Single-page handwritten passport, signed by the applicant, Arnaud Marie Bécot, and by the French vice-consul in Algeciras, J. Blanc (or J. Blanco), bearing the stamp of the vice-consulate.
Fold marks, a few tears along the folds, including a substantial one of eleven centimetres, some ink scribbles on the verso.

This passport was issued on 25 September 1848, valid for one month, to Captain Arnaud Marie Bécot. The opening formula "Au nom de la République" and the title of "citoyen" tie the document to the return of the Republic, proclaimed on 24 February of the same year. Bécot had just lost his brig, the Veloce, on the reefs of San García point, south of Algeciras, and applied for this document in order to reach Cadiz.
In 1848, a passport was still required in France, both for travel within the country and for journeys abroad, and the royal ordinance of 25 October 1833 had laid down the powers of consuls in such matters. A note on the verso shows that the document enjoyed a second life: it served as supporting evidence for the issue of a new passport, no. 62, bound for Le Havre. The document thus bears witness to the route the shipwrecked mariner followed back to France, from one administrative formality to the next.