Turner Philip

Entered the service of the Hudson's Bay Company about

1779, and carried out important surveys for the Company. Stationed at

Cumberland House in 1789, and while there gave David Thompson

instruction in practical astronomy. Between 1790 and 1792 made a survey

of Lake Athabaska, and of the canoe route from Cumberland House to Great

Slave Lake. Dr. J. G. Kohl says that his manuscript journal of a

Journey from Cumberland-house towards the Athapiscow Country and back

to York Factory, 1790-1792, is preserved in the archives of the

Hudson's Bay Company at London. His map of this region, the original of

which is also in the Hudson's Bay Archives, is reproduced in Burpee's

Search for the Western Sea. His careful survey of Lake Athabaska was

important in that it corrected Peter Pond's crude map, which placed the

western end of the lake as far west as 131 deg., and so gave rise to the

impression that the lake was within easy reach of the Pacific Ocean.