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In an article about Lewis & Clarks navigation I see references to a Lunar distance method without real time altitude measurements being required. Instead they use a calculated pair of altitudes.

"Patterson’s Problem 4th, which is also a part of his notebook,
describes a method of calculating the altitude of a body at any instant
using the known latitude of the observer; the estimated longitude; a
Greenwich time for that instant calculated from the estimated longitude
and the difference between the watch time of the instant and the
watch time of noon (with a correction for watch rate).
Although this is a reasonable procedure and gives excellent results,
it seems to have been controversial at the time."
Richard S. Preston, Physics Department, Northern Illinois University

Can anyone tell me if this is valid?
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