Felipe BauzÁ y CaÑas

Felipe Bauzá y Cañas was born in Palma, Majorca, and at a young age entered the Royal School for Pilots at Cartagena. After some experience of war, he worked from 1785 to 1787 in the service of Vicente Tofiño, and obtained as a result the Chair of Fortifications and Draughting at the Academy of the Guardiamarinas at Cádiz. He was chosen by Malaspina to oversee the cartography of his Expedition and, after the return to Cádiz, was occupied for a while with the completion of the charts made during the trip. After the suppression of all the materials relevant to the Expedition, he was assigned to the frigate Mahonesa and then captured by the English. Freed a few months later, he  was named Co-Director (under Espinosa) of the Hydrographic Office and occupied this position up until May 1809, at which time he moved to Cádiz, surreptitiously removing several boxes of documents which the French generals had intended to take to Paris. Having returned to Madrid after the fall of the Napoleonic regime, and having resumed his work there, he was named Director of the Office on the death of Espinosa in 1815. In 1820 he was elected Deputy for Majorca in the Spanish Parliament; as a result of his liberal views, he had to flee to London in 1823, and was condemned to death in absentia. Bauzá took with him many of the importanMarch 8, 2020veloped or copied in the Hydrographic Office. After being pardoned, he died suddenly in 1834, while preparing to reenter his country.

For further information, see:

J. LLABRÉS  BERNAL, Breve noticia de la labor científica del capitán  de navío don Felipe Bauzá y sus papeles sobre América. 1764 - 1834, Palma de Mallorca, Impr. Guasp, 1934, 74 pp.

U. LAMB, "The London years of Felipe Bauzá, Spanish Hydrographer in exile. 1823 -1834," The Journal of Navigation, Royal Institute of Navigation, London, XXXIV, (1981), 3, pp. 319-340.

P. BARBER, " 'Riches for the Geography of America and Spain': Felipe Bauzá and his topographical collection, 1789-1848," The British Library Journal, XII (1986), 1,  pp. 28-57.

A. DAVID, "Felipe Bauzá and the British Hydrographic Office. 1823-1834," in M. PALAU - A. OROZCO (eds.), Malaspina '92. Jornadas Internacionales: Madrid - Cádiz – La Coruña, Cádiz, Real Academia Hispano Americana, 1994, pp. 235-242.

C.A. BAUZÁ, "Felipe Bauzá director de cartas y planos de la Expedición Malaspina," in M. PALAU - A. OROZCO (eds.), Malaspina '92. Jornadas Internacionales: Madrid - Cádiz - La Coruña, Cádiz 1992, Cádiz, Real Academia Hispano Americana, 1994, pp. 205 - 208.

C.A. BAUZÁ, "Alejandro Malaspina, Felipe Bauzá y la expedición 'alrededor del mundo'," in B. SÁIZ (ed.), Malaspina '93. Alessandro Malaspina e la sua spedizione scientifica 1789-1794. Atti del Congresso Internazionale nel Bicentenario della massima impresa di Alessandro Malaspina, Mulazzo - Cadice, Centro "Alessandro Malaspina” and the Real Academia Hispano Americana, 1995,  pp. 207-228.

D. MANFREDI - S. VALETTINI, Dodici lettere inedite di Felipe Bauzá y Cañas ad Alessandro Malaspina, Mulazzo, Centro di Studi Malaspiniani, 1995, pp. 5+ n.n.

Image courtesy of the Centro di Studi Malaspiniani, Mulazzo, Italy and the Museo Naval, Madrid.  Biographical and bibliographical notes by Dario Manfredi (Italian version), translated by John Black.

Updated: March 8, 2020