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John Ledyard
John Ledyard (1751-1789) was an American explorer and adventurer. He was born in November 1751 in Groton, Connecticut, the son of a local sea captain. Young Ledyard grew up with an...view moreJohn Ledyard (1751-1789) was an American explorer and adventurer. He was born in November 1751 in Groton, Connecticut, the son of a local sea captain. Young Ledyard grew up with an adventurous soul and the smell of salt air in his nostrils. The disciplines of law and the ministry could not hold him, and in 1773 he shipped as a common seaman from new London to the Barbary Coast for a load of mules. By September 1774, Ledyard was back home in Connecticut, having made the triangular trade run via the West Indies.
After a brief love affair in Boston, the young sailor shipped for London to seek his fortune. He arrived just in time to sign as a corporal of marines on Captain Cook’s third voyage to the Pacific. The expedition left London on July 12, 1776. Ledyard was in the king’s service before news of the Declaration of Independence had crossed the ocean.
The expedition lasted until October 1780. During these four years, its two ships stopped at the Sandwich Islands, Cape of Good Hope, the Prince Edward Islands off South Africa, the Kerguelen Islands, Tasmania, New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Tonga, Tahiti, and then Hawaii. It continued to the northwest coast of North America, making Ledyard perhaps the first U.S. citizen to touch its western coast, along the Aleutian islands and Alaska into the Bering Sea, and back to Hawaii where Cook was killed. The return voyage touched upon Kamchatka, Macau, Batavia (now Jakarta), around the Cape of Good Hope again, and back to England.
Still a marine in the British Navy, Ledyard was sent to Canada to fight in the American Revolution. Instead he deserted, returned to Dartmouth, and began to write his Journal of Captain Cook’s Last Voyage. It was published in 1783, five years after he had visited Hawaii.
Ledyard died in Cairo, Egypt on January 10, 1789.view less