DECEPTION ISLAND — When Nathaniel’s Palmer’s sloop Hero anchored at Deception Island on that fateful day in 1820 when it is thought that Palmer first saw the continent of Antarctica, a small sailor’s ditty box was along for the ride. Two hundred years later, that same box – now in the Museum’s collection – made the trip back to the very same harbor.
The trip was the idea of Museum trustee Alex Bulazel, who has traveled to Antarctica and the Arctic many times. It was Bulazel who called attention to the 200th anniversary of Palmer’s sighting of the continent.
Bulazel, Museum president Steve White, and 12 other people with ties to Mystic Seaport Museum were part of a group of 186 passengers on the ship Le Lyrial on a cruise to Antarctica in January to visit sites connected to the Palmer bicentennial. The expedition was organized by the luxury travel company Abercrombie & Kent. Glenn Gordinier, co-director of the Museum’s Munson Institute, was on board to give talks on the history of the Palmer story and Antarctica.
Palmer and a crew of four were on a sealing expedition on the 47-foot Hero. While anchored in Whalers Bay on Deception Island, Palmer went ashore and climbed a hill where he saw the continent of Antarctica for the first time on November 17, 1820. Two other expeditions led by the Russian explorer Fabian Gottlieb von Bellinghausen and Englishman Edward Bransfield also sighted the continent earlier in the year.
The 7″ x 3″ wooden ditty box was donated to the Museum in 1950. It is ornately carved and has an inscription, “L.B. Stonington Slp. Hero.” The L.B. probably stands for Stanton L. Burdick, who was 16 at the time. Ditty boxes were carried by sailors, who would keep special items and personal remembrances in them during their time at sea.
