Maurice-Raymond de Brossard du Bourg was born in Ézy-sur-Eure on 2 March 1909 and died in Saint-Cloud on 5 October 1997. He began his naval career in October 1928 at the École navale, a prestigious French naval academy. He graduated in October 1930 as enseigne de vaisseau de 2e classe, a junior naval rank, and was later promoted to enseigne de vaisseau de 1re classe in October 1932. In 1934, he became certified as an airship pilot, a rare and specialized skill at the time. He commanded the V-11 in 1936 and the V-12 in 1937, becoming the last officer to hold such a position in the navy’s airship fleet. In 1938, he was promoted to lieutenant de vaisseau and earned his pilot’s license for seaplanes, a type of aircraft designed to take off and land on water. During the early years of World War II, he led a formation in 1939–40 and was later assigned to the cruiser Marseillaise, where he became head of the aviation service in 1941. After the Allied landing in Normandy in June 1944, he was tasked with welcoming the police commissioner for Normandy and took command of the GMR Normandie at Darnétal. He played a role in establishing the Republican Security Companies, a group formed to maintain order in post-war France. The GMR was later replaced by the CRS 31 at Darnétal. From 1946 to 1948, de Brossard du Bourg commanded the mobile base of the naval air group in Indochina, a region in Southeast Asia that was then a French colony. In 1947, he was promoted to captain of corvette and led the 1st assault naval division in 1950, where he was recognized for his service in Tonkin, a region in northern Vietnam. In 1952, he was promoted to captain of frigate and served as commander of the naval aviation in Algeria (1953–55) and then in New Caledonia (1957–59). He was later promoted to captain of ship in November 1959 and commanded the Naval Aviation Base of Lann-Bihoué in 1961. In 1963, de Brossard du Bourg became head of the Historical Service of the Navy, a position responsible for documenting and preserving naval history. He participated in a research mission in 1964 to locate the remains of Jean-François de La Pérouse, a French explorer whose shipwreck had been a mystery for many years. He was appointed rear admiral in March 1965 and retired in 1967. In 1975, he received the Broquette-Gonin Prize for literature from the French Academy for his Maritime History of the World, and in 1979, he was awarded the Albéric-Rocheron Prize for his work Lapérouse: from battles to discovery. He was a member of the Academy of Navy (1947) and the Academy of Sciences of the Overseas (1982), and held the rank of knight and later officer of the Legion of Honor. He received numerous military decorations, including the Cross of War 39–45 and the Medal of the Wounded in War, among others.