VILLENEUVE, Alexandre Louis Ducrest de, French naval officer, born in Theft, near Vitre, 7 March, 1777 ; died in Paris, 22 March, 1852. He entered the naval service as a midshipman in 1791, took part in an expedition to the Pacific ocean, and in the following year joined a privateer and won reputation for his bravery. Re-entering the navy in 1796, he participated in 1802 in the expedition to Santo Domingo under General Leclerc, and he was with Admiral Pierre de Villeneuve in the Antilles in 1805, and at Trafalgar. In 1806 he was sent by Napoleon on a special mission to carry the latter's orders to the French, Dutch, and Spanish colonies, and he was employed afterward in the Gulf of Mexico, and promoted to post-captain in 1814. From 1815 till 1818 he commanded the station of the Antilles, where he made valuable charts of those parts. He was sent in 1821 on a scientific mission to Havana and La Plata, assumed command of the station of the Gulf of Mexico in 1825, and prepared a chart of the Bay of Vera Cruz and the Isthmus of Panama. He was recalled in 1827, sent to the Mediterranean sea to chase the Tunisian and Algerian corsairs, was promoted rear-admiral in 1829, commanded the division that blockaded Anvers in 1832-'3, and was afterward maritime prefect at Lorient, retiring from active service in 1838. The charts of the American coast that Admiral Villeneuve prepared have long been standard authorities in the French navy.

VILLENEUVE, Jules Edmond Francois de, French author, born in Paris, 27 February, 1804; died there, 5 August, 1863. He emigrated with his parents to Brazil after the fall of Napoleon I., was admitted to the Brazilian naval school, and served afterward in the fleet, attaining the rank of lieutenant-commander, but he resigned in 1832 and devoted himself to literary labors. In the same year he bought the "Jornal do Commercio" at Rio Janeiro, which under his management became the chief periodical in the country. He was the first to publish reports of the deliberations of the Brazilian parliament, and to advocate the enfranchisement of the negroes. Villeneuve returned to Paris in 1844. He published articles on Brazil in the Paris magazines, and "Coup d'ceil sur l'empire du Bresil" (Versailles, 1849) ; " La guerre civile dans l'Amerique du Sud" (1858); and an opera, "Paraguassfi," represented at Paris in 1855.