1774-1814

English Sea Captain, Explorer and Cartographer

Matthew Flinders explored the coast of Australia, charted it more carefully than any explorer had before, and gave it the name Australia. He sailed around both Australia and Tasmania, proving they were islands, and accurately located many coastal features as well as nearby islands, reefs, bays, and rocks on British maps.

Born in England in 1774, Matthew Flinders studied navigation and cartography so he could go to sea. In 1789 his uncle got him on a ship as a servant. He was fifteen, five feet six inches tall, wiry with black hair and dark eyes. A year later he was a midshipman with a berth on Bellerophon, a British, 74-gun man of war, where he learned important sailing skills and navy operations.

In 1791 Flinders was on the ship Providence with Captain William Bligh (1754-1817). Providence reached Tahiti in April of 1792 and...