Colonial Despatches

Captain Manuel Quimper was a Spanish naval officer and explorer. He was sent to the Northwest Coast in 1789,1 during the British/Spanish competition for control over the coast, known as the Nootka Sound Controversy.2

During the Spanish attempt to permanently reoccupy Nootka Sound in 1790, Quimper sailed on the Princesa Real, the captured British Princess Royal, with Captain Gonzalo Lopez de Haro to explore the southern coast.3 Quimper and Haro charted the entrance to the Juan de Fuca Strait and named points in and near Sooke Inlet, where Haro landed and claimed posession for the King of Spain.4 They travelled up to Rosario Strait and Whidbey Island before returning to Nootka Sound.5 Mt. Manuel Quimper, near Victoria, and Quimper Penninsula, in Washington State, are named after Quimper.6

• 1. Christon I. Archer, Quimper, Manuel The Canadian Encyclopedia.
• 2. Barry M. Gough, Nootka Sound Controversy The Canadian Encyclopedia.
• 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1778-1846 (Vancouver, BC: Discovery Press, 1977), 58.
• 4. Hubert Howe Bancroft, The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, vol. 32, History of British Columbia 1792-1887 (San Francisco: The History Company, 1887), 9.
• 5. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1778-1846 (Vancouver, BC: Discovery Press, 1977), 58.
• 6. Captain John T. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver, BC: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 411.