DISCOVERY HMS 1791 (Vancouver)

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aukepalmhof
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Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2009 1:28 am

DISCOVERY HMS 1791 (Vancouver)

Post by aukepalmhof » Thu Oct 22, 2009 8:48 pm

To celebrate the 250th anniversary of Captain Vancouver’s birth and honour his accomplishments on 22 June 2007, Canada Post issued a single international rate stamp. The stamp depict Captain George Vancouver standing by the railing of the DISCOVERY looking to the coast.

The Canada Post has the following info by the stamp.
http://www.canadapost.ca/personal/colle ... etail=2027

The first hint of Captain Vancouver’s desire to make history probably came when he was an ambitious 16 year-old seaman serving on Captain James Cook’s ship the RESOLUTION, during Cook’s second great voyage. Cook sailed with the intention of determining whether an Antarctic continent really existed by exploring the Antarctic region and the South Pacific. Just before RESOLUTION turned north after having sailed as far south as was possible, Vancouver climbed the bowsprit leaning out over the Antarctic sea toward the polar ice, and established his claim of having been “nearer the south pole than any other man”.
By his mid-twenties, he had narrowly escaped death on the island of Hawaii (the day before Captain James Cook was killed on the same island) sailed the world twice and gained his first commission.

As captain of the DISCOVERY, Vancouver is credited with undertaking the last of the great voyages of exploration embarked upon by 18th century European sailors.
During this expedition, he oversaw the return of British territory and property from the Spanish at Nootka and created the first accurate map of the northwest Pacific coast, exploring from the tip of Vancouver Island to the southern end of the Alaska panhandle. He bestowed almost 400 place names that are still used today, including the largest island on the west coast of North America and Canada’s largest west-coast city, which both carry the name Vancouver.

“The importance of Vancouver’s achievements, which went largely unnoticed until after his death, have significant bearing in today’s world,” explains stamp designer Niko Potton of Fleming Design in Vancouver.
“Despite being a long way from home and being treated poorly by the (British) Admiralty upon his return, Vancouver selflessly served his King and country by fulfilling his duty. It’s that self-sacrifice that to me is the mark of a great man with a great character. I wanted to create a design that focused on the man himself and captured the solitary and isolation position in which he found himself, geographically and personally.

The detail-oriented stamp features a solitary image of Vancouver standing onboard ship, gazing out toward the horizon. The stamp also features a stunning reproduction of Vancouver’s authenticate signature running vertical down the right-hand side of the stamp. Permission to use the signature comes courtesy of the British Columbia Archives.

Built in 1789 as a wooden merchant vessel by Randall & Co. Rotherhithe.
November 1789 bought by the British Admiralty.
Launched under the name HMS DISCOVERY.
Tonnage 330 ton (bm), dim. 99.2 x 28.3 x 12.4ft. (30.2 x 8.6 x 3.77m.)
Armament: 10 – 4pdrs. short, 10 - ½pdr. swivels.
Crew 100.
February 1791 commissioned under command of Cmdr. George Vancouver.

When trouble was brewing between Spain and Great Britain over control of lands in the Pacific Northwest in 1789, and after a favourable resolution for Great Britain was made of the Nootka Sound controversy in 1790, the English fitted out two ships the DISCOVERY and the tender CHATHAM to survey all the waters and inlets, and to look for a Northwest passage between Cape Mendocine (30ºN) and Cook Inlet (60ºN).

01 April 1791 the two ships sailed from Falmouth, and after making calls at Tenerife and Cape Town, she headed east making landfall at Cape Chatham, Australia on 28 September, made a surveys of the west coast of Australia, then Dusky Bay, New Zealand where she arrived on 02 November 1791.

Then the two ships headed for Tahiti, during bad visibility the two ships lost contact, and the CHATHAM discovered a group of islands east of New Zealand which she named after the ship Chatham Islands.

The Chatham joined the DISCOVERY again at Tahiti, and after a three week stay there together the two ships sailed to Hawaii, where she arrived early March, sailing mid-March bound for the west coast on North America. A month later the Oregon coast was sighted, where after the two ships headed north along the coast.
End April she were off the Juan de Fuca, and the two ships sailed to Discovery Bay for repairs.
From this base she explored Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands, and there they met the Spanish vessels SUTIL and MEXICANA also on a survey voyage, the relations between the British and Spanish vessels were friendly.
06 August 1792 at 4 a.m. the Discovery grounded on rocks in the Queen Charlotte’s Sound, after throwing overboard ballast, wood and water at least she got free again, without much damage.

October 1792 the DISCOVERY sailed south leaving behind the CHATHAM.
14 November 1792 she arrived at Yerba Buena now San Francisco, she was the first non-Spanish ship to sail into San Francisco Bay.
15 January 1793 she sailed from Mendocino bound for Hawaii where she arrived on 12 February, she made a survey of the islands before she headed back to the North West coast of America.
20 May she arrived at Puget Sound, the two ships surveyed the Queen Charlotte Sound including Elcho Harbour on Dean Channel, by the end of the second season, Vancouver’s expedition had charted so far 1700 miles of coast from29 56N to about 56 N.
Then she headed back to Hawaii to finish the surveys of these islands.
Then the two ships sailed back to the North American coast, shortly after departing Hawaii the two ships separated, coming together again on 06 May.
DISCOVERY in the meantime sighted Chirikof Island and proceeded to the Cook’s Inlet on 12 April, after finding out that it was not a river the DISCOVERY sailed around the Kenai Peninsula and made a survey of the Prince William Sound.
In the end of the summer season she completed surveys and charted the northern end of the Alexander Archipelago, after a call at Cape Decision on the southern end of Chichagof Island in 1793, the two ships
Sailed for California.
02 December 1794 the two ships sailed from Monterey and after calling at Maria Magdalena, Cocos Island, the Galapagos and Valparaiso before passing Cape Horn and sailing in the Atlantic, arriving 03 July 1795 at St Helena.
At St Helena they were informed that Great Britain was in War with the Netherlands and thereafter she seized the Dutch East Indiaman MACASSAR who was underway from Cape Town to the Netherlands.
The CHATHAM was dispatched to Brazil as an escort.
15 July DISCOVERY sailed from St Helena, and she arrived at Shannon on 13 September 1795.
The DICOVERY and CHATHAM arrived Deptford in October 1795.
Of her original crew only 5 men died during the five year voyage.
Thereafter laid up.
1798 Fitted out as a bomb vessel.
July 1795 re-commissioned under command of Cmdr John Dick, October 1800 relieved by Cmdr. John Conn.
October 1801 decommissioned.
June 1803 re-commissioned under Cmdr. John Joyce, relieved on June 1804 by Cmdr. Charles Pickford.
1808 Fitted out as convict ship in Sheerness.
1818 At Woolwich as convict ship.
1834 Broken up.

More on Vancouver is given on: http://www.shipstamps.co.uk/forum/viewt ... allery]/0/

Australia 1991 $1.05 sg1303, scott1226.
Canada 2007 $1.55, sg?, scott?

Source: Some web-sites. Voyages of Delusions by Glyn Williams. Ships of the World by Lincoln P.Paine.
British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793-1817.
Attachments
CA021.07.jpg
tmp1CE.jpg
Discovery 1791 (Small).jpg
SG1303
SG1303

aukepalmhof
Posts: 7771
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2009 1:28 am

Re: DISCOVERY HMS 1791 (Vancouver)

Post by aukepalmhof » Mon Nov 27, 2017 6:38 pm

In the 18th century, new scientific equipment allowed explorers to survey land and sea with greater accuracy than ever before. Some of George Vancouver's maps, in fact, are still in use today. Trained as map-maker under Captain James Cook, Vancouver undertook a round-the-world voyage from 1791 to 1795, covering 105,000 kilometres. He surveyed the west coast from 30o to 60o N., and was so intent on mapping the coastline that he missed the Columbia River. Nevertheless, he would eventually dispel the myth that a Northwest Passage existed at these latitudes. Artist Frederick Hagan of Newmarket, Ontario painted these four images, third in the series of Exploration stamps. Using a palette of vivid colours, he depicts the lands carted by four 18th century explorers. His imaginative backgrounds detail charts, map-making tools and the DISCOVERY, the ship Vancouver sailed on his voyage around the world.

Source: Canada Post Corporation. [Postage Stamp Press Release], 1988.
Canada 1988 37c sg 1286, scott?
Attachments
Discovery_1789_Vancouver.jpg
1988 discovery.jpg

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