Skip to content. Home Help Contact us Login. Libraries Australia Authorities - Full view. De Caen therefore may have decided to continue the detention until the capitulation of the island was imminent. On 14 June Flinders sailed for England.
He arrived on 23 October and received belated promotion to post captain. In failing health he prepared his monumental work A Voyage to Terra Australis ; it was published on 18 July , the day before he died. He was buried at St James's, Hampstead Road. Later alterations to the churchyard obliterated his grave, so he was 'pursued by disaster after death as in life'.
But in January his remains were unearthed during an archaeological excavation preceding a major new railway development, clearly identified by a lead plate bearing his name. Matthew Flinders was among the world's most accomplished navigators and hydrographers, though his exploration was mostly made in unsuitable, leaky or rotten ships.
To ensure that his observations were as accurate as possible and that nothing important was overlooked, his constant practice was to stand his ship off shore at dusk and run back each morning to where the previous day's work had ended. Each bearing and angle in his charting was taken by himself either from the deck or the mast-head and the results worked up by him each night.
Flinders is remembered not only for his achievements but also for great improvements in the science of navigation, for his research on the action of the tides, and the affinity between the height of the barometer and the direction of the wind, and for his practical investigations into the deviation of the compass through the presence of iron in ships, since controlled by compensating devices such as the bar named after him.
Some of his observations were published by the Royal Society in 'Concerning the Differences in the magnetic needle …' Transactions , , pt 2. A Voyage to Terra Australis , written by an intellectual man, is an enlightening and fascinating story of brilliant navigation and discovery, achievement and tragedy, self-sacrifice and devotion. He pays noble tribute to his comrades suddenly swept away off the Unknown Coast; expresses spontaneous gratitude to the people of Mauritius who befriended him in the hour of need, and expressed sympathy and some understanding towards the Aboriginal people he encountered.
His moral character and devotion to duty were based on high ideals. At Mauritius he had many opportunities to escape but resolutely refused to break his parole, even when his health was shattered and his hope destroyed. His considerate and just treatment of the men who served with him won their confidence and respect.
In his brief but brilliant career he surmounted difficulties and adversity, and his voyage in the Investigator endures as an imperishable monument to his undaunted spirit and outstanding ability. He wanted to be rich — or at least comfortable — and he wanted to be famous. It was sensible for Matthew to look towards the Royal Navy as a career. The Navy promoted on merit and once on the promotional ladder, a sailor acquired a regular income and a pension scheme.
Austin, The Voyage of the Investigator James D. Mack, Matthew Flinders, , praises Flinders's scientific work. Sidney John Baker, My Own Destroyer , explores a similar theme, attributing deficiencies in Flinders's character to the relationship between father and son. Ingleton, Geoffrey C. All rights reserved.
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