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John Miers' account of the discovery of the South Shetland Islands

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

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Extract

[The South Shetland Islands were first sighted in February 1819 by William Smith, master and part-owner of the brig Williams of Blyth, and resighted in October of that year, when Smith landed and claimed the territory for the British Crown. On his arrival at Valparaiso, he and his ship were taken over by the British naval authorities and sent back in December 1819 with Edward Bransfield, Master, R.N., and a small naval staff to survey the new territory. During their absence on this duty, an account of the discovery by John Miers and a sketchmap signed by “Henry Foster, Midn H.M.S. Creole”, both dated January 1820, were sent home. The former was published in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, Vol. 3, No. 6, 1820, p. 367–80, and the latter is preserved among the original documents of the Hydrographic Department of the Admiralty (Press mark S 90/3 Ael).

John Miers (1789–1879) was an English engineer who had gone out to Valparaiso in 1819 at the invitation of Lord Cochrane, then commanding the Chilean Navy, to help in developing that country's mineral resources. He was installing a plant at Conc6n for rolling copper plate for sheathing vessels, and had contracted with Smith for the transport of mining machinery from Valparaiso to Concón in the Williams, when Captain Sheriff, the Senior British Naval Officer at Valparaiso, decided to charter the Williams and to send Bransfield to the Antarctic.

Type
Research Article
Information
Polar Record , Volume 5 , Issue 40 , July 1950 , pp. 565 - 575
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1950

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References

1 [The following notes may help readers to follow the text:

Admiral and Lady Cochrane.

2 The brig Williams, 216 tons, was built at Blyth in 1813.Google Scholar

3 This landfall was in the neighbourhood of what is now called Williams Point, Livingston Island. Smith's own account, in his manuscript Memorial to the Admiralty dated 31 December 1821 (Public Records Office, Adm. In letters, 5029; Pro. S. 498. 1821), reads as follows: “On the 19th aforesaid at 7 a.m. Land or ice was discovered bearing South East by South distance two or three leagues—strong gales from the South West accompanied with Snow or Sleet—wore ship to the Northward, at 10 a.m. more moderate and clear, wore Ship to the Southward and made sail for the Land—at 11 rounded a large Ice Berg; at noon, fine and pleasant weather—Latitude by Observation 62dg 15m South—Longitude by Chronometer 60d 01m West—steering in a South South East direction—at 4 p.m. made the land bearing from S.S.E. to S.E. by E. distance about 10 miles, hove to, and having satisfied ourselves of land hauled to the Westward and made sail on our voyage to Valparaiso.”

4 Smith's account in bis Memorial (loc. cit.) reads as follows: “…the Americans at that Port and Buenos Ayres offered your Memorialist large sums of Money to make known unto them the Discovery he had made, but your Memorialist having the Good of his Country at heart (if any should be derived from such Discovery) and as he had not taken possession of the land in the name of his Sovereign Lord the King resisted all the offers from the said Americans, determined again to re-visit the new-discovered land.”

5 Smith used Ship Time—now obsolete. In that system the day began at noon, not at midnight, and twelve hours before the ordinary Civil Day. This landfall was therefore on 14 October, Civil Date.

6 Smith says that he landed himself. His Memorial (loc. cit.) reads: “On the 17th day of October 1819—your Memorialist landed and took formal possession of the new-discovered land in the Name of His Majesty George the Third and named the land New South Britain, and after making every possible discovery, made sail for Valparaiso.” Converting to Civil Date, this landing was on 16 October. The position was near the north-eastern point of what is now called King George Island.

7 Capt. William H. Shirreff, R.N., senior naval officer on the west coast of South America. Probably what is now called Shirreff Cove on Livingston Island.

8 It is most improbable that Smith really reported seeing sea-otters in the South Shetlands; still less Ornithorhynchus, the Duck-billed Platypus. These speculations were probably added by Miers.

9 Probably what are now called Nelson, Robert and Greenwich Islands.

10 Now called Rugged Island.

11 Now called Williams Point on Livingston Island.

12 No such observation is mentioned in Smith's Memorial; there are, of course, no trees. This information was probably added by Miers in his enthusiasm for the economic possibilities of the new land.

13 Now called Smith Island.

14 Concón.

15 Dalrymple's chart was published in April 1769.

16 le Sieur Ducloz Guyot, in the Spanish ship Léon, sighted and circumnavigated South Georgia in 1756.

17 Dalrymple took it from Ortelius's world-map of 1586.

18 See note 12.

19 The British settlement was withdrawn for reasons of economy in 1774, although the British still maintained their title. From 1820 onwards the Buenos Aires Government began to assert its claim to the islands, and it was not until 1833 that the British occupation was re-established.

20 Capt. Hall never visited the South Shetland Islands.]