Bate, William, 1945-

Following Napoleon's exile to St. Helena in October 1815, a small British naval garrison was established on Ascension Island. By the time of Napoleon's death in 1821 the island had became a sanatorium and victualling base for ships engaged in suppressing the slave trade on the coast of West Africa. In 1823 the first Royal Marine commandant arrived on the island and it remained a naval possession. This volume is a logbook of Ascension Island kept by Captain William Bate, commandant of the island from 1828 to 1838. Bate was responsible for much of the building work carried out on the island and also for naming the settlement 'Georgetown' in 1829. He died on the island in April 1838.

From the guide to the Logbook of Ascension Island kept by Captain William Bate, 1 January 1834 - 31 October 1835, (The Bodleian Library of Commonwealth and African Studies at Rhodes House)