52 Ancestors - Week 20 - Another Language - Augustin Bullot

All of my direct ancestors were English speaking, born in England, the South West of Scotland or the northern part of Ireland. Of those who were early settlers to New Zealand, some spoke Maori. I know my 3x great grandfather Ben Lovell found this very challenging, though my 2x great grandfather, Alexander McMinn, was fluent enough to act as an interpreter on occasions. Perhaps this was because Alexander was university-educated, reputed to speak eight languages, so adding another might not have been too difficult.

My most linguistically interesting "ancestor" started off life as a French speaker, must have charmed the ladies with his accented English and ended up dying in Naples, so he would have been a speaker of French, English and Italian. To be honest, Augustin Bullot, is not really my ancestor. He was the grandfather of my 2x great grandmother's second husband, but I've borrowed him as there are a great number of his descendants in New Zealand.

Augustin Bullot was the son of a Picardy shoemaker who trained as a chemist for the French Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. He was unlucky to be the third surgeon on the frigate Indefatigable when it was captured by British forces on 25 September 1806 while attempting to run a blockade taking supplies, military equipment and reinforcements to the French Caribbean islands.

As an officer, Augustin was able to lodge with English residents in Launceston, Cornwall and it is likely he taught French to supplement his income. There he met and married Deborah Harvey in 1809. She bore him a son, John, before he was moved to Greenlaw in the Scottish Borders because too many French prisoners were absconding from the south coast of England and escaping to France. Augustin returned to Cornwall on his release in 1815 and Deborah's second son, Eugene Isidore Bullot, was born. (He emigrated to New Plymouth, New Zealand on the Amelia Thompson in 1841.)

After that, it is challenging to find what became of Augustin. The marriage to Deborah did not last and in 1818 and 1820, two more sons, Alexander and Gustave, were born in England to Augustin and his "wife", Elizabeth Blair. It is possible that he had met Elizabeth at Greenlaw as her parents were Scottish, though she was baptised in Devon. By 1824, the family had moved to Ile de France, Paris where another son, Alfred, was born. The Bullots disappear until 1830 when they turn up in Naples where Augustin set himself up as a dentist. Augustin died there in 1846.

I'd love to know if Eugene Bullot was French speaking and if any of his children were bilingual. It is unclear if he stayed with his mother, Deborah, in Cornwall. His elder brother, John, died in Naples so it is possible that Eugene too spent time in France and Italy before returning to marry in England and then emigrate to New Zealand.


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