He held the title of baron and may have been of corsair descent[1] (see Robert Surcouf).
From at least 1906–1911, he was head of zoology at the colonial laboratory of the Paris National Museum of Natural History.
In 1909 he published a description of four new species of horse-fly (Tabanidae) from India and Assam with Gertrude Ricardo, a scientist from the British Museum.
[6][1] Surcouf was a difficult person to work with and clashed with his peers, particularly, for example, Eugene Seguy.
[1] In 1920 he distinguished the genus Caiusa from Phumosia in the family Calliphoridae based on flies he discovered in southern India and in Australia.