DUNKIRK, or DuNouBitouE, in Dutch and Flemish Brabant, a considerable sea port of France, in the de partment of the North, 30 miles northeast of Calais. The name denoo. s the rhumb n the Don Its. or sand anl the place is of great antiquity. It belonged for hest ral et mune% to the Earls of nand( rs, and pass ed, in the 15th century, to the house of Austria. It remained tinder the Spanish branch of that !louse a con shit cable time, hut changed masters more than once, in the wars in the Low Countries carried on in the minon tv of uis XIV. Cromwell haying taken part against Spann and It sing assisted the French in obtaining pos session of Dunkirk, it was put into his hands, and its fornficatioas ro,siderably extended by him. It remain ed, howl:\ Cr, only four years in our possession, Charles 11. selling it, in 1662, to Louis XIV. for the sum of 309,90t1. sterling. Tutu ambitious monarch expended large sums in strengthening its fortifications, so that Dun kirk afterwards became the seat of very formidable an noyance to the English commerce. h is said, that in the war of the Succession, the prizes carried into Dun kirk exceeded the value of a million sterling : a loss of such importance, that, at the peace of Utrecht, our ministers made a point of stipulating for the destruction of the fortifications, and even of the harbour. This ac cordingly took place, in a considerable degree, in the year 1713; but though, in the subsequent treaties of 1748 and 1763, similar stipulations were inserted, the Fri nch contrived to evade their execution, and the Bri tish ministers have been disposed to consider the inser tion of the article as little else than an expedient for ac quiring popularity• Since the American war, the French have been at liberty to improve the harbour and fortili cations as they thought proper. It is generally thought,
that the Duke of York might have succeeded in taking possession of this place in the autumn of 1793, had his operations been properly combined. Reichard taking his account front the Terrier office, (le Bureau de Cadas :re,) makes the population of Dunkirk to be 16,832. It may be taken at about 22,000. The houses are built of white brick. The communication between the harbour and the interior of the town is by a quay, which is very long and solid. The lope yard and sailors' magazine are two buildings, each of nearly 600 feet in front. The barracks are beautiful. There is here a public school for teaching mathematics and hydrography. The road stead of Dunkirk is at the distance of a mile and a half north of the town, and lies within a sand hank, which runs parallel to the shore for an extent of nearly five miles in length. Of late years, it has suffered in point of trade in the same way as other towns in France, and its inhabitants have little other occupation than that of pn ivateering, and of a few inland manufactures, such as glass, ropes, leather, dell ware and starch, bcc. In time of peace. it will, in all probability, enjoy a considerable foreign trade, and might be expected to employ nearly 200 merchantmen, and 2500 or seamen. It is the native place of the celebrated Jean Bart. E. Long. 2° 7', N. 1, tt. 2'.