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

• Published in: Polar Record
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1950
• Subjects: General Earth and Planetary Sciences; Ecology; Geography, Planning and Development; Antarctic; The Antarctic; South Shetland Islands; Miers; Antarc*; Polar Record
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0032247400045186; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0032247400045186

[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, Mid n 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.