MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Falklands: next month Argentine families will know results of DNA tests at Darwin cemetery
The humanitarian mission to identify the Argentine unknown soldiers fallen during the South Atlantic conflict and buried in the Falkland Islands Darwin cemetery is reaching its end, and many families will finally know, after 35 years, where the remains of their loved ones rest, according to the Buenos Aires media. Read full article
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Disclaimer & comment rulesOf course, this could have been dealt with years ago if the Kirchner governments had been cooperative instead of trying to make political capital out of this sad business.
Nov 24th, 2017 - 02:28 pm - Link - Report abuse +2Came across this and thought of DT. No suitable page on offer,
Nov 25th, 2017 - 06:04 am - Link - Report abuse 0https://www.loc.gov/resource/g5200.ct003987/
Oooh. So the South Sea Company did plan to trade with both coasts of South America, but it's the Pacific side that's labelled 'The Great South Sea', and the title says “from the river Aranoca to Terra del Fuego, and *from thence* through the South Sea”. Similarly in the small maps only the Pacific side is labelled 'South Sea'. That definitely confirms your argument. The only thing that possibly disagrees is the lake that feeds into 'P. St. Julian', which is labelled 'Tis said that out of this lake runs a River into the South Sea'. But perhaps they meant there was a rumoured outlet to the Pacific, as well as the marked river that clearly flows into the Atlantic.
Nov 25th, 2017 - 11:27 am - Link - Report abuse 0I compared to google maps and there's a Puerto San Julián, but it doesn't have any major rivers flowing into it. There's no big lake where it's marked either. However, there is the Lago Argentino which is very close to the Pacific coast and from which the Santa Cruz river flows to the Atlantic a little further down from San Julián. I suppose someone might have thought that lake could have a connection with the Pacific.
It's also impressive how different things were then. The whole continent is drawn much too thin, Brazil is so small but includes the coast of what's now Uruguay, Paraguay was part of La Plata which I suppose is accurate, there was no Bolivia or Equador and Peru was much bigger, and included those provinces which Chile later took from Bolivia, and 'Chili' is shown occupying half the width of Patagonia. I don't even know what 'Terra Firma' is supposed to be.
Also, the description says the limits of the South Sea Company are from the River Aranoca (whatever that is, seems to be the mouth of the Orinoco) around to California, but the map shows the company's 'Sea Limit' ending on the north shore of the Rio de la Plata. Strange. And the map shows several extra islands near the Falklands that don't appear to exist. Pepys Island even has it's own map, but I can't find it on a modern one.
Pepy's Island and the Falklands are one and the same. Down to what may now be referred to as a Typo - 10 degrees out.
Nov 25th, 2017 - 11:51 pm - Link - Report abuse +3Dampier lost his log from 1684 and attempted to rewrite it from memory. There was further confusion when it was published in the late 1690's with the island(s) marked at 41 degrees south latitude and not 51. The publisher thought that there was another previously undiscovered island, and it was he that named it Pepy's.
A lot of time was wasted looking for that island, the last by Weddell in the 1820's.
Beware typos.
England will return the Malvinas within 25 years.
Nov 26th, 2017 - 03:58 am - Link - Report abuse -4@RL
Nov 26th, 2017 - 10:37 am - Link - Report abuse -1Huh. So all those random islands in the area are sort of mirages of the Falklands? In that case it's quite impressive the rest of the map is as good as it is. Do Spanish maps from that era show the same political divisions?
In 1770 Spain's Ambassador to London Prince Masserano complained that unless Spain published some charts he could not convince the British of Spanish claims in the Americas and South Seas. He was still moaning about it a few years later.
Nov 26th, 2017 - 11:48 am - Link - Report abuse +4I've a quote somewhere, which basically comes down to - the British and Dutch announced every discovery, while Portugal and Spain kept quiet.
I have French & British charts for the period around 1700, but I've yet to find a Spanish one. Earliest I have is the 1748 Orosco (Orozco/Horozco) map published in 1760.
I'm still looking. There are a couple of possibles, but finding a decent image can be frustrating.
How odd. They must have had some kind of charts, or how could they get there or work out which bit was supposed to belong to which Viceroyalty?
Nov 26th, 2017 - 11:01 pm - Link - Report abuse -1I had a quick look to see what maps there are, and most of them do seem to have the Pacific marked as South Seas. What did the treaty say about it exactly?
Not enough space here - but Arts 3 & 4 only mention the Pacific & South Seas which rules them out. Art. 6 talks about the west & east coasts & the islands 'adjacent.'
Nov 27th, 2017 - 01:45 am - Link - Report abuse +3The British & indeed the French did not accept that the Falklands were 'adjacent.' The Spanish claimed that anything up to 100 leagues was (300 miles). Modern ruling from the ICJ have suggested that any island even 100 miles away could not be considered adjacent. Even 40 miles may be too much.
As for charts, I understand that Malaspina in his Spanish expedition of the early 1790's used British charts. I shall have to set up a page on the blogsite for all the maps I have so far. Another job.
So then the Spanish probably thought they were included when they signed the treaty, and the British thought they weren't. Typical, I swear they left these things unsettled just to annoy us now in modern times! They pulled the same kind of inconclusive crap with Belize, and Belize didn't manage to become independent until 1981 as a result.
Nov 27th, 2017 - 10:39 pm - Link - Report abuse 0It's odd that Spain wouldn't have their own charts after all their early discoveries, but a page with maps would be cool. It's fun trying to match them up to modern features, and you can understand how there were so many wars in Latin America after independence when most borders were so vague and ill-defined.
Nothing changes much, even today important matters are just left to the next generation to sort out, and often by them to the next....... bloody politicians :-)
Nov 27th, 2017 - 11:02 pm - Link - Report abuse +2Commenting for this story is now closed.
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