Martin Kopper
Already since the mid-19th century, it was a task of the Imperial-Royal Austro-Hungarian Navy not only to take part in military actions, to train sea cadets, to strengthen diplomatic relations, and to protect the coasts, the sea trade, and Austrian citizens in far countries, but also to carry out coast surveys and soundings, as well as scientific observations during their missions. On a trip around the earth, Tobias von Österreicher, commander of the corvette Erzherzog Friedrich, was instructed to observe the Venus transit of December 8, 1874 in Yokohama. This order was only one out of many that he had to fulfill: to train the Navy cadets, to explore the possibility of the installation of a colony on the island of Borneo, to meet diplomats and consulate representatives, to carry out soundings and coast surveys to improve sea-charts, and to make meteorological observations. The "qualification list" indicates that all these tasks were fulfilled according to expectations. However, an incident on Borneo in 1875 took the life of two of his sailors. In its aftermath he did not react according to rules, he was reproached by the Navy Section of the Imperial War Ministry, and his career as a ship commander came to an end. Besides the Austrian expedition to observe the Venus transit of 1874 in Yokohama, a second one was carried out by the astronomers Eduard Weiss and Theodor Oppolzer in Jassy (Romania), which was supported by the Vienna Academy of Sciences.
Manuscript: jad10_7r.pdf