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James Horsburgh (28 September 176214 May 1836) was a
Electric Scotland
a major educational resource on Scottish History. {{DEFAULTSORT:Horsburgh, James 1762 births 1834 deaths Fellows of the Royal Society People from Elie and Earlsferry Scottish cartographers Scottish hydrographers
James Horsburgh (28 September 176214 May 1836) was a Scottish
Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including:
*Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland
*Scottish English
*Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...
hydrographer
Hydrography is the branch of applied sciences which deals with the measurement and description of the physical features of oceans, seas, coastal areas, lakes and rivers, as well as with the prediction of their change over time, for the primary ...
. He worked for the British East India Company
The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...
, (EIC) and mapped many seaways around Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
in the late 18th century and early 19th century.
Life
Born at Elie, Fife, Horsburgh went to sea at the age of 16 and was captured and imprisoned by the French atDunkirk
Dunkirk (french: Dunkerque ; vls, label= French Flemish, Duunkerke; nl, Duinkerke(n) ; , ;) is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France.West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Great ...
and Calcutta
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comm ...
. In May 1786, aboard the EIC ship ''Atlas'' he sailed from Batavia to Ceylon
Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...
as first mate and was subsequently shipwrecked on the island of Diego Garcia
Diego Garcia is an island of the British Indian Ocean Territory, a disputed overseas territory of the United Kingdom. It is a militarised atoll just south of the equator in the central Indian Ocean, and the largest of the 60 small islands ...
. This disaster influenced him in his decision to produce accurate maps after he found his way back to India
India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...
and while on board another ship employed in trade with China.
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'.
Horsburgh's Directory became the standard work for oriental navigation in the first half of the 19th century, until Robert Moresby's survey of the treacherous coral groups in the central Indian Ocean, when for the first time in history accurate maps of the areas that were in the way of the main trade routes: the Maldives
The Maldives, officially the Republic of Maldives,, ) and historically known as the Maldive Islands, is a country and archipelagic state in South Asia in the Indian Ocean. The Maldives is southwest of Sri Lanka and India, about from the A ...
, Chagos
The Chagos Archipelago () or Chagos Islands (formerly the Bassas de Chagas, and later the Oil Islands) is a group of seven atolls comprising more than 60 islands in the Indian Ocean about 500 kilometres (310 mi) south of the Maldives archi ...
and Laccadives, were published. In March, 1806 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society
Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathematic ...
Legacy
Robert Moresby, during his survey of the Maldives in 1834, named a small atoll south ofSouthern Maalhosmadulhu Atoll
Southern Maalhosmadulu Atoll (code name Baa) is an administrative division of the Maldives. It consists of two separate natural atolls, namely the southern part of Maalhosmadulhu Atoll (which is 42 km long and 32 km wide and consists of ...
after James Horsburgh as a homage to his valuable previous hydrographic work.
Horsburgh Island in the Cocos (Keeling) Islands
)
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is also named after him as is the Horsburgh Lighthouse
Horsburgh Lighthouse (Chinese: ; ms, Rumah Api Horsburgh; ta, ஹோர்ஸ்பர் கலங்கரை விளக்கம்) is an active lighthouse which marks the eastern entrance to the Straits of Singapore. It is situated on t ...
, located on Pedra Branca, Singapore, the construction of which was funded by a group of British merchants in Canton, China (now Guangzhou
Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong ...
).
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
The Spratly Islands ( fil, Kapuluan ng Kalayaan; zh, c=南沙群島/南沙群岛, s=, t=, p=Nánshā Qúndǎo; Malay, id, Kepulauan Spratly; vi, Quần đảo Trường Sa) are a disputed archipelago in the South China Sea. Composed ...
.
Works
*See also
*Atolls of the Maldives
The Maldives are formed by 20 natural atolls, along with a few islands and isolated reefs today which form a pattern stretching from 7 degrees 10′ North to 0 degrees 45′ South. The largest of these atolls is Boduthiladhunmathi, while th ...
*Alexander Dalrymple
Alexander Dalrymple FRS (24 July 1737 – 19 June 1808) was a Scottish geographer and the first Hydrographer of the British Admiralty. He was the main proponent of the theory that there existed a vast undiscovered continent in the South ...
, 1st Hydrographer of the Navy
The Hydrographer of the Navy is the principal hydrographical Royal Naval appointment. From 1795 until 2001, the post was responsible for the production of charts for the Royal Navy, and around this post grew the United Kingdom Hydrographic Offic ...
* Fehendu / Fulhadu
*Horsburgh Atoll
Goidhoo (Dhivehi language, Dhivehi: ގޮއިދޫ) is one of the inhabited islands of Southern Maalhosmadulhu Atoll, code letter "Baa".
History
In the 19th century, a female African Arab slave trade, slave who had been bought by the king on his Ha ...
* Robert Moresby
References
Bibliography *External links
Electric Scotland
a major educational resource on Scottish History. {{DEFAULTSORT:Horsburgh, James 1762 births 1834 deaths Fellows of the Royal Society People from Elie and Earlsferry Scottish cartographers Scottish hydrographers