Writing about ‘A rare publication by Grand Master Hompesch’s head of secretariat’ Albert Ganado (The Sunday Times of Malta, May 27), inter alia, states that Louis be                                                                Boisgelin, a French knight who went into exile after 1798, in 1804 endorsed the accusation of Pierre-Jean Louis Ovide Doublet’s betrayal of the Order in his book Ancient and Modern Malta. He further adds that on the other hand, an opposite view was expressed by Dominique Miège, the French consul in Malta in his Histoire de Malte of 1840.

In view of what Ganado writes about Doublet’s good intentions, to clear his (and the Grandmaster’s) name one would perhaps do well to contextualise his Mémoires, completed around 1820 when the author was living with one of his sons in Tripoli while petitioning British favour to return to his family in Malta, where he died soon after.

In the third volume of his Histoire, Miège in fact casts doubts on Doublet’s truthfulness. Miège states that ‘all’ the Maltese at the time considered Doublet’s Mémoires as the most conscientious, adding however, that a clerk at the Bibliotheca had raised suspicions on their veracity because of Doublet’s biased opinions. Miège adds that Doublet was never enthusiastic about his allegiance to the French so much so that he refused to go to Egypt or serve the new republican government commission.

Reluctantly he must have accepted the post of commission secretary (and later commissioner) only to provide for his large Maltese family. Conversely Bonaparte’s own list (June 13, 1798) of members of the Order who had contributed to the French takeover of the island included Doublet.

Ganado also mentions Doublet’s version of events re Hompesch’s invitation in June 1798 to follow him abroad and Doublet’s readiness to accept if accompanied by his family; quite different from what Doublet himself wrote to the Directory in Paris on February 8, 1799 boasting of his preference to remain in Malta and serve the Republic.

Doublet remains an interesting but enigmatic historical persona. Roderick Cavaliero, in his 1960 publication The Last of the Crusaders, describes his document as “suspect and a justification of his future actions”.