Phillip Parker King
Norfolk Island-born naval officer and explorer Phillip Parker King (1791 – 1856) surveyed the sections of Australia's coast that Matthew Flinders had not investigated between 1791 and 1810. King's four voyages (December 1817 to April 1822) focussed on northern waters between Arnhem Land and Northwest Cape.
The Mermaid's nineteen-man crew on his first voyage included botanist Allan Cunningham, surveyor John Septimus Roe and the Guringal man Bungaree (a.k.a. Bongaree), who had accompanied Matthew Flinders on his circumnavigation of the continent.
After leaving Sydney in December 1817, King arrived off North West Cape via King George Sound (modern-day Albany, WA) in February 1818. Over the next four months, he surveyed the coast as far as Van Diemen Gulf. After replenishing his provisions in Timor, King returned to Sydney the way he came, arriving in Port Jackson on 29 July.
King spent the southern summer surveying the recently discovered Macquarie Harbour in Van Diemen's Land before setting out for northern waters again in May 1819.
KIng's second expedition travelled via Port Curtis and Torres Strait. It concentrated on the coast between Cape Wessel and Admiralty Gulf before returning to Sydney on 12 January 1820.
An extensive refit in Sydney Cove saw the Mermaid careened, coppered and caulked before King sailed north again on 14 June 1820. Damage to the hull after the Mermaid ran aground off Port Bowen (today's Port Clinton) was more extensive than King and his carpenter realised.
Still, the expedition surveyed the coast between Admiralty Gulf and Brunswick Sound and spent eighteen days carrying out emergency repairs at Careening Bay before beginning the return journey in early October. After a narrow escape from disaster off Botany Bay, the Mermaid was back in Sydney on 9 December.
A fourth voyage in the 154-tonne sloop HMS Bathurst passed through Torres Strait. It focussed on the Dampier Archipelago, with further survey work on the west coast after a visit to Mauritius to replenish supplies.
While King's four voyages failed to discover the hoped-for river likely to lead to an interior navigation into this great continent, his two-volume Narrative Of A Survey Of The Intertropical And Western Coasts Of Australia contains detailed information about the topography, flora, fauna, resources and people of the areas he visited. He also provided the illustrations for the Narrative.
After a promotion to Commander, King returned to England in April 1823. He subsequently spent five years (1826–1830) commanding HMS Adventure on survey work around the Straits of Magellan and Patagonia.
After King returned to New South Wales in 1832, he served on the colony's Legislative Council, acted as resident commissioner of the Australian Agricultural Company and was elected to the Legislative Assembly as the member for the Counties of Gloucester and Macquarie in 1851. He died in North Sydney on 26 February 1856.
Links to add:
Allan Cunningham
Australian Agricultural Company
Bungaree
Guringal
John Septimus Roe
Matthew Flinders
Narrative Of A Survey Of The Intertropical And Western Coasts Of Australia
New South Wales Legislative Assembly
New South Wales Legislative Council
Port Bowen
Port Clinton
Port Curtis
