On May 25, 1720, the Great Plague of Marseille began with the arrival of the Grand St Antoine in port from Sydon, a town near Tyre, in Asia . On board were seven sailors on who had died en route.

The health commissioners impounded the ship’s merchandise and quarantined the passengers and crew in a lazaretto on the island of Jarros, but not before the crew had established contacts with the porters of contraband cloth and those workers were the first to fall ill at the end of Jun.. When the plague ended two years later between 76,000 and 126,000 people had died from the disease in southeastern France.