Financing the French Navy in the Seven Years War: Beaujon, Goossens Et Compagnie in 1759

Late in 1758, a year of distress in the French empire, the government of Louis XV took the unusual step of hiring merchant bankers to assist in financing the navy. Who they were, what they did, and how they failed to stave off bankruptcy in October and November 1759 makes an interesting short chapter in the history of the French navy, of the Seven Years War, and of the Bourbon monarchy.