Harold Corwin

IC 703 and IC 704 are a pair described by Swift as "eeF, S, R, p of 2" and "eF, vS (? close D), f of 2". His positions orient them southwest/northeast and separated by about 4 arcmin. There is nothing in the area that matches these constraints.

There is a possibility that they may be NGC 3704 and NGC 3707, about 1m 40s west of Swift's nominal positions. But those are on an almost exact east-west line, and are separated by only about an arcmin. Also, the brighter object is the western, while Swift makes the eastern brighter. Finally, NGC 3707 shows no sign of being double.

There is also the possibility that NPM1G -11.0302, about 4 arcmin north- northeast might be the second of Swift's nebulae, with NGC 3704 the first. Again, however, the Lick galaxy shows no sign of duplicity, and it is even fainter than NGC 3707 and is thus less likely to have been picked up visually.

The only other nebulae that Swift found on the same night (IC 619 and IC 799) have problems of their own (IC 619 is 20 arcmin north of Swift's position, while IC 799 is identical to NGC 4520). So, a systematic error in Swift's positions can't be claimed for the night.

All in all, there is not much to go on here. So, the identifications with the NGC objects are only tentative, and very questionable.

― IC Notes by Harold Corwin

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