Henry Barber was an 18th-century

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

sea captain A sea captain, ship's captain, captain, master, or shipmaster, is a high-grade licensed mariner who holds ultimate command and responsibility of a merchant vessel.Aragon and Messner, 2001, p.3. The captain is responsible for the safe and efficie ...

, credited with the discovery of

McKean Island McKean Island is a small, uninhabited island in the Phoenix Islands, Republic of Kiribati. Its area is . Kiribati declared the Phoenix Islands Protected Area in 2006, with the park being expanded in 2008. The 164,200-square-mile (425,300-square ...

, in the

Phoenix group Phoenix Group Holdings plc (formerly Pearl Group plc) is a provider of insurance services based in London, England. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. History The company was founded in 1857 as ...

in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

Sailing history

Barber operated merchant routes from India and America to the new settlement at

Port Jackson Port Jackson, consisting of the waters of Sydney Harbour, Middle Harbour, North Harbour and the Lane Cove and Parramatta Rivers, is the ria or natural harbour of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The harbour is an inlet of the Tasman Sea (p ...

. Barber was responsible for the first recorded western shipwreck in the Hawaiian Islands. On October 31, 1796, the British brig ''Arthur'', commanded by Captain Henry Barber, struck a coral shoal off what is now called

Barbers Point Naval Air Station Barbers Point , on O'ahu, also called John Rodgers Field (the original name of Honolulu International Airport), is a former United States Navy airfield closed in 1999, and renamed Kalaeloa Airport. Parts of the former air station ...

, O‘ahu, and was driven onto the rocks. Six of the twenty-two men aboard were swept to their deaths while struggling to get a boat off.

Discovery of McKean Island

Captain Barber made four voyages to the Pacific North West between 1794 and 1804. While captaining the British ship ''Arthur'' on a journey from

Botany Bay Botany Bay (Dharawal: ''Kamay''), an open oceanic embayment, is located in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, south of the Sydney central business district. Its source is the confluence of the Georges River at Taren Point and the Cook ...

, New South Wales to the north-west coast of

America The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

in 1794, Barber discovered what is believed to be McKean Island. Sighting the uninhabited island on 28 May, Barber named it "Drummond's Island", plotting it at 3°40'S, 176°51'W.Maude, p 109 The ''Albany Sentinel'' reported that the "small sandy island...is very low and cannot be seen from the deck of a vessel more than five or six miles".''The Albany Sentinel'', 28.8.1797, quoted in Maude, p 109 It was later named 'Arthur Island' and appeared as such in Arrowsmith's charts of the time located at 3°30'S, 176°0'W.Sharp, p 210 The closest island to these coordinates is McKean Island at 3°35'S, 174°02'W, which was renamed and mapped by

Charles Wilkes Charles Wilkes (April 3, 1798 – February 8, 1877) was an American naval officer, ship's captain, and explorer. He led the United States Exploring Expedition (1838–1842). During the American Civil War (1861–1865), he commanded ' during the ...

of the

United States Exploring Expedition The United States Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842 was an exploring and surveying expedition of the Pacific Ocean and surrounding lands conducted by the United States. The original appointed commanding officer was Commodore Thomas ap Catesby ...

1838-1842. However, Arthur Island remained suspected and 'in need of confirmation' until at least 1871, when it was listed in ''Findlay's Directory'', using the charts of cartographer John Arrowsmith.

Notes

References

* Maude, H.E., (1968) ''Of Islands and Men: Studies in Pacific History'', Melbourne:

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

* Quanchi, Max & Robson, John, (2005); ''Historical Dictionary of the Discovery and Exploration of the Pacific Islands'', USA: Scarecrow Press, * Sharp, Andrew (1960); ''The Discovery of the Pacific Islands'', Oxford:Oxford University Press, {{DEFAULTSORT:Barber, Henry Year of birth missing Year of death missing British sailors British explorers of the Pacific History of Kiribati Fur traders