Background
William Lewis Herndon was born on October 25, 1813 in Fredericksburg, Virginia, United States, the son of Dabney and Elizabeth (Hull) Herndon, and a descendant of William Herndon who came to America some time before 1674.
( In 1857, Captain William Lewis Herndon sacrificed his l...)
In 1857, Captain William Lewis Herndon sacrificed his life trying to save 600 passengers and crew when his ship foundered in a hurricane off the Carolina coast. Memorialized in Gary Kinder's best-selling book Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea, Herndon, with this final courageous act, epitomized a lifetime of heroism. Seven years earlier, the secretary of the Navy had appointed Herndon to lead the first American expedition into the Amazon Valley. Herndon departed Lima, Peru, on May 20, 1851, and arrived at Para, Brazil, nearly a year later, traveling 4,000 miles by foot, mule, canoe, and small boat. He cataloged the scientific and commercial observations requested by Congress, but he filed his report as a narrative, creating an intimate portrait of an exotic land before the outside world rushed in. Herndon's report so far surpassed his superiors' expectations that instead of printing the obligatory few hundred copies for Congress, the secretary of the Navy ordered 10,000 copies in the first print run; three months later, he ordered 20,000 more. Herndon described his adventures with such insight, such compassion and wit, and such literary grace that he came to symbolize the new spirit of exploration and discovery sweeping mid-nineteenth-century America. For the next hundred years, Herndon's report languished out of print before being revived briefly in 1951. Now, for the first time in nearly fifty years, Gary Kinder and Grove Press bring to readers one of the greatest chronicles of travel and exploration ever written.
https://www.amazon.com/Exploration-Valley-Amazon-William-Herndon/dp/0802137040?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=0802137040
William Lewis Herndon was born on October 25, 1813 in Fredericksburg, Virginia, United States, the son of Dabney and Elizabeth (Hull) Herndon, and a descendant of William Herndon who came to America some time before 1674.
William Herndon was appointed midshipman on 1 November 1828. He was promoted to passed midshipman in 1834 and lieutenant in 1841. He cruised in Pacific, South American, Mediterranean, and Gulf waters from then until 1842. From 1842 to 1846, Herndon served in the Depot of Charts and Instruments of the US Naval Observatory with his first cousin and brother-in-law, Matthew Fontaine Maury. They prepared oceanographic charts and performed other scientific work invaluable to the safe and accurate navigation of the seas. During the Mexican-American War, Herndon commanded the brig Iris with distinction.
In 1851 Herndon headed an expedition exploring the Valley of the Amazon, a vast area uncharted by Europeans, although inhabited for thousands of years by numerous tribes of indigenous peoples. The purpose of the expedition was to ascertain the commercial resources and potential of the valley. Departing Lima, Peru, 21 May 1851, Herndon, in the company of Lieutenant Lardner Gibbon and five other men, pressed into the jungles. After crossing the Cordilleras, Gibbon separated to explore the Bolivian tributaries of the Amazon while Herndon continued to explore the main trunk. After a journey of 4, 366 miles, which took him through the wilderness from sea level to heights of 16, 199 feet, Herndon reached the city of Pará, Brazil on 11 April 1852. On 26 January 1853, Herndon submitted an encyclopedic and illustrated 414-page report to the Secretary of the Navy John P. Kennedy. The report was published by the Navy in 1854 as Exploration of the Valley of the Amazon.
After two years of active service on Potomac and San Jacinto, Herndon was assigned in 1855 as commander of the Atlantic Mail Steamship Company steamer SS Central America, from New York to Aspinwall, Panama. Herndon was carrying perhaps 15 tons of gold (then worth $2, 000, 000) and 474 passengers, many of whom were from California and were returning to the East Coast, as well as 101 crew members. After leaving Cuba on 7 September 1857, a few days later, they encountered a three-day hurricane off Cape Hatteras. The hurricane steadily increased in force. By the 12th, the Central America was shipping water through several leaks due to the ship's lack of water-tight bulkheads and general unseaworthiness. Water in her hold put out her boiler fires, precluding the use of steam for both controlling the ship and pumping out the bilges.
Herndon recognized that his ship was doomed; he flew its flag upside down as a distress signal and hoped another ship would see them. At 2 p. m. , the West Indian brig Marine arrived to help take passengers from the stricken steamer. It did not have room to take on all of the passengers and crew. Commander Herndon supervised the difficult loading of women and children into lifeboats to transfer to the Marine. He gave one of the women passengers his watch to send to his wife, saying that he could not leave the ship while there was a soul on board. Survivors of the disaster reported last seeing Commander Herndon in full uniform, standing by the wheelhouse with his hand on the rail, hat off and in his hand, with his head bowed in prayer as the ship gave a lurch and went down.
( In 1857, Captain William Lewis Herndon sacrificed his l...)
William Herndon married Frances Elizabeth Hansborough and they had a daughter Ellen Lewis Herndon, born in Culpeper Court House, Virginia. His daughter Ellen Lewis Herndon married Chester A. Arthur, the future U. S. President.