> 
WM. H. CROCKER, 
President Board of Trustees 
' SUSIE M. PEERS, 
Secretary Board of Trustees 
California Academy of Sciences 
GOLDEN GATE PARK 
San Francisco, California 
Telephone bXyview 5100 
F. M. MAC FARLAND, 
President of the Academy and Acting 
Director of the Museum and of the 
Steinhart Aquarium’ 
down towards the heach just to the northward of the north 
point of James Bay and this one with the inscriptions is 
the largest of them. You no douot can get a chart at the 
Hydrographic Office giving the detail of the James Island 
anchorage and this will give you the correct location. 
You will no doubt find the name of the Schooner ACADEMY 
there too. Possibly the weather has worn some of the names 
by this time , out you will no doubt find several old Hew 
Bedford whalers. You might keep your eye open for the 
name of the Frigate ESSEX. That would be q.uite a find. I 
do not rememDer seeing it and it may not be there. However, 
it wotild be well to oe on the lookout for it. I have tried 
to find out something aoout the location of Lieutenant Cowans 
grave at James Bay, but there does not seem to be any mention 
as to the exact location. I got Mr. Parker, of the British 
Museum, to look at the Log of the Frigate” Briton” which is 
on file at the Admiralty Offices, to see if he made any 
mention of it as he was the party who discovered it during 
the cruise of the British Frigate BRITON in 1817. The 
data regarding the stop at James Bay is very meagre and 
mentions only the fact that a landing party went ashore and 
brought off some tortoises. Most of the entries in .the Log 
for that day seem to oe concerning the stores issued. Our 
own Navy Department has no record of it either, but if you 
go there it would oe a good thing to see if there was any 
signs of a grave in oack of the oeach opposite the landing, 
I shoilLd think there would be some sign of a circle of lava 
blocks or some such sign, I couldn’t imagine it oeing disturbed 
to any extent even at this late date. The original log of the 
ESSEX was lost no doubt, out Porter in his Journal of a Cruise 
to the Pacific mentions the fact that the duel between Cowan 
and a brother officer took place and that Cowan was buried 
where he fell at James Bay. Porter’s letters back to the Navy 
Department mention the death of Cowan, but only in a list of 
deaths on board the frigate, and his name was listed according 
to rank, I got this information from the Captain in charge of 
historical documents at the Navy Department, I think it would 
oe quite a thing to discover this grave. Should you do so 
it would be nice to photograph it, or even see if there were 
any remains left of the casket made oy the ship’s carpenter. 
It would be well to photograph the ships names if you locate 
them in the gulley north of James Bay, I was thinking it would 
De a great event in the cruise of the VELERO to b'ring the 
remains, should they be discovered, back to Arlington for 
interment. 
