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He entered the merchant service very early in his life and was apparently bound to the master of a Newcastle collier (a coal transport vessel) for some years. About 1805 he shipped on board a merchantman trading to the West Indies, making several voyages there.
In 1820 he volunteered for service in the Royal Navy and subsequently served on several ships. He was aboard the Hope when in 1813 in the English Channel she captured the True Blooded Yankee, an American privateerA privateer is a private ship (or its captain) authorized by a country's government to attack and seize cargo from another country's ships. Prior to the development of international law among European nations, there was no legal recourse for minor grievan. With the end of the Napoleonic War he was laid off on half pay in February 1816Events March 25 Friedrich Karl Ludwig, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Beck dies and is succeeded by the later Friedrich Wilhelm, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg, his son and founder of the Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg., and for a while resumed merchant voyages to the West Indies.
In 1819Events January 17 Simon Bolivar proclaims the Republic of Colombia January 29 Sir Stamford Raffles lands on the island of Singapore February 6 Formal treaty between Sultan Hussein of Johor and the British Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles originates Singapore F Weddell was introduced to James Strachan, a shipbuilder of Leith, who together with James Mitchell, a London insurance broker, owned the 160-ton brigIn sailing, a brig is a vessel with two masts at least one of which is square rigged. In modern parlance, a brig is square rigged on both masts, and this is the standard name for such a vessel. Previously, brig has been used as an abbreviation of briganti Jane, an American-built ship taken during the war of 1812 and re-fitted for sealing. News of the discovery of the South Shetland IslandsThe South Shetland Islands are a chain of islands in the Southern Ocean about 120 kilometers off the coast of Antarctica. They fall within the region 61° 00' 63° 37' South, 53° 83' 62° 83' West. The South Shetlands consist of 11 major islands and several had just broken, and Weddell suggested that fortunes might be made in the new sealing grounds. His first voyage as the captain of the Jane took him to the Falkland IslandsThe Falkland Islands is an overseas territory of the United Kingdom in the South Atlantic consisting of two main islands known as East Falkland and West Falkland and a number of smaller islands. Sovereignty of the islands is also claimed by Argentina wher and further south. He returned with the holds full, and the voyage was so profitable, that Strachan and Mitchell had a second ship, the Beaufroy, built.
The next voyage from 1821Events February 23 The Philadelphia College of Apothecaries founds the first pharmacy college. March 25 Greece declares its independence from the Ottoman Empire, beginning the Greek War of Independence. July 10 The United States takes possession of its ne and 1822 took both ships to the South Shetland Islands. However, there were some 45 sealers operating in the area and seal were already becoming rare (a mere two years after the discovery of the islands!), and so he scouted for new hunting grounds. Micheal McCleod, the captain of the Beaufroy, sighted the South Orkney Islands on November 22, 1821, an independent discovery from that of Powell just a few days earlier. There, they hunted for seals, and arrived back in England in July.
On the third voyage from 1822 to 1824, Weddell again commanded the Jane, while the captain of the Beaufroy was one Matthew Brisbane. Together they sailed to the South Orkneys again. Sealing proved disappointing, though, and after searching for land between the South Shetlands and the South Orkneys (and not finding any), they turned south in the hope to better sealing ground there. The season was unusually mild and tranquil, and on February 17, 1823 the two ships had reached latitude 74°34' S and longitude 30°12' W: the southernmost position any ship had ever reached before, a record that would hold for more than 80 years. A few icebergs were sighted but there was still no sight of land, leading Weddell to theorize that the sea continued as far as the South Pole. Another two days' sailing would have brought him to Coat's Land but Weddell decided to turn back. The region would not be visited again until 1911, when Wilhelm Filchner discovered the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf.
Weddell returned north and sheltered at South Georgia, where he and his crews searched for the elusive seal. They wintered at the Falklands and sailed again for the South Shetlands in November 1823. At the beginning of 1824, the two ships separated. Weddell returned in March 1824 to the Falklands and headed back to England, where he arrived in July.
His record for a southerly voyage, three degrees beyond that of James Cook, caused some raised eyebrows. Weddell was persuaded by Strachan and Mitchell to incorporate everything in a book. The first edition appeared in 1825, followed by second enlarged edition in 1827, incorporating some informations from the Beaufroy which had returned to England in 1826.