King, Phillip Parker (1791 - 1856)

Summary

Phillip Parker King was a naval officer whose principal scientific work was hydrographic surveys of the Australian coast, continuing the work of Mathew Flinders. King also made research notes on Australian natural history, collected insects and had a small observatory.

Related entries

Archival resources

Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science

• Australian Botanists - Biographies, MS 064; Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science. Details

Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales

• King Family - Records, 1843 - 1897, ML MSS 673; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• King Family - Records, 1831 - 1903, ML MSS 3447; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1817 - 1823, ML MSS 4429; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1837 - 1843, ML MSS 963; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1817 - 1822, FM 4/2113 and FM 4/2094-5; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1818 - 1829, ML DOC 2312; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1837 - 1861, ML MSS 592; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1817, ML DOC 920; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1819 - 1830, ML MSS 1521; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1848 - 1856, MS Q299; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1824 - 1855, A3599 and on microfilm FM 4/66; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details

National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection

• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1817, MS 1645; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1818 - 1821, Mfm G/1893; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 9 February 1818 - 3 May 1818, Mfm G 1883; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
• Phillip Parker King - Records, 1826 - 1830, MS 3232; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details

Published resources

Books

• Abbott, Brian Douglas, Phillip Parker King 1791-1856: a Most Admirable Australian (Sydney: Glenburgh Pty Ltd, 2012), 397 pp. Details
• Gibbs, W. J., The Origins of Australian Meteorology, Metarch Papers No. 12 (Bureau of Meteorology, 1998). Details
• Hordern, Marsden, King of the Australian coast; the work of Phillip Parker King in Mermaid and Bathurst 1817 - 1822 (Carlton South (Vic.): Melbourne University Press, 1997), 441 pp. Details
• King, Phillip Parker, Narrative of a survey of the intertropical and western coasts of Australia performed between the years 1818 and 1822 by Captain Phillip King, 2 vols (London: John Murray, 1826). Details
• McKenna, Mark, From the edge: Australia's lost histories (Melbourne: The Miegunyah Press (University of Melbourne Publishing Ltd), 2016), xx, 251 pp. See pages: 67, 117-120, 166, 193-195. Details
• Orchard, A. E.; and Orchard, T. A., The Australian botanical journals of Allan Cunningham: the Oxley and early King expeditions October 1816 - February 1819 (Weston Creek, A.C.T.: A. E. Orchard, 2018), 309 pp. Details
• Orchard, A. E.; and Orchard, T. A., The Australian botanical journals of Allan Cunningham: the later King expeditions February 1819 - September 1822 (Weston Creek, A.C.T.: A. E. Orchard, 2018), 431 pp. Details
• Tiley, Robert, The Mermaid Tree: How a Tiny Unknown Ship Opened Australia's North and West to Development, Dreams and Disappointment (Sydney: ABC Books, 2006), 297 pp. Details
• Wellbank, I., compiler, Complete sailing directions for the various passages to and through Torres Straits: comprising the inner passage of the late Admiral King, and the outer routes by Raine Island: and by the north eastern entrance, by Captain Blackwood (...) (Sydney: Reading & Wellbank, 1864), 47 pp. Details

Book Sections

• 'King, Phillip Parker (1791-1856), naval officer, hydrographer and company manager' in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Douglas Pike, ed., vol. 2 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1967), pp. 61-64. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A020053b.htm. Details
• Shellam, Tiffany, 'Ethnographic inquiry on Phillip Parker King's hydrographic survey' in Expeditionary anthropology: teamwork, travel and the ‘science of man’, Thomas, Martin; and Harris, Amanda, eds (New York: Bergahn Books, 2018), pp. 205-32. Details
• Shellam, Tiffany, 'The centrality of ethnographic inquiry on Phillip Parker King's Australian hydrographic survey' in Expeditionary anthropology: teamwork, travel and the "science of man", Thomas, Martin; and Harris, Amanda, eds (New York: Berghahn, 2018), pp. 205-32. Details

Conference Papers

• Curry, Suzanne; Maslin, Bruce, 'Cunningham's Collecting Localities While Botanist on Lieutenant Phillip Parker King's Survey of Coastal Australia, December 1817 to April 1822', in History of Systematic Botany in Australasia: Proceedings of a Symposium Held at the University of Melbourne, 25-27 May 1988 edited by Short, P.S. (Melbourne: Australian Systematic Botany Society, 1990), pp. 137-148.. Details

Edited Books

• Stanbury, David ed., A narrative of the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, being passages fron the Narrative written by Captain Robert FitzRoy, R.N., together with extracts from his logs, reports and letters; additional material from the diary and letters of Charles Darwin, notes from Midshipman Philip King and letters from Second Lieutenant Bartholomew Sullivan (London: Folio Society, 1977), 359 pp. Details

Journal Articles

• Beanland, Denver, 'Connections in charting the Great Barrier Reef, 1770 - 1850', Queensland history journal, 24 (3) (2019), 251-67. Details
• Kenneally, Kevin; and Clement, Cathie, 'Two centuries on: the iconic "Mermaid" boab tree in the Kimberley', Australasian Systematic Botany Society newsletter, 188 (2021), 32-8. Details
• Morgan, Kenneth, 'Navigating the Great Barrier Reef: the inner and outer routes, 1815 - 1860', International journal of maritime history, 31 (1) (2021), 37-53. https://doi.org/10.1177/0843871421991164. Details
• Orchiston, Wayne, 'Illuminating Incidents in Antipodean Astronomy: Phillip Parker King and the Founding of Sydney Observatory', Vistas in Astronomy, 32 (1988), 285-301. Details
• Paterson, Alistair [and others], 'The Mermaid? Re-envisaging the 1818 exploration of Enderby Island, Murujuga, Western Australia', Journal of island and coastal archaeology, 15 (2) (2020), 284-304, https://doi.org/10.1080/15564894.2019.1604007. Details
• Paterson, Alistair; Shellam, Tiffany; Veth, Peter; Mulvaney, Ken; Anderson, Ross; Dortch, Joe; and McDonald, Jo, 'The Mermaid? Re-envisaging the 1818 exploration of Enderby Island, Murujuga, Western Australia', Journal of island and coastal archaeology, 15 (2) (2020), 284-304. Details
• Russell, H.C., 'Astronomical and Meteorological Workers in New South Wales, 1778-1860', Report of the first meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, 1 (1888), 45-94, https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/15813133. Details
• Shellam, Tiffany; and Paterson, Alistair, ' A historical stratum of geological collections from Western Australia in the Natural History Museum, London', Studies in Western Australian history, 35 (2020), 37-57. Details
• Webb, Joan B., 'A. Cunningham, P.P. King and the Legacy to the Botanical Fraternity', Australian Systematic Botany Society Newsletter, 152 (2013), 4-7. Details
• Whitley, Gilbert P., 'Some Early Naturalists and Collectors in Australia', Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society, xix (1933), 291-304. Details

Resources

• Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q1338334. Details
• VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/52570893. Details
• 'King, Phillip Parker (17911213-18560226)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-494430. Details

Resource Sections

• Gibbs, W. J., 'The Origins of Australian Meteorology', in Federation and Meteorology, 2001, http://www.austehc.unimelb.edu.au/fam/0805.html. Details

Seminar Papers

• Brock, John F., 'Cook-Bligh-Flinders-King: the quadrilogy of master mariners' in given in The Discovery Room, Australian Museum, Tuesday 6pm (Sydney: Australian Science History Club, 2005). Details

See also

• Federation and Meteorology, 2001, http://www.austehc.unimelb.edu.au/fam/index_k.html. Details
• Branagan, David and Moore, D. T., 'W. H. Fitton's Geology of Australia's Coasts, 1826', Historical Records of Australian Science, 19 (1) (2008), 1-51, https://doi.org/10.1071/HR08001. Details
• Maiden, J. H., 'Records of Australian botanists:- (a) general; (b) New South Wales', Journal and Proceedings of The Royal Society of New South Wales, 42 (1908), 60-132. Details
• Serle, Percival, Dictionary of Australian biography (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1949). Details