See also Watkins Island (Maryland)

Watkins Island is a low lying, ice-covered island 5 miles (8 km) long, lying 3 miles (5 km) SW of Lavoisier Island

Lavoisier Island

Lavoisier Island is an island long and wide, lying between Rabot and Watkins Islands in the Biscoe Islands. It is named Isla Serrano by Chile and isla Mitre by Argentina....

 in the Biscoe Islands

Biscoe Islands

Biscoe Islands is a series of islands, of which the principal ones are Renaud, Rabot, Lavoisier and Watkins, lying parallel to the W coast of Graham Land and extending some in a NE–SW direction...

. The island was first mapped by the French Antarctic Expedition

French Antarctic Expedition

French Antarctic Expedition refers to several French expeditions in Antarctica.-First expedition:Yves-Joseph de Kerguelen-Trémarec was a French explorer....

 under Jean-Baptiste Charcot, 1903–05 and 1908–10, but remained unnamed until resighted by the BGLE under Rymill, 1934–37. He gave the name Mikkelsen Island after Ejnar Mikkelsen

Ejnar Mikkelsen

Ejnar Mikkelsen , was a Danish polar explorer and author, born in Jutland. He served in the Georg Carl Amdrup expedition to Christian IX Land, East Greenland , and in the Baldwin-Ziegler expedition to Franz Joseph Land .With Ernest de Koven Leffingwell he organized the Anglo-American polar...

, Danish

Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...

 Arctic

Arctic

The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...

 explorer. In applying the name, Rymill was unaware of the existence of Mikkelsen Islands

Mikkelsen Islands

Mikkelsen Islands is a small group of islands and rocks lying off the southeast coast of Adelaide Island, southeast of the Leonie Islands. Discovered by the French Antarctic Expedition under Jean-Baptiste Charcot, 1908-10, and named by him for Otto Mikkelsen, Norwegian diver who inspected the...

 75 mi (121 km) southwestward, named in 1908–10 by Charcot. To avoid confusion of the two, the UK-APC recommended in 1952 that the Rymill naming be amended. The new name, Watkins Island, commemorates Gino Watkins

Gino Watkins

Henry George "Gino" Watkins FRGS was a British Arctic explorer.Born in London, he was educated at Lancing College and acquired a love of mountaineering and the outdoors from his father through holidays in the Alps, the Tyrol and the English Lake District...

, leader of the British Arctic Air Route Expedition

British Arctic Air Route Expedition

The British Arctic Air Route Expedition was a privately-funded expedition to the east coast and interior of the island of Greenland. The expedition, led by Gino Watkins, aimed to draw improved maps and charts of poorly-understood sections of Greenland's coastline, and to gather climate data from...

, 1930–31. A new feature, Mikkelsen Bay

Mikkelsen Bay

Mikkelsen Bay is a bay, 15 miles wide at its mouth and indenting 10 miles, entered between Bertrand Ice Piedmont and Cape Berteaux along the W coast of Graham Land, Antarctica. First seen from a distance in 1909 by the French Antarctic Expedition under Jean-Baptiste Charcot, but not recognized as a...

, has been named for Ejnar Mikkelsen.

See also

• List of Antarctic islands south of 60° S