THE VOYAGE OF THE HURON AND THE HUNTRESS 



sort of Emeline, under Captain Henfield, anchored off Volunteer Bay, close 



by.'' 



The Hero and Express then sailed for Staten Land, off the eastern coast of 

 Tierra del Fucgo, close by Cape Horn. Here they lay for three days. If an 

 agreement had been made to rendezvous at Port Hatches here, no one will 

 ever know, as no written evidence exists, but this had been a well-known pro- 

 visioning place for sealers for many years. 



On November 4, 1820, the Hero and Express got under way for their voyage 

 to the South Shetlands. Captain Palmer recorded a five-day cruise south-south- 

 east and on November 10, 1820, while anxiously looking for the Land, "sighted 

 Mount Pesca (Smith Island) 30 miles away." The weather coming on thick 

 they tacked off and on until 4 o'clock on the afternoon of November 12, when 

 they stood in for Rugged Island, a small island off Livingston Island. 



At the mouth of the harbor, the Hero was met by a whaleboat from the 

 Hersilia, Captain Sheffield on board.^* Wrote Palmer: ". . . he informed us he 

 had run in 12 days and that the Frederick and Freegift, Capt Pendleton and 

 Dunbar, were in a harbor on the opposite side of the strait." 



The Hero came in to anchor alongside the Hersilia, followed some hours 

 later by the Express. Then they lowered a whaleboat and were rowed across 

 the strait three miles to President Harbor, where they went alongside the 

 Frederick and Freegift and were greeted there by their Stonington compatriots. 

 The Fanning fleet was together for the first time, and thousands of miles from 

 the home port of Stonington. 



On the western side of Livingston (largest of the South Shetland Islands) 

 is President Harbor, called by the British "New Plymouth." A few miles away, 

 the English sealers had already arrived and had set up camps along Livingston's 

 north shore all the way from Start Point to Shirreff's Cape. This possession 

 of the beaches in this region had an important bearing on the subsequent ac- 

 tivities of the American sealers. 



[20] 



