Background research on the Wilkes and Reynolds Antarctic expeditions of 1838-40.

January 22, 2002

Researcher:  Samantha McDonald

Recorder:  Marion Carpenter

John Symmes developed a theory in the early 1800s that speculated the center of the earth was hollow and, beyond the polar ice barriers, an entrance to the center of the earth existed.  While this theory ultimately discredited Symmes in the scientific community, it did draw the attention of an Ohio newspaperman, Jeremiah Reynolds.  While Reynolds did not completely agree with Symmes’s theory, he did believe Antarctica was enclosed by a thick ring of ice that surrounded a warmer, polar ocean rather than an entrance to the center of the earth.

Unlike Symmes, Reynolds understood the political and economic environment of the time.  At this point in U.S. history, scientific research was entirely dependent on private and commercial funding, not governmental funding.  When Reynolds approached Congress lobbying for expedition funds, he did not emphasis the less tangible, scientific rewards of the expedition.  Instead Reynolds brought two of the strongest advocates of the time, the whaling industry and the American public.  The South Seas and Antarctic regions promised to be a significant source of both animals as well as other species that were only beginning to be discovered, but the waters needed to be charted and safe harbors identified before any new hunting grounds would be profitable.  In 1836, Reynolds addressed Congress and, appealing to their patriotic spirit, asked them to envision an American ship reaching Antarctica, “where all the meridians terminate [and] where our eagle and star spangled banner may be unfurled and planted, and left to wave [at the] axis of the earth itself!” (Hollow Earth, 2).  With the strong support of both the commerce community and the general public, Congress authorized $300,000 for the U.S. Exploring Expedition. 

Over two years passed before the expedition was launched.  The Secretary of the Navy, Mahlon Dickerson, believed the Navy should not be involved in non-military, scientific research, and this expedition was the first to ever mix civilian and military research personnel.  After Dickerson’s numerous delays and multiple captains’ refusal to take command, Charles Wilkes, a relatively inexperienced officer, was given command of the expedition.  Due to Reynolds’ public condemnation of Dickerson’s blatant attempts to prevent the expedition, Dickerson removed Reynolds from the expedition.

On August 18, 1838, without Reynolds, the United States Exploring Expedition began its survey.  The expedition was made up of four naval vessels and two schooners with a total crew of 433.  Three years and ten months later, two of the naval vessels and one schooner manned by less than 250 crewmembers returned to New York.

Antarctica was surveyed at two times during the expedition.  At the beginning of the expedition, the ships split into three teams and surveyed different portions of the Antarctic area until April 1939.  Fog, ice, and fierce storms continually plagued all of the ships, and none of the scientific objectives were met during this time.  After spending the Antarctic winter surveying warmer waters, the expedition began mapping the Antarctic again in January 1940.  Wilkes first detected a mountain range in the distance in late January 1940.  A few days later an officer trapped a penguin that was found to have pebbles in its stomach.  This combined with the relative shallowness of the water led Wilkes to conclude there was land in the very near vicinity.  The next month was spent naming mountain ranges and headlands to provide supporting evidence of Wilkes discovery of Antarctica.  In the spring of 1840, Wilkes returned to Australia and announced his discovery and dated it January 19, 1840.

Upon his return to the United States, Wilkes was forced to recant some of his log entries that notated areas he had charted as land.  While determining the distance to land, Wilkes had experienced a type of optical illusion that made him believe land was much closer than it actually was.  Wilkes later revised his discovery date to January 16 when French explorer d’Urville gave January 19 as the day he first sighted Antarctica.  Finally eleven court-marshal charges were levied against Wilkes for his conduct during the expedition.  Though he was only convicted on one charge, Wilkes’ conduct combined with the charting errors significantly discredited the integrity of the data collected and caused the government to distance itself from the expedition.  The discoveries of the expedition were downplayed and little was presented to the general public.

In comparison to many Antarctic expeditions, the Wilkes Expedition was an overwhelming success.  The majority of the crew and equipment survived the voyage.  All of the major milestones of the expedition were met.  The scientific community did express some disappointment in the number and quality of the specimens collected from the region, but still had enough to begin a collection that would become the foundation of the Smithsonian Institute.  The Wilkes’ Expedition quite possibly did not receive its due place in history simply because the reputation of its leader.

Antarctic Explorers:  Charles Wilkes.  20 January 2002 <http:// www.south-pole.com/p0000079.htm>.

Poe, Edgar Allan.  “Review of A Brief Account of the Discoveries and Results of the United States Exploring Expedition.”   Graham’s Magazine September 1843:  164-165.

Reader’s Digest.  Antarctica:  The Extraordinary History of Man’s Conquest of the Frozen Continent. 2^nd ed.  Sydney:  Reader’s Digest, 1990.

 “Reynolds, Jeremiah.”  American National Biography.  Ed. Jan A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes.  Vol. 18.  New York:  Oxford University Press, 1999.

“The History of the Hollow Earth.”  International Society for a Complete Earth Quarterly Newsletter January 2002.  24 January 2002 http://www.hollow-earth.org/news899-1.html.

“Wilkes, Charles.”  American National Biography.  Ed. Jan A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes.  Vol. 23.  New York:  Oxford University Press, 1999.

Discussion Notes:

Question:  Why did Reynolds instead of Wilkes receive the admiration and respect of authors such as Poe, Cooper, and Melville?

(1)      John G.:  The men who made the journey, specifically Wilkes, had to make all of the decisions and were ultimately responsible for all of the failures.  They repeatedly were stuck in the ice, lost in the fog, and finally had to turn back.  They didn’t appear to achieve their objectives in the eyes of the public, though technically they did.  But spending hundreds of thousands of dollars and multiple years doing surveying work without setting foot off the ships in Antarctica just didn’t satisfy the America government or general public.

(2)      Aaron:  The type of person Wilkes was also seems to have an impact.  He was mean and nasty (son-of-a-bitch).  Since Reynolds didn’t have to do the job, he didn’t have to make the difficult, sometimes ugly, decisions Wilkes did to accomplish the goals of the expedition.  Reynolds was the man with the great ideas and Wilkes was the marginally competent skipper who didn’t have what it took to make those ideas a reality.  Dr. White pointed out that Reynolds's conflict with the Secretary of the Navy also played into this.  Reynolds stood against the government and won in spite of the determination of the Secretary that the expedition be cancelled.

(3)      Aaron/James/Kelly:  Reynolds and Poe both seemed to favor C. Simms’ theory and the results of the expedition did not support that theory.  They (presumably Poe) may have had a tendency to not appreciate things that did not support his view.  Also Reynolds was more like themselves (Poe, Cooper, Melville).  Reynolds was a competent, even popular, author.  Though he traveled, Reynolds also was a “sit down and write about it” type that Poe, Cooper, and Melville may have been able to relate to better (birds of a feather).  Dr. White identifies Reynolds as a type of visionary.  Even though many of his visions were wrong or extravagant, they caught people’s imagination.  Reynolds was able to go in front of congress and excite them in a way Wilkes could never do.  Reynolds made Antarctica sound exciting, a place were anything not only could happen but would happen.  No one wanted to hear of the hunting, both for land and animal, or the possibility that there was just nothing there.  As long as there was a possibility of wonderful things, Reynolds knew the imagination of Congress and the public would be enough to secure his funding.  Dr. White also points out that this was (is?) the same appeal Mars holds for some people.  Yes – it’s really cold and dirty and has lots of sand.  But we never really knew what we’d find until we actually got there.

(4)      Kelly:  Reynolds had a fictional quality about him while Wilkes had a non-fictional, gritty, nasty truth quality.  Poe, Cooper, and Melville may have liked Reynolds since he had the vision, the literary side, and the newspaperman side that appealed to them.  Wilkes had the grit, had to tick people off constantly, and everyone hated him.  Maybe the authors wanted to distance themselves from Wilkes’ rather disgraceful displays.  Wilkes generated very negative press that the authors may not have wanted their works associated with, fearing it may negatively impact sales.  Dr. White did point out that Cooper did use Wilkes’ five-volume record of the Expedition to write Sea Lions.  The data Cooper used from Wilkes helped make Sea Lions more believable.

(5)      Dr. White began a conversation about what was learned about American exploration based on the politics that affected the Reynolds/Wilkes Expedition.  A couple of weeks earlier the class discussed the difficulties of maintaining a presence in space and the discontinuation of the Supercollider project.  Dr. White also pointed out that one of the biggest problems with a democracy is how it deals with science.  Tara:  Throughout history, American exploration has always been reined in by some government force whether it was the need for status reports, the need to hurry or remove objectives because the funding was expiring, or an enormous budget cut has been imposed because the project has been over budget for years.  No one’s even been the go ahead to just “go do it”.  Aaron: Even when things were done, often they were done for the wrong reasons (beating Russians to the moon).  That was nationalism, but idealism is harder to sell.  Instead of going to learn, explore, or finding a way we could use the moon, once we beat the Russians there, we backed away and left.  Even now this is seen in the European particle accelerator scheduled for 2004 on the Space Station.  Now there’s a push for us (United States) to build a linear accelerator to come on-line soon afterwards.  The “we can’t let them get ahead of us” mentality kicks in with the national/political pride and provides the justification, however sound it may be, for the expensive.  Dr. White points out this may become even more apparent if the Chinese continue with their expansion into space.

(6)      Final point made by Samantha was her surprise at the number and type of authors who were interested in the Antarctic and how much many of them were interested in theories the majority of people found crazy (Simms’ Hollow Earth Theory).  Apparently that type of unknown appealed to authors who tended to write in gothic style.