Mathew Flinders: Glory and tragedy

1801 Matthew Flinders (1774 - 1814) left England to circumnavigate and map Australia. It was he who gave the continent its name.

In 1789 Flinders had entered the Royal Navy and in 1791 joined HMS Providence as a midshipman, serving under William Bligh on his second ‘breadfruit voyage’ to Tahiti.

In 1798 he circumnavigated Van Diemen’s Land (later renamed Tasmania, Australia's southernmost state) aboard The Norfolk, therefore proving it to be an island.

The Flinders story has a tragic turn to it. In 1803, while attempting to return to England aboard The Cumberland, he was forced to put in at Mauritius for repairs on December 17. Unbeknown to Flinders, England was at war with France, and the French governor, General De Caen, had Flinders detained as a spy. He would be imprisoned on Mauritius for almost seven years ...