New Guinea Exploring Expedition (1885)

Summary

The New Guinea Exploring Expedition, often referred to as the Bonito Expedition, was organised by the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia with financial support from the New South Wales, Queensland and Victorian Governments. It departed from Sydney in June 1885 in the steam launch Bonito, returning in December of the same year. The purpose was to collect biological, geological, ethnographic and geographical information. Key personnel were: H. C. Everill (Leader); Wilhelm Baeuerlen (botanical collector); Sydney A. Bernays (surgeon and botanist); William Froggatt (zoological collector and entomologist); and Wilhelm Haacke (Chief Scientist). Four months were spent exploring the Fly River and its tributary the Strickland River, the Expedition travelling approximately 200 km upstream. Few reports of the expedition and its collections were issued. Some of the insect collections were published by Edward Ramsay and William Macleay: most of the botanical specimens were sent to Ferdinand von Mueller for identification.

Related entries

Published resources

Books

• Bäuerlen, William, The voyage of the Bonito : an account of the Fly river expedition to New Guinea (Sydney: Gibbs, Shallard &​ Co, 1886), 38 pp. Details
• Mackay, Roy D., The Bonito Expedition: the New Guinea Exploring Expedition of 1885 (Belair, S.A.: Crawford House Publishing,, 2012), 145 pp. Details
• Pulsford, Edward, Special record of the proceedings of the Geographical Society of Australasia in fitting out and starting the exploratory expedition to New Guinea, July 1885 (Sydney: F. Cunninghame, 1885), 80 pp. Details

Journal Articles

• Dwyer, Peter D.; Minnegal, Monica and Warrillow, Chris, 'The forgotten expedition - 1885: the Strickland River, New Guinea', Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society, 101 (1) (2015), 7-24. Details
• Everill, H. C., 'Exploration of New Guinea - Capt. Everill's report', Transactions and proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia, New South Wales Branch, 3/4 (1888), 170-86. Details
• Macleay, William [J.], 'The insects to the Fly River, New Guinea: Coleoptera', Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales ser. 2, 1 (1886), 136-204. Details
• Ramsay, E. P., 'Exploration of New Guinea: report on the collections', Transactions and proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia, New South Wales Branch, 3/4 (1888), 207-8. Details
• Wilkinson, C. S., 'Report on the geological specimens from New Guinea, collected by the exploring expedition of the Geographical Society of Australasia', Transactions and proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia, New South Wales Branch, 3/4 (1886), 203-6. Details

See also

• D'Albertis, L. M., 'Journeys up the Fly River and in other parts of New Guinea', Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and monthly record of geography, 1 (1) (1879), 4-16. Details
• Dwyer, Peter D.; and Minnegal, Monica, 'Captain Everill's error: mapping the Upper Strickland River in Papua and New Guinea, 1885 - 1979', Journal of Pacific history, 53 (3) (2018), 310-29. https://doi.org/10.1080/00223344.2018.1483188. Details
• Wilson, K.L., 'William Bauerlen - a 'Circumspect and Zealous' Collector', 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. 97-104.. Details