Captain William Henry Smyth
Apr 27, 1831    No. 6 The Crescent, Bedford, England (map)
150mm f/17.6 refractor by Tully 1827

A neat double star, on the Bear's left fore-knee, where an occult line from Polaris to the west of θ will find it nearly on the parallel of declination with γ Ursæ Majoris. A 8, silvery white; B 9, violet tint, with a third star at a distance in the np quadrant. This fine object is 73 ♅. II.; and as that observant astronomer gained these results:

    Pos. 306 45'  Dist. 5".00  Ep. 1782.87
         317 38'   ...    ...      1802.39

he concluded that a change of 10° 52' had taken place, in 19 years and 184 days. This, however, is not confirmed, and it is probable that the 317°, of 1802, ought to have been registered 307°. The other recent observations have been :

    H. and S.  Pos. 309° 02'  Dist. 6".47  Ep. 1822.12
    S.              310° 56'        5".69      1830.29
   [WDS             315°            5".8					  2018   ]

A false alarm having been sounded about this star, I attacked it again in 1839, and hope I have settled the question of 1802, because all the circumstances, observatorial and atmospherical, were so truly favourable, that I can safely assign the highest weight to the results.

― A Cycle of Celestial Objects Vol II, The Bedford Catalogue, William Henry Smyth, 1844

Drawings, descriptions, and CCD photos are copyright Andrew Cooper unless otherwise noted, no usage without permission.

A complete list of credits and sources can be found on the about page