Pierre-Dominique Bazaine

Pierre-Dominique Bazaine (1783 - 1838) was a French scientist and engineer. He was sent by Napoleon I, at the request of Alexander I along with three other mathematicians from Paris to St. Petersburg, as the first pupils of the Paris Polytechnic School, to teach Russian engineering students at the Institute of Communications. He prepared several courses, printed in French and translated into Russian by Ganeshinym his pupil. He taught mathematics and was made Director of the Institute. in 1830 he returned to France.

Lieutenant General, Director of Communications Packaging Paths, mathematician, writer. He was born 13 January 1786, in the town of Scy-sur-Moselle. Educated in Paris, graduate of L'Ecole Polytechnique and the School of Bridges and Roads. Initially he practised as an Engineer in Italy and southern France. His outstanding abilities drew the attention of Napoleon I who subsequently recommended him to the Russian Emperor Czar Alexander I, along with engineers Fabrom, Destremom and Potier, to take up senior posts in the Russia corps of Civil Engineers. Bazaine arrived in St.Petersburg, Russia in 1810 with Lieutenant Fabrom but due war with France, did not immediately take up his post. Instead he was sent to Odessa under the Governor-General of the Duke de Richelieu, where his first work was at the Russian port of Evpatoriya. He was then sent to Yaroslavl, to Poshehone and then in 1812 due to the war with France, he was deported to Eastern Siberia, where he spent more than two years. Bazaine devoted himself entirely to science and analytics whilst in Siberia, writing his great treatise on differential calculus and several memoirs about plane geometry and properties of various lengths in three dimensions. In 1815, with the end of war in Europe, he returned to St. Petersburg where with the new rank of Colonel, he was appointed Chair Professor of Higher Analytics and Mechanics at the Civil Engineering Institute. In 1820, he was promoted to Major-General and in 1823 he was appointed a member of the Council Ways and Communications, being made Inspector-General. In January 1824, He became Director of the Civil Engineering Institute, and also Chairman of the Committee for Buildings and Hydraulic works in St.Petersburg. In 1828, Bazaine returned to France but on his return to Russia was promoted to Lieutenant General on 1 April 1830. Bazaine's structural engineering works were extensive and much remains in the historic infrastructure in Russia. His main works were:

• the Obvodny canal in St. Petersburg;
• water supply Yamskoy Slobody and Tavrichesky Garden;
• Shlisselburgsky granite building locks (for which he was awarded the Order of White Eagle).

For the last buildings he wrote a remarkable treatise, in which he argued for the possibility of huge water savings in the Ladoga Canal, by ships passing through its locks: "Mémoire sur les bassins d'épargne" (napech. in Zapiskah Acad. Sciences). From 1820-1832 Bazaines prominent works include: rebuilding St. Isaac's Cathedral and on the same design building several other churches; the first chain bridge in Russia at Ekaterina park; restructuring, under his personal supervision, Ohtenskogo powder factory; deepening the river estuary at Neva and its channels; erection of buildings of the Senate and the Synod; rebuilding the University; the remarkable construction of the dome over the cathedral of St.Trinity (at the St. Petersburg side), 87 feet in diameter. These and many other constructions brought Bazaine several awards: in addition to the above, he was awarded the Order of St.Vladimir, the Grand Cross of St.Alexander Nevsky; Commander of the French Legion of Honour, Prussian Order of the Red Eagle (1st Class). He was elected an honorary fellow of St Petersburg Academy and the Science Academies of Turin, Munich, Stockholm and St Petersburg. He was made a member of the Mineralogical Society of St. Petersburg University in 1834. Deteriorating health prompted Bazaine to resign, and in 1834 he was transferred to the corps of military engineers, but heart disease forced Bazaine to return to Paris where he died in 1838 and was buried at the cemetery Monmartre.

He married Marie-Madeleine Vasseur and they had 3 children, 2 sons and a daughter. His daughter Melanie (1808-1852) married the engineer Benoît Paul Émile Clapeyron in 1834. His eldest son, also Pierre-Dominique Bazaine (known as Adolphe) (1809-1893) was also a Civil Engineer and an important Railway engineer in the 1840s. He married an English woman Elizabeth Hayter. His second son was Francois Achille Bazaine, a distinguished soldier who became a Marshal of France.

Sources

"Zhurn. Glavn. Upravl. Paths Messaging. And Publicity. Buildings", in 1858, so HH VIII.

Works

• "The initial reason differential calculus" (French edition in 1817 and Russian in 1819);
• "The initial reason integral calculus" (1825 edition of the French and Russian in 1827);
• "The proof is the beginning of speculative speeds, be construed as mechanics" (translated Zavadsky, 1832).
• "Mémoire sur l'état actuel du système de Vychni-Volotchok, ou de la principale communication artificielle établie entre la mer Caspienne et la Baltique".
• "Mémoire sur l'impossibilité de ramener par un simple approfondissement le niveau du canal de Ladoga, à la même hauteur, que celui du lac du même nom".
• "Notice sur un nouvel artifice propre à diminuer la dépense d'eau des canaux en général et sur un nouveau système de petite navigation".
• "Mémoires sur les méthodes de raccordement à employer pour les alignements des routes".
• "Notice sur la construction des paratonnerres".
• "Notice sur un nouvel appareil gazogène".
• "Mémoire sur la construction des Chaussées, et sur la détermination des distances moyennes pour le transport des matériaux".
• "Introduction à l'étude de la statique synthétique, à l'usage des élèves de l'institut des voies de communications".
• "Démonstration du principe des vitesses virtuelles, considéré comme base de la mecanique".
• "Notices sur la composition des reliefs".
• "Memoire sur un nouveau système relatif à l'établissement d'un chantier général destiné à la construction, au radoub et à la conservation des vaisseaux".
• "Mémoire sur les machines à vapeurs en général".
• "Mémoire sur la détermination de la force expansive de la vapeur, et des avantages qu'on en peut retirer sous le rapport industriel".
• " Mémoire sur les moyens de preserver les machines à vapeur des exploisions auxquelles elles sont exposées ".
• "Mémoire sur la fabrication, et en particulier sur le séchage de la poudre à canon".