Colonel Vincent-Yves Boutin KC, Knight with eminent merits | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1 January 1772 Le Loroux-Bottereau, Kingdom of France |
| Died | Summer 1815 (at 43) Syrian Coastal Mountain Range |
| Allegiance | French First Republic (1792-1804) First French Empire (1804-1815) |
| Service | French Land Army |
| Rank | Colonel |
| Battles / wars | |
| Awards | Order of the Crescent (1807); Knight of the Legion of Honour (1808) |
| Alma mater | Royal School of Engineering, Mézières |
| Relations | Lady Hester Stanhope |
Vincent-Yves Boutin (1 January 1772, Le Loroux-Bottereau, Province of Brittany - August 1815, Syrian Coastal Mountain Range, Ottoman Empire) was a French engineer, adventurer, officer and spy who participated in the French Revolutionary wars and the Napoleonic Wars. He was born into a humble family in western France and served in the French revolutionary army in the United Provinces, in the Italian campaign and in Dalmatia. He was tasked with undertaking intelligence and espionage missions for Napoleon I in Egypt, Syria, and Algiers. Additionally, he participated in defending Constantinople against the British forces of Admiral Duckworth in 1807.
In 1808, Napoleon granted him the Chevalier de l'Ordre de la Légion d'Honneur for his espionage and intelligence work. Sultan Selim III awarded him the Imperial Order of the Crescent for his victorious defence of Constantinople in the Anglo-Turkish war.
He was romantically involved with Lady Hester Stanhope, the explorer and niece of British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger. In the summer of 1815, when he was 43 years old, he vanished under mysterious circumstances in the Syrian Coastal Mountain Range.