James Byers was an American shipowner, merchant and sealer in New York, originally from Springfield, Massachusetts.[1]

Byers sent a four-vessel sealing fleet to the South Shetland Islands in 1820-21. He also lobbied US Secretary of State John Quincy Adams and President James Monroe to send a warship and take possession of the islands, suggesting that the American sealers were prepared to establish a permanent settlement there.

Honor

Byers Peninsula on Livingston Island in the South Shetland Islands is named after James Byers.

References

  • Alan Gurney, Below the Convergence: Voyages Toward Antarctica, 1699-1839, Penguin Books, New York, 1998

Notes

  1. ↑ The First American Discoveries in the Antarctic, 1819, The American Historical Review Vol. 16, No. 4 (Jul., 1911), pp. 794-798, at p. 765. Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Historical Association. Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1835710
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