science

Nathaniel Portlock

Nathaniel Portlock is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Nathaniel Portlock rather than just read about it. In short: Nathaniel Portlock (c. 1748 – 12 September 1817) was a British ship's captain, maritime fur trader, and author. Career He entered the Royal Navy in 1772 as an able seaman, serving in HMS St Albans.

Key takeaways

Nathaniel Portlock belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Nathaniel Portlock to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Nathaniel Portlock from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Nathaniel Portlock (c. 1748 – 12 September 1817) was a British ship's captain, maritime fur trader, and author.

Career He entered the Royal Navy in 1772 as an able seaman, serving in HMS St Albans. In 1776 he joined HMS Discovery as master's mate and served on the third Pacific voyage of James Cook. During the expedition, in August 1779, he was transferred to HMS Resolution. He passed his lieutenant's examination on 7 September 1780, then served on HMS Firebrand in the Channel fleet. On Cook's third voyage, furs obtained in present-day British Columbia and Alaska sold for good prices when the expedition called at Macao. In 1785 Richard Cadman Etches and partners, including Portlock and George Dixon formed a partnership, commonly called the King George's Sound Company, to develop the fur trade. Dixon had also served on Resolution in the Pacific Ocean under Cook. In September 1785 Portlock and Dixon sailed from England. Portlock was in command of the larger vessel, the 320-ton (bm) King George, with a crew of 59. Dixon's was in command of the 200-ton (bm) Queen Charlotte, with a crew of 33. Dixon and Portlock sailed together for most of their three-year voyage. They crossed the Atlantic Ocean, reaching the Falkland Islands in January 1786, and transited Cape Horn to enter the Pacific Ocean. They reached the Hawaiian Islands on 24 May and anchored in Kealakekua Bay (where Cook had been killed in 1779), but did not go ashore. They took on fresh food at other Hawaiian Islands and proceeded on to what is now Alaska. After two years of plying the waters, Portlock and Dixon departed North America, reaching Macao in November 1788. On their return Portlock and Dixon published an account of the voyage, based in part on letters written by William Beresford, the trader on the expedition. Returning to the Royal Navy in 1791, Portlock was appointed to command the brig HMS Assistant, which accompanied Bligh on his second voyage to transport breadfruit plants from Tahiti to the West Indies. Following his return to England in 1793, Portlock was promoted to commander and later commanded the sloop HMS Arrow. In 1799 he was promoted to captain, and served as a Sea Fencibles commander at Poole in 1803, and at Dartmouth from 1805 to 1807. He died on 12 September 1817 in Greenwich Hospital.

Personal life His son, Major-General Joseph Ellison Portlock, was a British geologist and soldier.

Legacy Portlock Harbor, a bay on the west coast of Alaska's Chichagof Island, was named by Portlock in 1789, following a visit there in August 1787. Portlock, a cannery settlement active in the early and middle 20th century, Portlock Glacier and a road east of Homer, all on Alaska's Kenai Peninsula, were named in his honor.

See also HMS Lutine — while commanding Arrow, Portlock was involved in the wreck and attempted salvage of Lutine, which sank on 9 October 1799 carrying a large cargo of gold. The Lutine Bell, which was salvaged, was in the past rung when ships were reported sunk at Lloyd's of London.

Citations

References "Portlock, Nathaniel". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/22586. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.) Hīroa, Te Rangi (Peter. H. Buck) (1953). Explorers of the Pacific: European and American Discoveries in Polynesia. Honolulu, Hawaii: Bernice P. Bishop Museum. p. 35. OCLC 646912113. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help), has background on the voyage of King George and the Queen Charlotte Laughton, John Knox (1896). "Portlock, Nathaniel" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 46. London: Smith, Elder & Co. Pethick, Derek (1976). First Approaches to the Northwest Coast. Vancouver: J.J. Douglas. pp. 97–100. ISBN 0-88894-056-4. Portlock, Nathaniel (1789). A voyage round the world but more particularly to the north-west coast of America: performed in 1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788, in the King George and Queen Charlotte, Captains Portlock and Dixon. London: J. Stockdale and G. Goulding. OCLC 221899194. OL 6961184M. Dixon, George (1789). A voyage round the world but more particularly to the north-west coast of America: performed in 1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788, in the King George and Queen Charlotte, Captains Portlock and Dixon. London: G. Goulding. OCLC 243542399. OL 22121376M. Restarick, Henry B. (1928). "Historic Kealakekua Bay". Papers of the Hawaiian Historical Society. Honolulu: The Bulletin Publishing Company. hdl:10524/964.

External links Media related to Nathaniel Portlock at Wikimedia Commons Lieutenant Nathaniel Portlock's Logbook of the Assistant, with brief biographical notes Will of Nathaniel Portlock Bligh Encyclopedia, Pitcairn Islands Study Centre, retrieved 16 February 2012, text from Sven Wahlroos (2001), Mutiny and Romance in the South Seas: A Companion to the Bounty Adventure, iUniverse, ISBN 978-0-595-13807-4, OCLC 150457732 Pieter van der Merwe (25 September 2008), Nathaniel Portlock's origins - sources?, archived from the original on 4 November 2016, retrieved 16 February 2012, information from National Maritime Museum database

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Nathaniel Portlock

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Nathaniel Portlock claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Nathaniel Portlock before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Nathaniel Portlock ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Nathaniel Portlock

In research: Nathaniel Portlock appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Nathaniel Portlock in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Nathaniel Portlock is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1740s births, 1817 deaths, 18th-century British explorers, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Nathaniel Portlock outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Nathaniel Portlock in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Nathaniel Portlock means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
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Frequently asked questions

What is Nathaniel Portlock in simple terms?

Nathaniel Portlock (c. 1748 – 12 September 1817) was a British ship's captain, maritime fur trader, and author. Career He entered the Royal Navy in 1772 as an able seaman, serving in HMS St Albans.

Why does Nathaniel Portlock matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Nathaniel Portlock?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Nathaniel Portlock.