Abstract
The story of John Harrison and his marine timekeepers, engagingly told by Dava Sobel, has promulgated the misleading notion that accurate clocks solved the problem of determining longitude at sea.3 Neither Harrison’s timekeepers nor the cheaper, more seaworthy, chronometers of Arnold and Earnshaw immediately transformed the longitude problem, partly because there were alternative, well-supported methods, notably that employing lunar distances, promoted by Nevil Maskelyne, Astronomer Royal, the villain of Sobel’s piece.4 However, to advocate either of these ‘solutions’ misses the central point that I want to make — that we need to understand the longitude problem, and its solution, in a broader sense. Neither technological determinism identifying an instrument as the solution, nor singular method determinism, captures how longitude was established in practice.5 Its solution could be universalized in theory but individual determinations of longitude at sea were contingent acts reliant upon hardware (instruments, ships), software (methods, procedures, logs, charts, tables, outputs of land-based observatories), and wetware (the embodied skills, abilities, judgments and goals, of sailors, officers, hydrographers and their masters).
McCluer had a lot of trouble with the box chronometer […] until [he] found that by holding the key still and turning the chronometer around it he could keep it going, and when he adopted this trick it subsequently kept much better time
W. E. May, drawing on John McCluer, 18061
More in fact is to be gained in Hydrography […] by establishing the true place and bearing of a few fixed Observatories on terra firma, simply as starting points, than from a thousand unconnected or disputed points of departure […] they constitute, in fine, a sort of half-way house between the earth and the heavens, to which any phenomena may be referred
Thomas B. Jervis, 18402
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Notes
W. E. May, ‘How the Chronometer Went to Sea’, Antiquarian Horology, 9 (1976), 638–63 (p. 643)
John McCluer, Description of the Coast of India (London: William Ballintine, 1806), pp. iii–iv.
Thomas B. Jervis, speech to Section C of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, in Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, 4 (1840), 158–89 (p. 168).
Dava Sobel, Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time (New York: Walker, 1995)
David Philip Miller, ‘The Sobel Effect’, Metascience, 11 (2002), 185–200.
Jim Bennett, ‘The Travels and Trials of Mr Harrison’s Timekeeper’, in Instruments Travel and Science: Itineraries of Precision from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century, ed. by Marie-Noëlle Bourguet, Christian Licoppe and H. Otto Sibum (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), pp. 75–95
Jonathan Betts, ‘Arnold and Earnshaw: The Practicable Solution’, in The Quest for Longitude, ed. by William J. H. Andrewes (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments, 1996), pp. 311–28.
Rebekah Higgitt (ed.), Maskelyne: Astronomer Royal (London: Robert Hale, 2014)
Derek Howse, Nevil Maskelyne: The Seaman’s Astronomer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
The value of the solution of the longitude problem has been questioned on the grounds that the paramount safety problem was that ships were at the mercy of wind and weather. From this perspective, mechanical propulsion systems were more important than marine chronometers. See William E. Carter and Merri S. Carter, ‘The Age of Sail: A Time when the Fortunes of Nations and Lives of Seamen Literally Turned with the Winds Their Ships Encountered at Sea’, Journal of Navigation, 63 (2010), 717–31.
D. F. H. Grocott, ‘Shipwrecks in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Eras, 1793–1815. Causal Factors and Comments’, Journal of Navigation, 52 (1999), 149–62.
Felix Driver and Luciana Martins, ‘Visual Histories: John Septimus Roe and the Art of Navigation, c. 1815–1830’, History Workshop Journal, 54 (2002), 144–61 (pp. 145–46).
A. R. T. Jonkers, Earth’s Magnetism in the Age of Sail (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), pp. 132–46.
Edwin Hutchins, Cognition in the Wild (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1995), pp. 114–15.
Andrew S. Cook, ‘Alexander Dalrymple and John Arnold: Chronometers and the Representation of Longitude on East India Company Charts’, Vistas in Astronomy, 28 (1985), 189–95 (p. 189).
W. E. May, ‘The Log-books used by Ships of the East India Company’, Journal of Navigation, 27 (1974), 116–18.
Jean Sutton, Lords of the East: The East India Company and its Ships (1600–1874), 2nd edition (London: Conway Maritime Press, 2000), pp. 87–93.
Phillip Arnott, ‘Chronometers on East India Company Ships 1800 to 1833’, Antiquarian Horology, 30 (2007), 481–500
J. A. Bennett, The Divided Circle. A History of Instruments for Astronomy, Navigation and Surveying (Oxford: Phaidon/Christie’s, 1987), p. 179.
Richard Owen, ‘Essay on Chronometers’, prefixed to W. F. W. Owen, Tables of Latitudes and Longitudes by Chronometer of Places in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans […] Resulting from the Observations of HMS Leven and Barracouta in the years 1820 to 1826 (London: Hydrographical Office, the Admiralty, 1827), p. 2.
James Horsburgh made a similar point in Memoirs: Comprising the Navigation to and from China, by the China Sea (London: Privately printed, 1805), pp. v–vi.
Susanna Nockolds, ‘Early Timekeepers at Sea’, Antiquarian Horology, 4 (1963), 110–13, 148–52 (p. 150 describes the procedure).
Nockolds, ‘Early Timekeepers at Sea’, p. 149. For the case for least disturbance of chronometers see Joseph Whidbey, ‘Remarks on Timekeepers, the Compass &c’, Naval Chronicle, 2 (1799), 505–12.
Richard Sorrenson, ‘The Ship as a Scientific Instrument in the Eighteenth Century’, Osiris, 11 (1996), 221–36.
John Robertson, Elements of Navigation (London: 1754)
J. B. Hewson, A History of the Practice of Navigation (Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, 1951), pp. 242–43.
Frank Scott, ‘Speed, Navigational Accuracy and the “Ship Log”’, Mariner’s Mirror, 92 (2006), 477–81 (p. 478).
See Jane Wess’s essay in this volume; Andrew Mackay, The Complete Navigator, US edition (Philadelphia: B. B. Hopkins & Co., 1807), pp. 169–70.
William Wales, for instance, was more positive in The Method of Finding the Longitude at Sea by Time-Keepers (London: Privately printed, 1794).
For this view of technology, see Brian Wynne, ‘Unruly Technology: Practical Rules, Impractical Discourses and Public Understanding’, Social Studies of Science, 18 (1988), 147–67.
William Walker, The Magnetism of Ships, and the Mariner’s Compass (London: Piper Brothers & Co, 1853), pp. 87–88.
Henry Raper, The Practice of Navigation and Nautical Astronomy, 2nd edition (London: R. B. Bate, 1842), p. xi.
Howard T. Fry, Alexander Dalrymple (1737–1808) and the Expansion of British Trade (London: Frank Cass & Co Ltd., 1970)
Andrew S. Cook, ‘Alexander Dalrymple (1737–1808), Hydrographer to the East India Company and the Admiralty, as Publisher: A Catalogue of Books and Charts’, 3 vols (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of St Andrews, 1993).
Cook, ‘Alexander Dalrymple’, I, 71, 86, 110, 241. Discovering the actual behavior of navigators of East Indiamen relies on a systematic examination of the logs, and even then involves interpretation. On the divergence between theory and practice in East Indiamen navigation, see Henry Harries, ‘Pre-Greenwich Sea Longitudes’, The Observatory, 50 (1927), 315–19.
Susanna Fisher, The Makers of the Blueback Charts. A History of Imray Laurie Norie & Wilson Ltd (St Ives: Imray Laurie Norie & Wilson, 2001), p. 12.
The following account relies on: R. H. Phillimore, Historical Records of the Survey of India, 5 vols (Dehra Dun: Survey Printing Group, 1945–62), I, 5–6, 101–102, 171–74
R. K. Kochhar, ‘Madras Observatory: The Beginning’, Bulletin of the Astronomical Society of India, 13 (1985), 162–68
R. K. Kochhar, ‘Growth of Modern Astronomy in India 1651–1960’, Vistas in Astronomy, 34 (1991), 69–105
S. M. Razaullah Ansari, ‘Early Modern observatories in India 1792–1900’, in Science and Modern India: An Institutional History c.1784–1947, ed. by Uma Dasgupta (Delhi: Pearson Education India, 2010), pp. 349–80.
Topping (c. 1747–96) was sent to India at Dalrymple’s initiative; Susan Hots, ‘Topping, Michael’, in A Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Ireland, ed. by A. W. Skempton et al. (London: Thomas Telford, 2002), pp. 711–12.
Matthew H. Edney, Mapping an Empire: The Geographical Construction of British India (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), pp. 88–90.
See, for example, James Horsburgh, Memoirs: Comprising the Navigation to and from China by the China Sea, and through the Various Straits and Channels in the Indian Archipelago (London: Privately printed, 1805).
John Warren, An Account of Some Experiments made on Three Chronometers to Ascertain how far Motion […] Does Affect their Rate of Going (Madras, 1807).
On the early Bombay Observatory, see Simon Schaffer, ‘The Bombay Case: Astronomers, Instrument Makers and the East India Company’, Journal of the History of Astronomy, 43 (2012), 1–30
Clements R. Markham, A Memoir of the Indian Surveys, 2nd edition (London: W. H. Allen & Co, 1878), p. 23
On imperial significances of astronomical ventures in India, South Africa and St Helena, see John McAleer, ‘“Stargazers at the world’s end”: Telescopes, Observatories and “views” of Empire in the Nineteenth-Century British Empire’, British Journal for the History of Science, 46 (2013), 389–413.
I have not seen an important account of the training of Company surveyors: Andrew S. Cook, ‘The Training of East India Company Surveyors in the Early 19th Century’, presented to the 10th International Conference on the History of Cartography, 29 August-2 September 1983. On navigational training generally, see Edwin Charles Millington, Seamen in the Making. A Short History of Nautical Training (London: J. D. Potter, 1935), pp. 48–60.
Harry W. Dickinson, Educating the Royal Navy: Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Education for Officers (London: Routledge, 2007), especially pp. 9–56.
See Anthony Farrington, A Biographical Index of East India Company Maritime Service Officers, 1600–1834 (London: The British Library, 1999).
J. R. Bruijn, Commanders of Dutch East India Ships in the Eighteenth Century (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2011), pp. 175, 284–85, 292–93.
N. Plumley, ‘The Royal Mathematical School within Christ’s Hospital. The Early Years’, Vistas in Astronomy, 20 (1976), 51–56
E. H. Pearce, Annals of Christ’s Hospital (London: Methuen, 1901)
Wayne Orchiston and Derek Howse, ‘From Transit of Venus to Teaching Navigation: The Work of William Wales’, Journal of Navigation, 53 (2000), 156–66.
Evan Cotton, East Indiamen. The East India Company’s Maritime Service (London: Batchworth Press, 1949), pp. 23–24.
Robert Bishop, The East India Navigator’s Daily Assistant; with the New Method of Computing the Longitude (London: Printed for the Author, 1773) was dedicated to the Directors of the Company.
Charles H. Cotter, ‘A Brief Historical Survey of British Navigation Manuals’, Journal of Navigation, 36 (1983), 237–49 (pp. 244–45).
John Hamilton Moore, The Practical Navigator, 9th edition (London: 1791), pp. 272–95. Questions and model answers were designed for candidates to ‘refresh their Memories, previous to that Examination which they must pass through, before they are appointed to a Commission in the Royal Navy, or an Officer in the East India Service’ (p. 272).
‘Qualifications of Commanders and Mates of Ships, established by the Honorable Court of Directors, 24th of January, 1804’, appended to Charles Hardy and H. C. Hardy, A Register of Ships Employed in the Service of the Honorable the United East India Company, from the Year 1760 to 1810 with an Appendix (London: Black, Parry and Kingsbury, 1811), pp. 112–13 (p. 113).
Jean Hood, Marked for Misfortune: An Epic Tale of Shipwreck, Human Endeavour and Survival in the Age of Sail (London: Conway Maritime, 2003)
Pierre Van Den Boogaerde, Shipwrecks of Madagascar (Strategic Book Publishing, 2008), pp. 97–106.
Cook, ‘Alexander Dalrymple and John Arnold’; Andrew Cook, ‘Establishing the sea-routes to India and China’, in The Worlds of the East India Company, ed. by H. V. Bowen, Margarette Lincoln and Nigel Rigby (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2002), pp. 119–36.
Eric Freeman, Tom Ross, Philip Brohan and Clive Wilkinson, ‘English East India Company Logbooks — Significant Contributions to History and Science’ ftp://ftp.wmo.int/Documents/PublicWeb/amp/mmop/documents/JCOMM-TR/J-TR-59-MARCDAT-III/ppts/E3-Freeman-EIC.pdf [accessed 9 April 2015]. See also Clive Wilkinson, ‘The Non-Climatic Research Potential of Ships’ Logbooks and Journals’, Climatic Research, 73 (2005), 155–67.
H. T. Fry, ‘Early British Interest in the Chagos Archipelago and the Maldive Islands’, Mariner’s Mirror, 53 (1967), 344–49.
Archibald Blair, Remarks and Observations in a Survey of the Chagos Archipelago by Lieutenant Archibald Blair, 1786 and 1787 (London: George Bigg, 1788).
James Horsburgh, The India Directory, 6th edition (London: W. H. Allen, 1852), I, 188, note; Cook, ‘Establishing the Sea Routes’, p. 135.
Andrew C. F. David, ‘McCluer, John (1759?-1795), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)
Andrew Dunlop, Memoirs of a Bombay Mariner: Being the Story of Captain John McClure of the Bombay Marine (Salisbury, Rhodesia: M. O. Collins, 1975).
Quoted in L. S. Dawson, Memoirs of Hydrography Including Brief Biographies of the Principal Officers who have Served in H.M. Naval Surveying Service between the Years 1750 and 1885. Part I: 1750–1830 (Eastbourne: Henry W. Keay, 1883), pp. 73–74.
Thomas Forrest, A Voyage to New Guinea, and the Moluccas from Balambangan […] Performed in the Tartar Galley, belonging to the Honourable East India Company, During the Years 1774, 1775 and 1776, 2nd edition (London: G. Scott, 1780)
H. T. Fry, ‘Alexander Dalrymple and New Guinea’, Journal of Pacific History, 4 (1969), 83–104.
For example, Henry Raper, The Practice of Navigation, and Charles F. A. Shadwell, Notes on the Management of Chronometers and the Measurement of Meridian Distances, (London: J.D. Potter, 1855), pp. 2–3.
Patricia Fara makes this point well, in a different way, in Sympathetic Attractions: Magnetic Practices, Beliefs and Symbolism in Eighteenth-Century England (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), pp. 69–77
W. E. May, A History of Marine Navigation (Henley-on-Thames: G.T. Foulis & Co., 1973), pp. xiii
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Miller, D.P. (2015). Longitude Networks on Land and Sea: The East India Company and Longitude Measurement ‘in the Wild’, 1770–1840. In: Dunn, R., Higgitt, R. (eds) Navigational Enterprises in Europe and its Empires, 1730–1850. Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137520647_12
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