Page 3 - Newsletter Spring 2023

More about Vancouver’s expedition...

In command of the HMS Discovery,
(a 10-gun sloop-of-war), and its tender,
the HMS Chatham, (a 4-gun survey
brig), Captain George Vancouver de-
parted England in April 1791.
The 34-year-old Captain’s mission
was to explore, chart and expand Brit-
ain’s claims in the Pacific, including the
Northwest.
After first traveling to South Africa,
Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, and
Hawaii, his crew surveyed the coasts Members of Vancouver’s Discovery expedition surveyed what would be named Port Town-
of present-day Oregon and Washington shend. The indigenous poles were strung with nets on which to catch ducks.
and northward to present day Canada
and Alaska. Salish Sea or “whulge” (meaning salt tween Whidbey and Mukilteo north
water) as the Coast Salish called it. to Everett) and Possession Point
Vancouver entered the Strait of Juan at the southeastern part of Whidbey
de Fuca, April 29, 1792. His crew sur- Island, were so named when Van-
veyed the area, including the waters couver declared the entire area to be
around Whidbey Island, in longboats. a possession of King George for the
Although areas already had indigenous King’s birthday.
names, these explorers named moun- Puget’s Sound was named for Dis-
tains, harbors, islands, and passages in covery’s 2nd Lieutenant Peter Puget,
their own language. Capt. Vancouver who explored its southern reaches.
was ordered to label as many places with Port Townshend (the ‘h’ was later
British names as possible to strengthen dropped) was named for Vancouver’s
Painting by Steve Mayo of the HMS Discov- British sovereignty. friend, the Marquis of Townshend..
ery & Chatham becalmed in Rosario Strait Indigenous people had lived in the Mount Baker was named after Dis-
area for more than 12,000 years. Their covery’s 3rd Lieutenant Joseph Baker,
Vancouver was not the first to explore descendants formed various Coast Sal- the first on the expedition to spot it
the region. Spain had sent several expe- ish tribes who spoke Lushootseed, a Port Gardner and Port Susan,
ditions, which is why some places car- common language with different dia- were named after former commander
ry Spanish names, including the Strait lects, though without written language. Vice Admiral Sir Alan Gardner and his
of Juan deFuca (after a Greek naviga- Tscha-kole-chy was the Salishan name wife Susannah, Lady Gardner.
tor who sailed on a Spanish ship and given to the island considered to be a ‘par- At age 37, Vancouver returned to
claimed to have discovered the Straits adise’ by the local tribes: primarily the an England at war with France. The
in 1592). Swinomish (far north), Skagit (north and importance of the expedition to the
On April 11, 1792 Vancouver en- central) and Snohomish (south). Americas took a back seat to the war.
countered American explorer Captain Capt. Vancouver named the island af- Vancouver was in ill health from
Robert Gray, off the coast of Oregon. ter his Sailing Master, Joseph Whidbey, the voyage. His death at age 40 large-
A month later Gray entered the estuary and it was written on his map as “Whid- ly went unnoticed by the empire he
of the Columbia River. (Gray had been bey’s Island.” It underwent several der- had served for so many years at sea.
unable to enter the river, which he had ivations in print over the decades such The HMS Discovery later served as
named Columbia, on an earlier voyage as “Whitby’s Is- a ‘bomb vessel’ capable
he had made to the northwest in 1788.) land” and “Whid- of firing mortars in the
Decades later Gray’s exploration would by Island” until it Battle of Copenhagen,
prove pivotal in settling where the U.S. finally came into then became a hospital
– Canadian border would be located. common use as ship, and lastly served
Captain James Cook and British pri- “Whidbey Island” as a convict ship or pris-
vateer Sir Francis Drake had also sailed in the early 1950s. on hulk (left). She was
off the Oregon and Washington coasts. Possession broken up in 1834 in
but it was Vancouver who charted the Sound (located be- Deptford, England.
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