tone was expected to play a significant role. Meanwhile there were already rumours around Paris that Hoche was to lead an invasion of Ireland (a talkative Irish exile named Duckett being responsible), which news would certainly reach London through the network of British spies employed in France.

On 20 September 1796 Tone arrived in Rennes, the capital of Brittany, remaining there for the next few weeks while awaiting news from Brest as to the readiness of the expedition, which Hoche was pressing for despite the incompetence and corruption of those charged with preparing the ships for the invasion. When Tone and his companions (who included several French officers of Irish descent) did set out for Brest it took several days to traverse Brittany, arriving in the port on 1st November. The frustration of preparing for departure took another six weeks, until finally the ships one by one left Brest harbour, carrying an army of 13,975 men, representing something of a triumph for Tone, thanks to his negotiations with the directory and his ability to get the support of General Hoche.

Tone sailed on board the largest ships of the line, the Indomptable, with 80 guns initially accompanied by his now great friend Colonel Shee, an Irish officer long in the French service (although he transferred to a 36 gun frigate, the Fraternité), and General Cherin, with whom he had formed a fast friendship over the previous weeks, while noting his modest abilities in command. The fleet now had 17 ships of the line (the other sixteen having 74 guns each), 13 frigates, 7 corvettes and 6 transport ships. But disaster soon struck, largely thanks to incompetent seamanship, with the Seduisant (74 guns) being lost on the first day with over 500 men of the demi-brigade drowned. By the second day part of the fleet had been separated from the rest, one of them carrying their commander, General Hoche. As the remainder of the fleet approached Bantry Bay the weather worsened and the senior officer in command in the absence of Hoche, General Grouchy, started to express doubts as to whether to proceed, with poor Tone forced to conceal his fury at the possible failure of everything he had worked for.

Meanwhile, although many of the provisions for the trip had disappeared with the rest of the fleet, the weapons they brought were still substantial, although lacking sabres and pistols for the cavalry. There were, however, no horses for the cavalry and just as the decision was made to proceed with the landing despite there now being just 6500 men, the wind got up and made an approach impossible. In the end it was wind not money that made it impossible for anyone to land and for the ships to get close enough to enable discussions between the senior officers as to how to proceed. Having then spent six days anchored in Bantry Bay, unable to approach land, the wind was now followed by thick fog, leaving the remaining officers with no contact or knowledge of the whereabouts of any of the senior admirals, nor the commander of the fleet or General Hoche.

The wind then got up again, one of the leading ships of the line was dragging her anchor and signalled that she would be leaving. The army was now reduced to 4,168 men and a vast reduction in the armaments that were to have been landed for the use not only of their own army but the expected uprising among the native population. There was now no choice but to retreat, despite having not confronted a single British naval vessel, but only the intractable forces of nature. The remains of the fleet, now reduced to just four ships of the line, one frigate and one corvette, finally returned to Brest on 1 January 1797, exactly one year after Tone had set sail for France, from Sandy Hook, full of hopes which now seemed dashed forever.

Louis-Philippe Crépin was the most accomplished marine artist working in France in the Napoleonic and Restoration periods. Born in Paris in 1772 in the Tuileries palace, where his father was employed, he first studied with two of the most eminent painters of the day, Hubert Robert and Joseph Vernet. In the Salon livrets he admits only to having studied with Jean-Baptiste Regnault, perhaps because the better-known Robert and Vernet were too closely associated with the ancien régime. In any case it was to Vernet’s grand scale seascapes that he was more faithful, although concentrating on a more naturalist approach with close attention to anecdotal detail and topographical accuracy; it is hard to see any remnant of the influence of the neo-classical history painter Regnault. Whether it was thanks to Vernet or to the four years Crépin spent in Brest as a “réquisitionnaire et timonier”at this great port that gave France immediate access to the Atlantic, that encouraged the young artist to pursue marine subjects, he soon obtained public recognition with a “prix d’encouragement” at the 1801 Salon with Le Bayonnaise, corvette française, commandée par le citizen Edmonton Richter, prenant à l’abordage la frégate anglaise l’Embuscade, le 24 frimaire an 7. The two ships can be seen close together in a strong wind in this painting, commissioned by First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte for the Tuileries and now in the musée de la Marine; an even more powerful painting with the figures of French and British seamen in hand-to-hand combat was painted later.

Throughout the Napoleonic period Crépin contributed dramatic images of marine combat to successive Salons including paintings of the Emperor but he proved ready to adapt to the changes of regime in 1814, with a painting of Louis XVI visiting Cherbourg, and an oil sketch entitled Le retour des Bourbons at the same Salon. The remainder of his career saw him continue to exhibit at the Salon, both contemporary and historical marine battles and displays in French ports, and in 1831 a large painting of the Battle of Navarino (the key naval battle helping the Greeks achieve independence), and the army disembarking in Alge