214 SIEGE OF THE SOUTH POLE 
1838, the Secretary of the Navy, passing over several 
senior officers, gave orders to Lieutenant Charles Wilkes, 
then forty years of age, to undertake the command and 
reorganise the whole expedition. Wilkes was much 
surprised at the appointment, but, after insisting that it 
should first be offered to all the officers above him in the 
service he accepted the task, well-knowing that it was be- 
set with more than ordinary difficulties. A month later 
he was informed that the squadron assigned to him would 
consist of the sloops of war Vincennes and Peacock, the 
brig Porpoise and the store-ship Relief, the last being 
the only vessel of the larger squadron originally intended 
for the purpose, and although new a very slow ship. 
Two pilotboats, the Sea Gull and the Flying Fish were 
subsequently added. 
The official orders describing the scope and aims of 
the expedition were dated August nth, 1838, and signed 
by J. K. Paulding of the Navy Department. The fol- 
lowing quotations from this document are necessary in 
order to understand the real object of the expedition and 
to show how far the ships were intended to work in the 
polar seas. 
“ The Congress of the United States, having in view 
the important interests of our commerce embarked in 
the whale-fisheries, and other adventures in the great 
Southern Ocean, by an Act of the 18th of May, 1836, 
authorized an Expedition to be fitted out for the purpose 
of exploring and surveying that sea, as well to deter- 
mine the existence of all doubtful islands and shoals, 
as to discover and accurately fix the position of those 
which lie in or near the track of our vessels in that 
quarter, and may have escaped the observation of scien- 
tific navigators. . . You will accordingly take your 
