The battle was the climax of a naval campaign that had ranged across the Mediterranean during the previous three months, as a large French convoy sailed from Toulon to Alexandria, carrying an expeditionary force under General Napoleon Bonaparte.

On 22 June, Nelson encountered a brig sailing from Ragusa and was told that the French had sailed eastwards from Malta on 16 June.

" By 24 July his fleet was resupplied and, having determined that the French must be somewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean, Nelson sailed again in the direction of Morea.

To support the centre, Captain Thompson of Leander abandoned the futile efforts to drag the stranded Culloden off the shoal and sailed down the embattled French line, entering the gap created by the drifting Peuple Souverain and opening a fierce raking fire on Franklin and Orient.

On 19 August, Nelson sailed for Naples with Vanguard, Culloden and Alexander, leaving Hood in command of Zealous, Goliath, Swiftsure and the recently joined frigates to watch over French activities at Alexandria.

Thus short-handed, Kidd sailed for New York City, capturing a French vessel en route ( which was legal under the terms of his commission ).

French explorer Antoine Laumet de La Mothe, sieur de Cadillac sailed up the Detroit River on July 23, 1701.

In 1498 French Guiana was first visited by Europeans when Christopher Columbus sailed to the region on his third voyage and named it the " Land of pariahs ".

In 1972 the yacht Vega, a ketch owned by David McTaggart, was renamed Greenpeace III and sailed in an anti-nuclear protest into the exclusion zone at Moruroa to attempt to disrupt French nuclear testing.

Preble commanded the frigate Essex, which he sailed around Cape Horn into the Pacific to protect American merchantmen in the East Indies ; he recaptured several ships that had been seized by French privateers.

Upon learning that de Grasse had sailed from the West Indies for North America, and that French Admiral de Barras had also sailed from Newport, Rhode Island, Admiral Graves concluded that they were going to join forces at the Chesapeake.

Finding no French ships there, he then sailed for New York.

De Barras sailed from Newport on 27 August with 8 ships of the line, 4 frigates, and 18 transports carrying French armaments and siege equipment.

The British, intending to blockade French ports, sent out their fleet in February 1755, but the French fleet had already sailed.

As a rule, the buccaneers called themselves privateers, and many sailed under the protection of a letter of marque granted by British, French or Dutch authorities.

In 1666, François Caron, the director general of the newly formed French East India Company, sailed to Madagascar.

In 1665, François Caron, the Director General of the newly formed French East India Company, sailed to Madagascar.

Fidelity sailed with a French crew, and was sunk by U-435 on 30 December 1942 during the battle for Convoy ON-154.

Barred by Britain from using the Suez Canal, the Russians sailed around Africa, and by April and May 1905 had anchored at Cam Ranh Bay in French Indochina.

French Jesuits who sailed along the Ussury and the Amur in 1709, preparing the first more or less precise map of the region.

In 1524, Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano, in service of the French crown, sailed past the Chesapeake but did not enter the bay.

While French skirmishers kept the English garrison of Saint-Loup contained, a fleet of boats from Orleans sailed down to the landing to pick up the supplies, Joan and 200 spearmen.

Lavaud sailed on the corvette Aube on 19 February 1840 ; the Comte-de-Paris, commanded by Langlois, and with the French immigrants on board, made a false start on 6 March and after going aground, finally got away on 20 March.

* 1781 – American Revolutionary War: British and French ships clash in the Battle of Fort Royal off the coast of Martinique.

During the sixth and final colonial war, the French and Indian War, the military conflicts in Nova Scotia included: Battle of Fort Beauséjour ; Bay of Fundy Campaign ( 1755 ); the Battle of Petitcodiac ; the Raid on Lunenburg ( 1756 ); the Louisbourg Expedition ( 1757 ); Battle of Bloody Creek ( 1757 ); Siege of Louisbourg ( 1758 ), Petitcodiac River Campaign, Gulf of St. Lawrence Campaign ( 1758 ), St. John River Campaign, and Battle of Restigouche.

During this time period Acadians participated in various militia operations against the British and maintained vital supply lines to the French Fortress of Louisbourg and Fort Beausejour.

While he volunteered for militia service in 1757 in response to French movements resulting in the Siege of Fort William Henry, his unit received word while en route that the fort had fallen, and turned back.

In August 1689, a French fleet appeared near the coast of Ceylon compelling the Governor of Pulicat Lawrence Pitt who was on high seas to seek protection within the bastions of Fort St George.

Equally short-lived, but still very important, was the World Film Company, which recruited most of the French directors, cameramen, and designers who had previously been working at the Fort Lee, New Jersey studios for Pathé and Éclair.

Governor Dinwiddie sent Washington back to the Ohio Country to protect an Ohio Company group building a fort at present-day Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania but before he reached the area, a French force drove out the company's crew and began construction of Fort Duquesne.

The French responded by attacking and capturing Washington at Fort Necessity in July 1754.

On 17 March 1649 a French expedition of 203 men from Martinique, led by Jacques Dyel du Parquet who had been the Governor of Martinique on behalf of the Compagnie des Iles de l ' Amerique ( Company of the Isles of America ) since 1637, landed at St. Georges Harbour and constructed a fortified settlement, which they named Fort Annunciation.

Between 1705 and 1710 the French built Fort Royal at St. George's which is now know as Fort George.

D ' Iberville's depleted French force captured York Factory by a ruse ; they laid siege to the fort while pretending to be a much larger army, the French held all of the outposts except Fort Albany until 1713.

( Fort Albany was again unsuccessfully attacked in 1709 by a small French and Indian force.

In 1782, during the American Revolutionary War, a French squadron under Jean-François de Galaup, comte de La Pérouse captured and demolished York Factory and Prince of Wales Fort.

* 1759 – French and Indian War: in Western New York, British forces capture Fort Niagara from the French, who subsequently abandon Fort Rouillé.

* 1754 – French and Indian War: George Washington surrenders Fort Necessity to French forces.

* 1754 – French and Indian War: George Washington surrenders Fort Necessity to French Capt.

* 1758 – French forces hold Fort Carillon against the British at Ticonderoga, New York.

* 1755 – French and Indian War: the French surrender Fort Beauséjour to the British, leading to the expulsion of the Acadians.