James Horsburgh
James Horsburgh (28 September 1762 – 14 May 1836) was a
Life
Born at
James Horsburgh was the author of the precisely titled Directions for Sailing to and from the East Indies, China, New Holland, Cape of Good Hope, and the interjacent Ports, compiled chiefly from original Journals and Observations made during 21 years' experience in navigating those Seas, also known as the 'India Directory'.[2]
Horsburgh's Directory became the standard work for oriental navigation in the first half of the 19th century, until
Legacy
Robert Moresby, during his survey of the Maldives in 1834, named a small atoll south of Southern Maalhosmadulhu Atoll after James Horsburgh as a homage to his valuable previous hydrographic work.
Horsburgh Island in the Cocos (Keeling) Islands is also named after him as is the Horsburgh Lighthouse, located on Pedra Branca, Singapore, the construction of which was funded by a group of British merchants in Canton, China (now Guangzhou).[1]
Horsburgh was the first to document the island now known as Spratly Island, naming it Storm Island. However, Richard Spratly's sighting eventually become the vernacular and led to the naming of the entire region as the Spratly Islands.[4]
Works
- James Horsburgh (1817). India Sailing Directory. Chart Office, East India House – via Internet Archive.
See also
- Atolls of the Maldives
- Alexander Dalrymple, 1st Hydrographer of the Navy
- Fulhadu
- Horsburgh Atoll
- Robert Moresby
References
- ^ a b Chakravorty, Capt. Raj S (2008), "James Horsburgh", Hydro International, 12 (7), archived from the original on 2014-03-07, retrieved 2008-12-13
- ^ Alfred C. Haddon, Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits-Vol 1 General Ethnography
- ^ "Library and Archive Catalogue". Royal Society. Retrieved 21 November 2010.[permanent dead link]
- ^ Hancox & Prescott 1995, pp. 14–15.
Bibliography
- Hancox, David; Prescott, Victor (1995), Schofield, Clive (ed.), "A Geographical Description of the Spratly Islands and an Account of Hydrographic Surveys Amongst Those Islands", Maritime Briefing, 1 (6), UK: International Boundaries Research Unit, ISBN 1-897643-18-7
External links
- Electric Scotland, a major educational resource on Scottish History.