John King Davis

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name = John King Davis


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birth_date = birth date|1884|2|19
birth_place = Kew, Surrey,England
death_date = death date and age|1967|5|8|1884|2|19
death_place = Toorak, Melbourne, Australia
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residence = Australia
nationality = Anglo-Australian
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known_for = Captain of the "Aurora"
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employer = Explorer, navigator
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parents = James Green Davis and Marion Alice King
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John King Davis (19 February 1884 – 8 May 1967) was an English-born Australian explorer and navigator notable for his work captaining exploration ships in Antarctic waters as well as for establishing meteorological stations on Macquarie Island in the subantarctic and on Willis Island in the Coral Sea.

Early life

Davis's formal education, at Colet Court, London, and at Burford Grammar School, Oxfordshire, ended in 1900, when he and his father left London for Cape Town, South Africa. [cite news | first= John | last= Béchervaise | coauthors= | title=Davis, John King (1884 - 1967) | date= | publisher= | url =http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A080262b.htm | work =Australian Dictionary of Biography | pages = | accessdate = 2008-09-16 | language = ]

Career

Early exploration work

Davis served as Chief Officer of the "Nimrod" during Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic expedition in 1908-1909. He was Captain of the "Aurora" and second in command of Douglas Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition in 1911-1914. [cite news | first= | last= | coauthors= | title=Bright Sparcs entry on John King Davis | date= | publisher= | url =http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/biogs/P001009b.htm | work =Bright Sparcs | pages = | accessdate = 2008-09-16 | language = ]

WWI

At the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, Davis volunteered for active service, and was put in charge of the troop transport Boonah, carrying troops and horses to Egypt and England. [cite news | first= | last= | coauthors= | title=Captain John King Davis | date= | publisher= | url =http://www.aad.gov.au/default.asp?casid=29573 | work =Australian Antartic Division | pages = | accessdate = 2008-09-16 | language = ]

Later exploration work

He also served as Captain of the "Discovery" in 1929-1930 in the course of the British Australian and New Zealand Antarctic Research Expedition.

Davis was Australia’s Commonwealth Director of Navigation from 1920 to 1949. It was at the beginning of this period that he volunteered to personally set up the remote Willis Island meteorological and cyclone warning station in 1921-22. [cite news | first=P. | last=Fletcher | coauthors= | title=Seventy-Five Years at Willis Island. Metarch Papers, No. 9, December 1996. Bureau of Meteorology: Australia | date=1996 | publisher= | url =http://www.austehc.unimelb.edu.au/fam/0596.html | work = | pages = | accessdate = 2008-09-16 | language = ]

Later work

Davis was President of the Royal Society of Victoria 1945-46, as well as being a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. Davis Station in Antarctica, established in 1957, is named after him.

He was invested as a Commander, Order of the British Empire (C.B.E.) in 1965. [cite news | first= | last= | coauthors= | title=John King Davis | date= | publisher= | url = http://thepeerage.com/p24058.htm | work =The Peerage | pages = | accessdate = 2008-09-16 | language = ]

Death

He died in 1967 in Toorak, Melbourne.

Bibliography

Books authored by Davis include:
* (1919) "With the Aurora in the Antarctic". Andrew Melrose: London
* (1921) "Willis Island: a storm-warning station in the Coral Sea" Critchley Parker: Melbourne.
* (1997) "Trial by Ice. The Antarctic Journals of John King Davis" (Edited by Louise Crossley) Bluntisham Books and Erskine Press: Bluntisham and Norwich (ISBN 1852970472)

References