Six ships and 346 men led by Lt. Charles Wilkes embarked on a four-year expedition that would change the way we see the world. From geographic, zoologic and ethnographic discoveries, the United States Exploring Expedition of 1838-1842 provided so much information that it was enough to establish the core of nearly every collection in every scientific department in the Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of Natural History.
Recommended reading: Sea of Glory: America's Voyage of Discovery by Nathaniel Philbrick
SI long article by Philbrick - https://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/learn/philbrick.htm
Expedition article - https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/united_states_exploring_expedition_1838_1842_/#.ZAjZ6OzMIWo
Peacock sinking - https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/u.s.s._peacock/#.ZAja7OzMIWp
Doc video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWeGu0WTOes
The specimen collection - https://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/learn/Walsh-01.htm
Route map - https://global.oup.com/us/companion.websites/fdscontent/uscompanion/us/static/companion.websites/9780199389315/maps/ch11/map11_00300.jpg
Philbrick Book - https://www.amazon.com/Sea-Glory-South-Expedition-1838-42/dp/0007121156
Ordered map - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Exploring_Expedition#/media/File:Charles_wilkes_part1.png
Westward age of expansion - https://americanexperience.si.edu/historical-eras/expansion/
Treaty of Fort Stanwix - https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/1768-boundary-line-treaty-of-fort-stanwix.htm
Lewis and Clark Exp - https://www.britannica.com/event/Lewis-and-Clark-Expedition
Jeremiah Reynolds - https://www.bensonlibrary.org/Author/Home?author=%22Reynolds%2C%20Jeremiah%22
Reynolds address to Congress - https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015027813719&view=1up&seq=20
The elements of maritime enterprise have been from the earliest period of our history incorporated with the character of our people. - pg 8
References George Berkeley’s verses regarding the Prospect of Planting Arts and Learning in America (1728) - pg 15
When monarchs hesitated, and ministers looked on with cold and calculating indifference, she cast her jewels upon the waters, and fortune paid her with a new world, from which has sprung a race of men, who have given new hopes to liberty, when it was nearly lost; and who are now struggling to throw back on Europe, with interest and gratitude, the rays of light we have received from her. - pg 100
Poe and Melville inspiration - https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/real-life-whale-inspired-moby-dick-180965282/
Sea Gull in gale image - https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/nh-series/NH-51000/NH-51499.html
Paulding quote - https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1939/october/wilkes-exploring-expedition
Three groups - https://www.history.navy.mil/our-collections/art/exhibits/exploration-and-technology/alfred-agate-collection/18390/orange-harbor--tierra-del-fuego-and-cape-horn.html
List of crew - https://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/navigation/Crew/crew_display_by_ship.cfm?ship=Flying%20Fish
Second expedition into Anarctica - https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/e/exploring-the-antarctic-1840-the-wilkes-expedition.html
Wilke’s Emerald Island and Wilkes quotes - https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/e/exploring-the-antarctic-1840-the-wilkes-expedition.html
Columbia River quote - https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/united_states_exploring_expedition_1838_1842_/#.ZAztR-zMIWp
Midshipman quote - https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/u.s.s._peacock/#.ZA96TuzMIWq
Settling the controversy Pillsbury - https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1914/september/wilkes-exploring-expedition
Smithsonian quote - https://www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/learn/Walsh-01.htm