Exclusive Of These, The
'Salamander', (Captain Nichols) Who, Of 155 Men Lost Only Five; And The
'William And Anne' (Captain Buncker) Who Of 187 Men Lost Only Seven,
I Find Most Worthy Of Honourable Mention.
In the list of convicts brought out
was Barrington, of famous memory.
Two of these ships also added to our geographic knowledge of the country.
The 'Atlantic', under the direction of Lieutenant Bowen, a naval agent,
ran into a harbour between Van Diemen's land, and Port Jackson,
in latitude 35 degrees 12 minutes south, longitude 151 degrees east, to which,
in honour of Sir John Jervis, Knight of the Bath, Mr. Bowen gave the name
of Port Jervis. Here was found good anchoring ground with a fine depth
of water, within a harbour about a mile and a quarter broad at its entrance,
which afterwards opens into a basin five miles wide and of considerable
length. They found no fresh water, but as their want of this article
was not urgent, they did not make sufficient researches to pronounce
that none existed there.* They saw, during the short time they stayed,
two kangaroos and many traces of inhabitants. The country at a little distance
to the southward of the harbour is hilly, but that contiguous to the sea
is flat. On comparing what they had found here afterwards,
with the native produce of Port Jackson, they saw no reason to think
that they differed in any respect.
[*Just before I left the country, word was brought by a ship which had
put into Port Jervis, that a large fresh water brook was found there.]
The second discovery was made by Captain Wetherhead, of the 'Matilda' transport,
which was obligingly described to me, as follows, by that gentleman,
on my putting to him the underwritten questions.
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