Vice-Admiral Count Pierre Étienne René Marie Dumanoir Le Pelley (2 August 1770 in Granville – 7 July 1829 in Paris) was a French Navy officer, best known for commanding the vanguard of the French fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar. His conduct during this battle was the subject of controversy. Family Pierre Étienne René Marie Dumanoir Le Pelley was descended from a very old family of the Granville bourgeoisie, who had once earned a considerable fortune in maritime armaments and was ennobled by King Louis XVIII. His father Louis Pierre Etienne Le Pelley (1733-1807), Sieur du Manoir, was a privateer captain, shipowner and bourgeois of Granville. Pierre Dumanoir Le Pelley is the 2nd cousin of Georges René Le Peley de Pléville (1726-1805). His mother Jeanne Élisabeth Lucas de Lezeaux (1744-1819) is the daughter of Charles Marie, squire, Lord of Lezeaux, honorary lord of Saint Pair and Saint Aubin des Préaux in the parish of Saint-Pair-sur-Mer. Youth and beginnings Rapid advancement Pierre Dumanoir Le Pelley entered the navy at the age of seventeen in March 1787 as an and served in the Antilles until 1790. Appointed second lieutenant in port two years later in April 1789 he boarded the frigates Pomone and Néréide, cruising off Africa. He then embarked on the fluyt Dromadaire, bound for Cayenne, as an ensign. Promoted to sub-lieutenant in 1790, he was appointed to the staff of Admiral Martin. He served on Sans-Culotte. He was not yet twenty-three years old when he was appointed Lieutenant de vaisseau in June 1793. Two years later, in Floréal year III (May 1795), at less than twenty-five years of age, he obtained the rank of Capitaine de corvette and command of the Berwick in Richery's squadron, which took over a large convoy in the Mediterranean Sea and was then tasked with destroying English fishing establishments in Newfoundland. A controversial advancement Some biographies suggest that his rapid progress could be explained by his cousin Georges-René Pléville Le Pelley. The latter, his father's first cousin, forty-four years his senior, had certainly been called to the commission of the Navy to be one of the three administrators who prepared the law of 3 brumaire year III (24 October 1794). In 1795, the Directory already wanted him as Minister of the Navy, but he refused. Truguet was appointed and Pléville-Le-Pelley remained under requisition from him as head of division. The Directoire finally convinced him to