René Charbonneau was 17th century French medical missionary Brother and a member of the Siam mission of the Société des Missions Etrangères. He was the first medical missionary to Siam and arrived in the country in 1677.

René Charbonneau first provided his services to the Siamese king Narai

Narai

Somdet Phra Narai or Somdet Phra Ramathibodi III was the king of Ayutthaya from 1656 to 1688 and arguably the most famous Ayutthayan king. His reign was the most prosperous during the Ayutthaya period and saw the great commercial and diplomatic activities with foreign nations including the...

 as an architect, to establish a wooden fort on the frontier with the country of Pegu.

In 1681 or 1682, king Narai, who was seeking to reduce Dutch and English influence, named René Charbonneau Governor of the island of Phuket

Phuket Province

Phuket , formerly known as Thalang and, in Western sources, Junk Ceylon , is one of the southern provinces of Thailand...

, a position which he held until 1685. Phuket was already highly valued at that time for its production of tin

Tin

Tin is a chemical element with the symbol Sn and atomic number 50. It is a main group metal in group 14 of the periodic table. Tin shows chemical similarity to both neighboring group 14 elements, germanium and lead and has two possible oxidation states, +2 and the slightly more stable +4...

. Charbonneau had received orders from king Narai to allow ships of all nations to trade freely in Phuket. In 1686, Charbonneau was replaced in this position by Sieur de Billy, the former maître d'hôtel

Maître d'hôtel

The maître d’hôtel in the original French language is literally the "master of the hotel". In a suitably staffed restaurant or hotel, it is the person in charge of assigning customers to tables and dividing the dining area into areas of responsibility for the various servers on duty. The plural...

 of the French ambassador to Siam Chevalier de Chaumont.

René Charbonneau also worked as a nurse in the French hospital established in 1669 in Ayutthaya

Ayutthaya kingdom

Ayutthaya was a Siamese kingdom that existed from 1350 to 1767. Ayutthaya was friendly towards foreign traders, including the Chinese, Vietnamese , Indians, Japanese and Persians, and later the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and French, permitting them to set up villages outside the walls of the...

 by the Catholic Bishops Lambert and Ballue, with Father Laneau

Louis Laneau

Louis Laneau was a French Bishop of the 17th century who was active in the kingdom of Siam . He was a member of the Paris Foreign Missions Society...

as the head doctor. The hospital provided medical care to about 200-300 people daily.