THE VOYAGE OF THE HURON AND THE HUNTRESS 



in the meantime collected cargo for a return voyage to Valparaiso. It was not 

 until early October, 1819, that he again reached the islands and on October 17 

 he landed and took formal possession in the name of King George III, naming 

 them New South Britain.* 



Once more at Valparaiso, Smith learned that Captain Shirreff had gone into 

 the country. Smith wrote an important dispatch to the naval officer and while 

 awaiting a reply took a freight of British machinery aboard, consigned to 

 Concan Bay in the name of a young engineer, John Miers. 



It was Miers, a well-read man, who persuaded Smith to rename the group 

 the New South Shetlands.'* The enthusiastic engineer was planning to charter 

 the brig for a cruise to the islands when Captain Shirreff, having thoroughly 

 digested Smith's dispatch, decided to charter the Williams in the King's name 

 as a surveying vessel. Edward Bransfield, the Andromache's sailing master, was 

 placed in command of the brig, with Smith as pilot. Midshipmen Blake, Bone 

 and Poyneter of the frigate were also assigned to the Williams as was Surgeon 

 Adam Young of the H.M.S. Slaney. 



On December 19, 1819, the Williams sailed. Captain Shirreff's "Instruc- 

 tions" leave no doubt as to his awareness of the possibility that this new land 

 might be part of Cook's "Southern Thule." Bransfield was told to explore, 

 chart and observe every detail.'' 



In the meantime, the news of the discovery was being sent to the United 

 States as well as England. Miers himself wrote an excellent account, drawn 

 firsthand from Smith's records and mailed it in January, 1820.'^ This eventually, 

 with a small chart, appeared in a publication in Edinburgh several months later. 

 In a letter written to Dr. Samuel L. Mitchell about this same time, a Mr. J. 

 Robinson, an American then residing in Valparaiso, described the discovery of 

 the islands, adding: "Perhaps new sources of wealth, happiness, power and 

 revenue would be disclosed."^ This letter, however, came to New York via 

 England and did not arrive until September, 1820. By that time a number of 

 New England vessels had been dispatched by American merchants who had 

 learned of the South Shetlands from other sources. Meanwhile, Captain Smith 

 had taken the Williams to the islands south of Cape Horn, where he arrived 

 on January 16, 1820.^ Bransfield immediately began his work of charting the 

 chain of islands ranging for 300 miles in a generally south-southwest to north- 

 northeast direction between 53° and 63° west longitude and 61° and 63° south 

 latitude. These were eight large islands, two small, and an innumerable number 

 of smaller islets. Tide-swept straits, twisting channels and iron-bound shores 

 combined with ice, fog, snow, sleet and gales to make navigation extremely 

 difficult. 



The mountainous South Shetlands, covered with snow most of the year, the 

 highest peaks in the clouds, with desolate shore and no vegetation, were a grim 

 landfall. But their great potential was from the sea — the accessible beaches 

 being the breeding ground for thousands of seals. Smith described these rook- 

 eries as being so closely occupied that the seals appeared to be "stowed in 



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