Charles Wilkes's United States Exploring Expedition sights…
January 1840 CE
The Exploring Expedition, commonly known as the "Wilkes Expedition," includes naturalists, botanists, a mineralogist, taxidermists, artists and a philologist, and it is carried by USS Vincennes (780 tons) and USS Peacock (650 tons), the brig USS Porpoise (230 tons), the store-ship USS Relief, and two schooners, USS Sea Gull (110 tons) and USS Flying Fish (96 tons).
Departing from Hampton Roads on August 18, 1838, the expedition has stopped at the Madeira Islands and Rio de Janeiro; visited Tierra del Fuego, Chile, Peru, the Tuamotu Archipelago, Samoa, and New South Wales; from Sydney, Australia, sailed into the Antarctic Ocean in December 1839 and reports the discovery "of an Antarctic continent west of the Balleny Islands" of which it sights the coast on January 25, 1840.
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Thomas Sully: Portrait of Charles Wilkes, 19 January 1840; U.S. Naval Academy Museum.
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