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Guillon (Shipping company, France)

Last modified: 2015-08-15 by ivan sache
Keywords: guillon | fleury |
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Presentation of Guillon

Léon Guillon (1837-1913; biography), member of a dynasty of shipowners established in Nantes since the 18th century, was a rich maritime insurance broker, whose wealth was estimated in 1881 to 800,000 francs. Guillon encouraged his brother Raoul and his sons Maxime, Norbert and Claude Guillon-Verne - his wife, Marie-Sophie Verne (1842-1913) was the sister of the writer Jules Verne (1828-1905) - to invest in steel-hulled three-masters and four-masters.

Ivan Sache, 13 September 2012


Norbert & Claude Guillon

[House flag]

House flag of Norbert & Claude Guillon - Image by Ivan Sache, 13 September 2012

Norbert and Claude Guillon operated ten three-masters (listed in the Les grands voiliers cap-hornais nantais website): Ernest Reyer (lost at the mouth of river Columbia during her maiden voyage in 1901), François Coppée, Charles Gounod, Edmond Rostand, Édouard Detaille, Ernest Legouvé, Ernest Reyer II (torpedoed in April 1916), Général de Négrier, Jane Guillon and Pierre Loti.
Most of these ships were named for famous writers (Coppée, Rostand, Legouvé, Loti), musicians (Dreyer, Gounod), and painters (Detaille) of the time.

The house flag of Norbert & Claude Guillon is shown by Louis Lacroix (Les Derniers grands voiliers. Histoire des long-courriers nantais de 1893 à 1931) as white with a red descending diagonal stripe, in upper fly a blue six-pointed star, in lower hoist the blue letters "NCG".

Ivan Sache, 13 September 2012


René Guillon & René Fleury

[House flag]         [House flag]

House flag of René Guillon & René Fleury, two reported versions - Images by Ivan Sache, 13 September 2012

René Guillon and René Fleury operated 15 ships (listed in the Les grands voiliers cap-hornais nantais website): Maréchal Lannes (lost during her maiden voyage to England in 1899), Bossuet, Général de Boisdeffre, La Bruyère, La Fontaine, La Rochefoucauld, Maréchal Davout, Maréchal de Turenne, Maréchal de Villars, Molière, Montebello, Jules Verne, Louis Pasteur, Reine Blanche and Amiral Troude (sold to Bordes in 1903 and sunk on 30 September 1917 in the Bay of Biscay by a German submarine).

The house flag of René Guillon and René Fleury is shown by Louis Lacroix (Les Derniers grands voiliers. Histoire des long-courriers nantais de 1893 à 1931) as white with a blue border and the black letters "RG - RF" in the middle. D. Kervella and M. Bodlore-Penlaez (Guide des drapeaux bretons et celtes) show the flag with red letters.

Ivan Sache, 13 September 2012