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Frank Reed  wrote:

" Remember, Lewis and Clark were NOT professional explorers. They did not
have experience in navigational methods, and they may well have known
nothing about the constellations before that brief period of training by
Ellicott."

This is very true and pulled me up when I thought about my previous
comparison of Lewis and Clark to Delambre, Mason/Dixon, Gregory et al. To
compare a soldier - Lewis- and a soldier's celestial navigation results to
those of professional surveyors is unfair to Lewis. He couldn't have got
comparable results after the brief training he received from Andrew
Ellicott.

Henceforth I shall cease and desist from any criticisms of the Captains'
capabilities. I would however ask our American colleagues why Jefferson did
not send a trained expert like Ellicott out on the expedition. If
Jefferson's intent was to map the West this would have seemed a logical
thing to do, particularly as he had the earlier exemplary work of M & D as a
guide.

Also following my earlier mention of some of the stars used by surveyors I
looked up the information on two used by Gregory: Zeta Aquila is the star
Deneb el Okab with a mag of 2.99. part way between Altair and Vega. Compare
this mag with Alpha Aquila (Altair) of .77 and you get an idea of how faint
it is.

Epsilon Pegasus - the star Enif - is only marginally better at mag 2.38. I
went outside last night and actually located Zeta Aquila, but only just. I
sure would hate to be navigating around in the bush trying to get his star
in the sextant. These old boys sure knew their biscuits.

Finally Frank chided me for calling a comparison  between terrestrial and
marine navigators "dangerous". Quite right and I stand corrected. It was a
momentary lapse into the Australian weakness for hyperbole.

Kieran Kelly
Sydney
Australia

   

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