Duperrey’s French corvette Coquille spends about ten days at Kosrae; Lesson describes the island and its paramount chief.

What happened

The French navy corvette Coquille, on a scientific voyage, anchored in a west-coast harbor the French named after their ship, and its officers spent ten days exploring. They visited the paramount chief at Lelu, and the naturalist Lesson wrote a long report on Kosraean dress, crafts, burial customs and society. Population estimates differ: Lesson put Kosrae at 1,200 people at most, while Duperrey estimated about 2,000.

Why it matters

Lesson’s report is one of the earliest detailed written descriptions of Kosrae, made before the whaling era of the 1830s–1850s.