Medal - Jean-Baptiste Charcot

Reverse

View of the ship "POURQUOI-PAS?" to the right in iceberg filled waters. Seal to the left and penguins to the right.

Lettering:
1867 / 1936
POURQUOI-PAS?

Engraver: René Grégoire

Comment

Jean-Baptiste Charcot, with the help of his Pourquoi Pas? IV, carried out several polar expeditions. From 1907 to 1936, he made many expeditions and participated in the Academy of Sciences. In September 1936, returning from Greenland, where he had gone to deliver scientific equipment to Paul-Émile Victor's mission, the Pourquoi Pas ? IV struck the reefs of Alftanes (Iceland). There was only one survivor, the master helmsman Eugène Gonidec, a native of Douarnenez and nicknamed Penguin.