Discovery of the Gilbert Islands
- When
- 1788
- Where
- Gilbert Islands chain, Micronesia; Marshall Islands, Micronesia; Mili Atoll, Marshall Islands
- Episodes
- 3
In June 1788, British captains Thomas Gilbert and John Marshall, sailing from Botany Bay toward Guangzhou, became the first Europeans to encounter the Gilbert Islands and charted islands later named the Marshall Islands after Captain Marshall.
Episodes
- Crossing the Gilbert Islands
Gilbert and Marshall sailed through six Gilbert atolls in 1788 without landing, the first Europeans recorded there.
- Charting the Marshall Islands
The captains charted islands in the region later named for John Marshall, after earlier Spanish sighting in 1526.
- Contact at Mili Atoll
On June 25, 1788, the British ships traded peacefully with islanders at Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
Background and detail
Background. The Gilbert Islands are a chain of sixteen atolls and coral islands in the Pacific Ocean, forming the easternmost part of Micronesia. The Marshall Islands lie north of the equator in the same region, comprising 29 coral atolls and many smaller islands divided into the Ratak and Ralik chains.
The 1788 Passage. Gilbert, commanding Charlotte, and Marshall, commanding Scarborough, had been part of the First Fleet that carried convicts from England to Botany Bay in New South Wales. En route to Guangzhou, their vessels passed through the Gilbert Islands and the Marshall Islands in 1788.
Naming and Charting. European maps and charts later named the Marshall group for British captain John Marshall, who explored the region in 1788. In 1820, Admiral Adam Johann von Krusenstern named the Gilbert Islands after Captain Thomas Gilbert, who had crossed the archipelago in 1788.
People involved
- Thomas Gilbert · Captain of Charlotte, first European to cross the Gilbert Islands
- John Marshall · Captain of Scarborough, explorer of the Marshall Islands region
Sources
- Marshall Islands Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-29
- Gilbert Islands Wikipedia, revision of 2026-06-10
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.