Marie Callegari in Australia: The identity of Alexandre Dumas's narrator in Le journal de Madame Giovanni

Abstract

In her 1982 study of The French in Australia Anny Stuer observed that ‘very few French people came to Australia’ before 1851 and, giving the example of a few French convicts who arrived before 1820, she concluded: ‘once they had served their sentence, these convicts resumed an active and honest life’. She added, ‘nearly two decades [1820–1840] elapsed without any more French settlers arriving in Australia (at least none that can be traced)’ (Stuer 1982, 40–46). Research methods have changed since 1982 and many French settlers and convicts can be traced. This is the story of one of those French convicts.