Jean Ribault (1520 – October 12, 1565) was a French naval officer, navigator, and a colonizer of what would become the southeastern United States. In 1562 he led an expedition to the New World that eventually founded Fort Caroline in what is now Jacksonville, Florida, as a haven for the Huguenots.

Early life and first colony

Ribault was born in the village of Dieppe on the English Channel. In 1562, Ribault was chosen to lead an expedition to the New World to establish a haven for the Huguenots. Leaving France February 18 with a fleet of 150 colonists, he crossed the Atlantic Ocean and explored the mouth of the St. Johns River in modern-day Jacksonville, Florida. He named it the "River May", as this was the month when he found it.

Ribault’s fleet then proceeded north and chose to settle on Parris Island, one of the Sea Islands off the coast of present-day South Carolina. The colony was named Charlesfort in honor of the French king, Charles IX. Ribault oversaw the layout of the small fort, then returned to France for supplies, leaving 28 men.

After Ribault left, much of his settlers' stores were burned, and Captain Albert's heavy discipline led to the tiny group attempting to return to France. They built their own boat and set sail, without compass, across the Atlantic. The survivors were rescued by an English ship, and some eventually reached France. Shortly after their departure, Hernando de Manrique de Rojas commanded a Spanish force from Cuba that went and destroyed the French fort, and took captive the one Frenchman who had remained with the local Native Americans in the region of the fort.

Ribault moreover did not fare well in getting supplies. While he was away from France, warfare had broken out between the Roman Catholic majority, and the Protestant Huguenots. Ribault fled to England after the fall of Dieppe. While in England, he managed to have an audience with Queen Elizabeth I and organized some backers for a plan to settle in America. Despite a cordial welcome, he was arrested and detained in the Tower of London. English authorities feared he was plotting to steal their ships to use in French colonization efforts.

In 1563, the Peace of Amboise brought Gaspard de Coligny back into favor, and he appointed René Laudonnière to replace Ribault in the North American endeavors. As this was happening, Charlesfort fell into despair. A lack of supplies threatened the colonists' lives, most of whom followed Laudonnière farther south into Spanish territory to establish Fort Caroline at the mouth of the St. Johns River. The fort had early success, but the colonists had trouble feeding themselves after turmoil developed with the local Native American tribes. Some colonists sailed, home while others deserted and became pirates. Following his release from prison, Ribault was dispatched by the French government to save the settlement. He arrived at the mouth of the St. Johns River in mid-August with a strong relief expedition of some 600 French soldiers and settlers, including Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues (circa 1533-1588), who had been sent by Charles IX to act as official cartographer and artist. On his return to Europe, he published an account of the expedition in Frankfurt in 1591, entitled "Brevis narratio eorum quae in Florida Americae provincia Gallis acciderunt" - it shows 42 maps, depicts the inhabitants of Florida and describes their customs. It is regarded as an important archive of life in that period.

Disaster

A few days after Ribault's arrival off the Florida coast, a Spanish fleet commanded by Pedro Menéndez de Avilés came over the horizon and attempted to grapple and board the Frenchmen. Rough sea conditions denied a decisive outcome to both sides. The Spanish admiral ordered his ships south, where some 800 troops and settlers from Spain disembarked on August 28, 1565. They hastily threw up palm-log and earthworks around an existing Timucua Indian village at what is today St. Augustine, Florida expecting an attack from Ribault. Jean Ribault took his fleet south to pursue Menéndez on September 10. Learning that the majority of the French men at arms were gone from Fort Caroline, Menéndez ordered his infantrymen to march 40 miles north to Fort Caroline, during a hurricane. On 20 September, the Spanish captured the now lightly defended French settlement; 140 men were immediately put to death. In the eyes of the king of Spain, the acts of piracy committed by former residents of Fort Caroline made the entire settlement a dangerous nest of pirates and heretics. Only about 60 women and children were spared. René Laudonnière and about 40 others escaped the wrath of the Spaniards, and eventually returned to Europe to tell their tales.

The same hurricane that masked the approach of Menéndez's troops on Fort Caroline, utterly destroyed all of Ribault’s fleet, driving them up on the beach many miles south of their intended target. Several hundred soldiers and sailors made it ashore barely alive and then walked from near present-day Daytona Beach to Matanzas Inlet, 14 miles south of St. Augustine. The marooned sailors were soon tracked down by Menéndez and a patrol force of Spanish troops, probably under a hundred men. Ribault, believing his hungry men would be fed and decently treated, allowed himself to be bluffed into surrender. In batches of ten, the Frenchmen were rowed across to the mainland, hands tied behind their backs. Following the explicit orders of King Phillip II of Spain, the prisoners were asked if they were professing Catholics. Those who were not were marched behind a dune and put to the knife by Menéndez's Spanish soldiers. Only a handful of Catholics, young musicians and ship's boys were spared their lives. A similar surrender and mass execution of a smaller group of Frenchmen followed a few days later. This time, a few Frenchmen, suspicious of their enemies, preferred to take their chances with the native Americans. Altogether, Ribault and about 350 of his officers and men lost their lives in the two massacres. The location of this event still carries today the name Matanzas, which is Spanish for "massacres." Menéndez had brilliantly but horrifically carried out his orders to wipe out the French incursion.

This act shocked Europeans even in that bloody age. In 1568, a French pirate, Dominique de Gourgues avenged Ribault in ghastly fashion. He attacked Spanish-held Fort Caroline, secured the garrison's surrender and then put all his prisoners to death.

Legacy

Several places and institutions in Jacksonville are named for Ribault, such as Jean Ribault High School, the Ribault Club on Fort George Island, and a tributary of the Trout River, the Ribault River. In 2005 Ribault was featured in the "Conquest of the Southeast" episode of The History Channel's documentary miniseries Conquest of America.