1908. - Lot 230

1908. Geographical Service of Indo-China. Map of Eastern China. Map printed in color on paper in the form of a stapled atlas with assembly table. Complete with 9 sheets, drawn at a scale of 1:2,000,000 by Commandant Friquegnon of the Colonial Infantry. Dated July 1908. Sheet size: 60x70 cm. (Small tears, some foxing, partial sunning of the title page, old heavy dampening to the last few leaves). A military man and geographer, Jean-Baptiste Friquegnon (1858-1934) was made a Knight of the Legion of Honor in 1885, an Officer in 1906 and a Commander in 1922. Holder of the Great War Commemorative Medal and the Combatant's Cross, he was elected a free member of the Académie des sciences coloniales when it was founded in 1923. Friquegnon enlisted as a volunteer in 1877, rising to the rank of second lieutenant in 1883. The following year, he joined the Infanterie de Marine and served with the Tirailleurs Tonkinois. Wounded during the Kem Pass expedition, he was promoted to lieutenant in 1885 and awarded the Chevalier du Cambodge and the Légion d'honneur. Assigned to Toulon in 1888, Friquegnon was then appointed to the topographic department of the Hanoi headquarters in 1889, before joining the Pavie mission in Laos, for whom he took numerous photographs during various expeditions. He was awarded the distinction of Officer of the Dragon de l'Annam in 1890, was assigned to Tonkin in 1892 and became Officer of Cambodia in 1894. Back in France and assigned to the 8th Marine Regiment in Toulon, Friquegnon was placed at the disposal of the Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1896 for a new edition of the map of Indochina. He helped organize the geographic service and the first geodetic campaign. Awarded the title of Officier d'Instruction Publique in 1902, he returned to Tonkin in 1903 and became head of the Indochina Geographical Service in 1904, then lieutenant-colonel of the Colonial Infantry. Our map of Eastern China was published in this context.