|
Arniston, South Africa
Arniston is a small seaside settlement on the coast of the Overberg region of South Africa, close to Cape Agulhas, the southernmost tip of Africa. Prior to the wreck of , it is also known as Waenhuiskrans, an Afrikaans name meaning literally "Wagon house cliff", after a local sea cave large enough to accommodate a wagon and a span of oxen. Wreck of ''Arniston'' In May 1815, a British East Indiaman, ''Arniston'', was rounding the Cape in convoy on a journey to repatriate wounded British soldiers from Ceylon. The ship lacked a chronometer — an expensive instrument at the time — and consequently had to rely on other ships in the fleet to calculate the longitude of the group. After being separated from the convoy in heavy seas, the captain of ''Arniston'' was obliged to rely solely on dead reckoning to navigate. Thinking incorrectly that he was west of the Cape of Good Hope because of lack of headway, led to an incorrect assumption that Cape Agulhas was Cape Point. Consequently ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Ocean; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini; and it encloses Lesotho. Covering an area of , the country has Demographics of South Africa, a population of over 64 million people. Pretoria is the administrative capital, while Cape Town, as the seat of Parliament of South Africa, Parliament, is the legislative capital, and Bloemfontein is regarded as the judicial capital. The largest, most populous city is Johannesburg, followed by Cape Town and Durban. Cradle of Humankind, Archaeological findings suggest that various hominid species existed in South Africa about 2.5 million years ago, and modern humans inhabited the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Overberg
__NOTOC__ Overberg is a region in South Africa to the east of Cape Town beyond the Hottentots-Holland mountains. It lies along the Western Cape Province's south coast between the Cape Peninsula and the region known as the Garden Route in the east. The boundaries of the Overberg are the Hottentots-Holland mountains in the West; the Riviersonderend Mountains, part of the Cape Fold Belt, in the North; the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic and Indian Ocean, Indian Oceans in the South and the Breede River in the East. The area has always been considered as the breadbasket of the Cape and is largely given to grain farming — mainly wheat. The wheat fields are a major breeding ground for South Africa's national bird, the blue crane. Another important crop in the Overberg is fruit, with the Elgin, Western Cape, Elgin Valley producing about 60 percent of the total annual apple crop of about 819 000 tonnes (2012 data). Nestled in the Overberg, one can find the Kogelberg, Kogelberg Biospher ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Viscount Molesworth
Viscount Molesworth, of Swords in the County of Dublin, is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1716 for Robert Molesworth. He was made Lord Molesworth, Baron of Philipstown, of King's County, at the same time, also in the Peerage of Ireland. Molesworth had been invested as member of the Irish Privy Council in 1697, represented Camelford, Lostwithiel, East Retford and Mitchell in the British House of Commons and served as British Ambassador to Denmark. His elder son, the second Viscount, notably served as Ambassador to the Kingdom of Sardinia, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Republic of Venice. He was succeeded by his younger brother, the third Viscount. He was a Field Marshal in the Army. On the death of his son, the fourth Viscount, this line of the family failed, and the titles passed to the latter's first cousin, the fifth Viscount. He was the eldest son of the Hon. William Molesworth, third son of the first Viscount. His son, the sixth Viscount, was a Majo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
73rd (Perthshire) Regiment Of Foot
The 73rd Regiment of Foot was an infantry regiment of the British Army, raised in 1780. Under the Childers Reforms it amalgamated with the 42nd Regiment of Foot to form the Black Watch, Black Watch (Royal Highlanders) in 1881. History Formation The regiment was raised as the 2nd Battalion, 42nd Regiment of Foot, 42nd (Royal Highland) Regiment of Foot in March 1780, with eight officers from the 1st Battalion being detached to help raise the new battalion. The battalion was sent to India in January 1781 and took part in the siege of Mangalore in autumn 1783 during the Second Anglo-Mysore War. It was still in India when the battalion received regimental status in 1786 as the 73rd (Highland) Regiment of Foot. The new regiment remained in India and saw action at the Siege of Seringapatam (1792), siege of Seringapatam in 1792 during the Third Anglo-Mysore War,Cannon, p. 13 the Siege of Pondicherry (1793), siege of Pondicherry in August 1793 during the French Revolutionary Wars an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrew Geils
Colonel Andrew Geils ( – 11 February 1843) was a military officer of British (Scottish) heritage, who served as Commandant (acting governor) of Van Diemen's Land (subsequently Tasmania) between 1812 and 1813; prior to that time he served in Madras, India, and subsequently spent 2 years with his regiment in Ceylon. In around 1818, having failed in an aspiration to the Lieutenant-Governorship of Tasmania when the latter was due to became vacant in 1818, he returned to Scotland where in 1815 he had inherited one of his father's properties, Dumbuck Estate in West Dunbartonshire, and where he resided until his death in 1843. The Hobart suburb of Geilston Bay, Tasmania, Geilston Bay in Tasmania is named after his one time (1812–1832) land holdings in the area. Biography Early life Geils was "probably" born in India around 1773, the eldest son of Lieutenant-General Thomas Geils, born Greenock, Scotland, who was in command of the Madras artillery of the East India Company. Andr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Bell & Sons
George Bell & Sons was an English book publishing house. It was based in London and existed from 1839 to 1986. History George Bell & Sons was founded by George Bell as an educational bookseller, with the intention of selling the output of London university presses; but became best known as an independent publisher of classics and children's books. One of Bell's first investments in publishing was a series of ''Railway Companions''; that is, booklets of timetables and tourist guides. Within a year Bell's publishing business had outstripped his retail business, and he elected to move from his original offices into Fleet Street. There G. Bell & Sons branched into the publication of books on art, architecture, and archaeology, in addition to the classics for which the company was already known. Bell's reputation was only improved by his association with Henry Cole. In the mid-1850s, Bell expanded again, printing the children's books of Margaret Gatty (''Parables from Nature' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
St Helena
Saint Helena (, ) is one of the three constituent parts of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, a remote British overseas territory. Saint Helena is a volcanic and tropical island, located in the South Atlantic Ocean, some 1,874 km (1,165 miles) west of the mainland of the continent of Africa, with the Southern African nations of Angola and Namibia on its southeastern coast being the closest nations geographically. The island is around west of the coast of southwestern South Africa, and east of the major seaport city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in South America. Saint Helena measures about and had a population of 4,439 in the 2021 census. It was named after Helena, mother of Constantine I, Saint Helena (AD c.246/248–330), influential mother of the famous Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, Saint Constantine I the Great. (A.D 272–337, reigned 306–337), of the ancient Roman Empire. It is one of the most remote major islands in the world and was uninhabited unt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dead Reckoning
In navigation, dead reckoning is the process of calculating the current position of a moving object by using a previously determined position, or fix, and incorporating estimates of speed, heading (or direction or course), and elapsed time. The corresponding term in biology, to describe the processes by which animals update their estimates of position or heading, is path integration. Advances in navigational aids that give accurate information on position, in particular satellite navigation using the Global Positioning System, have made simple dead reckoning by humans obsolete for most purposes. However, inertial navigation systems, which provide very accurate directional information, use dead reckoning and are very widely applied. Etymology Contrary to myth, the term "dead reckoning" was not originally used to abbreviate "deduced reckoning", nor is it a misspelling of the term "ded reckoning". The use of "ded" or "deduced reckoning" is not known to have appeared earlier th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Longitude
Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east- west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek letter lambda (λ). Meridians are imaginary semicircular lines running from pole to pole that connect points with the same longitude. The prime meridian defines 0° longitude; by convention the International Reference Meridian for the Earth passes near the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, south-east London on the island of Great Britain. Positive longitudes are east of the prime meridian, and negative ones are west. Because of the Earth's rotation, there is a close connection between longitude and time measurement. Scientifically precise local time varies with longitude: a difference of 15° longitude corresponds to a one-hour difference in local time, due to the differing position in relation to the Sun. Comparing local time to an absol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marine Chronometer
A marine chronometer is a precision timepiece that is carried on a ship and employed in the determination of the ship's position by celestial navigation. It is used to determine longitude by comparing Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), and the time at the current location found from observations of celestial bodies. When first developed in the 18th century, it was a major technical achievement, as accurate knowledge of the time over a long sea voyage was vital for effective navigation, lacking electronic or communications aids. The first true chronometer was the life work of one man, John Harrison, spanning 31 years of persistent experimentation and testing that revolutionized naval (and later aerial) navigation. The term ''wikt:chronometer, chronometer'' was coined from the Greek words () (meaning time) and (meaning measure). The 1713 book ''Physico-Theology'' by the English cleric and scientist William Derham includes one of the earliest theoretical descriptions of a marine chronome ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ceylon
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, Indian peninsula by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. It shares a maritime border with the Maldives in the southwest and India in the northwest. Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte is the legislative capital of Sri Lanka, while the largest city, Colombo, is the administrative and judicial capital which is the nation's political, financial and cultural centre. Kandy is the second-largest urban area and also the capital of the last native kingdom of Sri Lanka. The most spoken language Sinhala language, Sinhala, is spoken by the majority of the population (approximately 17 million). Tamil language, Tamil is also spoken by approximately five million people, making it the second most-spoken language in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka has a population of appr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
East Indiaman
East Indiamen were merchant ships that operated under charter or licence for European trading companies which traded with the East Indies between the 17th and 19th centuries. The term was commonly used to refer to vessels belonging to the British, Dutch, French, Danish, Swedish, Austrian or Portuguese East India companies. Several East Indiamen chartered by the British East India Company (EIC) were known as clippers. The EIC held a monopoly granted to it by Elizabeth I in 1600 for all English trade between the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn. This grant was progressively restricted during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, until the monopoly was lost in 1834. EIC East Indiamen usually ran between Britain, the Cape of Good Hope and India, where their primary destinations were the ports of Bombay, Madras and Calcutta. EIC East Indiamen often continued on to China before returning to England via the Cape of Good Hope and Saint Helena. When the EIC lost its monopoly ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
