NGC 1002 = NGC 983, which see. ===== NGC 1006 = NGC 1010. Swift saw all three of the galaxies here. Curiously, his RAs for the first two (NGC 1011 is the second) of the triplet are both 10 seconds of time too small, but the RA for the third galaxy (NGC 1017) is close to being right (he saw them all on the same night). Stephan picked up the first two of the galaxies, but not the third, while Stone got all three and recognized that the first two were Stephan's. Swift apparently did not have the GC supplement at hand, so did not realize that Stephan had already seen the nebulae. Thus, he included all three as new in his fifth list. This led Dreyer astray, but -- again curiously -- only for NGC 1006. He credited Swift for all three, but included a separate number only for Swift's observation of NGC 1006. The other two he combined with Stephan's and Stone's nebulae to get this field almost, but not quite, right. ===== NGC 1010 = NGC 1006, which see. ===== NGC 1011. See NGC 1006. ===== NGC 1014 is a double star not too far from Muller's position. It is positively identified by his note "1st of 2"; the second is NGC 1018, a galaxy about three arcmin to the northeast. Muller's relative position for the galaxy -- +0.2 minutes and +1 arcmin -- is close to the true relative position -- +9.4 seconds and +1 arcmin 47 arcsec. Muller's descriptions are appropriate, too. ===== NGC 1017. See NGC 1006. ===== NGC 1018. See NGC 1014. ===== NGC 1023 is one of the nearest early-type galaxies in the sky, and is also the brightest in a group. It has a low-surface-brightness companion ("NGC 1023A" in the position list) attached on the eastern end. Both galaxies may have bars, but they are indistinct on the DSS image. ===== NGC 1027 is probably also = IC 1824, which see. ===== NGC 1032. See NGC 1037. ===== NGC 1036 = IC 1828, which see. ===== NGC 1037. Swift found this on the night of 29 Sept 1886, and gives an 1885.0 position of 02 34 08 -02 13 47, describing it as "eeeF; vS; vE; eee diff; [GC] 581 [NGC 1032] in field" in his 5th list of new nebulae. Something is obviously wrong since NGC 1032 is at 02 33 29 +00 35.9 (1885) and probably has no other galaxies bright enough for Swift to have seen within 16 arcmin of it (he used an eyepiece that gave a field of 32 arcmin, so if N1032 is "in field," it must have been within 16 arcmin, assuming that N1037 was centered). In addition, Swift's quoted declination is 2 deg 49.7 min south of NGC 1032. I don't see any obvious typos, so I've had to conclude "not found" for N1037. After I wrote the preceding paragraph, I learned that Wolfgang Steinicke (and others) have suggested that NGC 1037 is actually UGC 2119, two minutes of time preceding Swift's position, and 6.7 arcmin south. This is certainly possible as there are several other larger RA errors in Swift's 5th list. However, this still leaves the problem of NGC 1032 being nearly 3 degrees to the north. Looking at the field, two other possibilities suggest themselves. First, Swift may have picked up UGC 2106 which is in the same field as UGC 2119. This would suggest that he somehow thought that U2119 was NGC 1032. Secondly, if he had NGC 1032 correctly identified, then it is just barely possible that he might have also seen the very faint galaxy about 4 arcmin northwest. This is quite flattened, and might be visible in a 16-inch under very good skies. However, there are brighter stars near it -- in particular, a star is less than an arcminute to the northeast. Why didn't Swift mention any of these? This hypothesis also requires a large error in position (50 seconds in RA and 2 deg 53 min in Dec). All in all, I'm not convinced by any of these hypotheses, so shall stick with "Not found." ===== NGC 1040 = NGC 1053. Here is a peculiar case where Lewis Swift's position is closer to the galaxy than Edouard Stephan's! However, if Stephan's position is made exactly one minute of time larger, then it agrees with the GSC position to within 5 arcsec. Stephan apparently made a simple error in subtracting the RA offset of the galaxy from the comparison star as the position he lists for the star is correctly precessed from the BD. However -- another error -- he recorded the star's BD number as +40 677 in both publications of his third list: the correct number is +40 577. We all have bad days. The identity with NGC 1053, by the way, was suggested by Reinmuth, and Swift's position and description are good. ===== NGC 1051 = NGC 961 = IC 249. See NGC 961 and IC 249 for the stories. ===== NGC 1053 = NGC 1040, which see. ===== NGC 1057 is noted as double in the NGC. It was seen this way several times by Lord Rosse and his observers. It is actually an S0^+ galaxy with a double star superposed just northwest. The position in the GSC for N1057 does not include the double star. ===== NGC 1059 may be the double star about an arcmin east of JH's position. He recorded the object only once, and then described it as "eF; hardly sure." Dreyer noted that this object was found neither by d'Arrest nor by Burnham. The suggestion that N1059 is the double comes from Reinmuth. ===== NGC 1061. See NGC 1062. ===== NGC 1062 is a star found by Copeland in the NGC 1061 group (actually in the core of an extended cluster of galaxies) with Lord Rosse's 72-inch "Leviathan." The offsets from NGC 1061 measured by him fall precisely on a faint star, so the identity is certain. The RNGC and PGC identification of NGC 1062 with a low surface brightness spindle near NGC 1066 and 1067 is incorrect. Dreyer reduced positions for the objects in this group from the 72-inch micrometer measurements assuming a position for the nearby comparison star. It was these positions that he used in the NGC. Comparison with positions in the GSC show that Dreyer's position for the star is off by about 1.8 seconds in RA and 21 arcsec in declination. Taking these offsets into account, Copeland's measured position for NGC 1062 becomes 02 40 23.6, +32 15 00 (1950.0). ===== NGC 1066. See NGC 1062. ===== NGC 1067. See NGC 1062. ===== NGC 1072 = IC 1837, which see. ===== NGC 1105 = IC 1840 = MCG -03-08-004. My previous decision to list two galaxies under the number "NGC 1105" was misguided. After reviewing the evidence, I've decided to go with historical precedent and let Leavenworth's sketch -- which clearly shows that N1105 = I1840 -- provide the final word. However, for those still interested, here is the full story. The NGC galaxy was found in 1885 by Leavenworth with the 26-inch refractor at Leander McCormick Observatory. As with most of the faint nebulae discovered visually with this telescope, the discovery position is crude, especially in RA. Fortunately, Leavenworth has left us a sketch that shows conclusively that his object is identical to IC 1840. The four stars to the west of the galaxy -- looking like the top four stars in the cross of Cygnus -- are all shown in the sketch along with the galaxy. The second candidate comes from Herbert Howe. Working with the 20-inch refractor at Chamberlain Observatory just outside of Denver, he could not find anything at the position given by Leavenworth. However, "... four minutes following was a very small nebula, about equal in brightness to a star of magnitude 13. As Leavenworth observed his nebula only once, and took its place roughly, the two may be identical." Dreyer took Howe's "may be identical" as "indeed are identical" and put Howe's RA in the IC2 Notes with only the qualification, "... (nothing in the place given by L.)." So, we have two galaxies for one NGC number (where is Solomon when we need him?!). My previous solution added "e" and "w" suffixes to the NGC number for the two different galaxies. Not very satisfactory for the purist, I'm afraid, but it did give some credit to each of the observers, and attempted to deal with Dreyer's Note in IC2. As I've said, however, my current sensibilities are offended by this Solomaic decision, so I've reverted to using historical precedent and ignoring Dreyer's Note. For what it's worth, the galaxy that Howe found is now called MCG -03-08-036. ===== NGC 1109 (= IC 1846?), 1111, 1112, 1113, 1115, 1116, 1117, and 1127. Of these eight nebulae, all found on a single night in 1863 by Albert Marth with William Lassell's 48-inch reflector, only three -- N1115, 16, and 27 -- can be readily identified. All but one of the others can be force-fit to galaxies in area, but only by changing RA offsets from galaxy to galaxy. The declinations are pretty good, assuming that the RA offsets noted below are in fact leading us to the correct objects. All we have here to help decypher the field are Marth's positions -- five of them clearly wrong -- and descriptions -- all of them sparce. Here are my tentative conclusions, with Marth's data on the first line (my comments follow in parentheses), and the modern positions (for B1950.0) on the second: NGC RA (1950.0) Dec Description and comments 1109 02 46 55 +13 02.7 vF (Marth's RA 2.0 min off?) 02 44 59.45 +13 02 50.0 = IC 1846 = UGC 02265 = CGCG 440-008 1111 02 46 59 +13 01.6 F, vS, stell (Marth's RA 1.0 min off?) 02 45 55.0 +13 03 07 = IC 1850. Faint comp 0.4 arcmin s. 1112 02 47 16 +13 00.6 F, pS (Marth's RA 1.0 min off?) 02 46 16.20 +13 00 59.6 = IC 1852 = UGC 02293 = CGCG 440-015 1113 02 47 24 +13 05.6 vF (Marth's position on * 10). 02 47 20.76 +13 07 16.0 = * 15. 1115 02 47 41 +13 02.6 vF 02 47 41.11 +13 03 36.5 = CGCG 440-020 1116 02 47 51 +13 07.6 vF 02 47 51.40 +13 07 44.3 = UGC 02326 = CGCG 440-021 1117 02 47 59 +12 57.6 Close to a small * (RA 30 sec off? Is the comp 0.4 arcmin n the "small *"?) 02 48 28.88 +12 58 48.1 = CGCG 440-022s = UGC 02337s 1127 02 50 07 +13 02.4 vF 02 50 07.5 +13 03 10 = CGCG 440-024 = UGC 02356 The RA offsets strike me as rather ad hoc, so these are tentative conclusions. ===== NGC 1111 may be IC 1850. See NGC 1109 for a discussion. ===== NGC 1112 may be IC 1852. See NGC 1109 for a discussion. ===== NGC 1113. See NGC 1109. ===== NGC 1115. See NGC 1109. ===== NGC 1116. See NGC 1109. ===== NGC 1117. See NGC 1109. ===== NGC 1120 = IC 261. Leavenworth's RA for this is just over a minute of time larger than Javelle's correct one. But Leavenworth left us a sketch which clearly shows the galaxy in the surrounding star field. The identity is certain. ===== NGC 1122 = NGC 1123. Swift's position is nearly identical to that given in the GC, yet neither he nor Dreyer caught the identity with the Herschel's nebula. These things happen to the best of us. Swift, by the way, mentions a star near to the north. It is there, about 2.0 arcmin away from the nucleus. There is also a faint edgewise companion to the brighter galaxy on to the northeast of Swift's star. ===== NGC 1123 = NGC 1122, which see. ===== NGC 1127. See NGC 1109. ===== NGC 1128 is the dumbbell galaxy in the center of Abell 400. Swift's RA is five minutes too small, but his comment about two pretty faint stars close west is accurate. Several objects found by Swift in October of 1886 have the same 5 minute problem. I wonder if the printed RA of a star that he commonly used then to calibrate his setting circles had a typographical error. ===== NGC 1129. See NGC 1130. ===== NGC 1130 and 1131. Both of these were discovered by Lord Rosse (or by his observer) while he was examining NGC 1129. The Parsonstown observers looked at NGC 1129 three times, noting the superposed object to the southwest all three times (it was finally taken as a star or a double star, so did not receive an NGC number. It is VV85, and may be a line of three galaxies, or two galaxies plus a star). Two other "knots," seen only during the final observation, did receive NGC numbers. While Lord Rosse did not yet have a micrometer to measure accurate offsets, the estimates he gives (2 minutes north for the first, and 2 minutes east and "a little south" for the second) are just good enough to tentatively identify the objects. Dreyer calculated the NGC positions from the offsets and the position for NGC 1129. Neither identity is certain. While there is a brighter CGCG galaxy a four or five arcmin on further southeast of N1131, Lord Rosse would have had to make a mistake of five arcmin in his estimated offset; this is unlikely. The situation for N1130 is even less sure. There is no object directly north of N1129. Of the two possiblities, CGCG 540-004 1.5 arcmin northwest is the more likely identification. Not only is the galaxy brighter than the one about two arcmin northeast, there is a star superposed just southwest that would probably have enhanced the visibility of the CGCG object. Assuming these identifications, CGCG and UGC got the correct objects, but MCG did not (not even N1129!). The accurate position measured at Bologna for CGCG 540-007 = NGC 1131 is also for the wrong object; they got a faint spiral that may be in the background of the group. ===== NGC 1131. See NGC 1130. ===== NGC 1135 = NGC 1136, and not ESO 154- G018 as Andris and I have it in ESO and SGC. Glen Cozens has pointed out that E154-G018 would be one of JH's faintest objects if he had seen it, and he would probably have called it "eF" instead of just "F". JH, in fact, has two observations of the galaxy. For the object that became NGC 1135 (h2498) he writes, "F, R, gbM; taken for No. 3 sw 520, but proves, on reduction, to be a different nebula"; this from Sweep 732 on 11 Sept 1836. For h2499 (the "No. 3 sw 520" in the description just quoted), JH says only, "F, R, gbM; [moon above the horizon]." (Sweep 520 is dated 5 December 1834). Both observations refer to the brighter of the two objects (ESO 154- G019), but the earlier observation has a 5 arcminute error in the north polar distance. This led JH -- and Dreyer and Andris and myself and several others -- to believe that he had two nebulae here, not just one. Coincidentally, there are two nebulae in the field, but as with NGC 5440 and NGC 5441 (which see), JH almost certainly saw only the brighter of them. ===== NGC 1136 = NGC 1135, which see. RC3 and ESO give the correct position. RC2 and RNGC are wrong. The incorrect position comes from JH who made a five arcmin error in his NPD. ===== NGC 1141 = NGC 1143, and NGC 1142 = NGC 1144. This is a well-known interacting pair of galaxies, perhaps a collision. Marth's description for N1141 and N1142 fits, and his positions are just 30 arcminutes off. He apparently was having an off night when he found this pair: of the ten objects that he discovered on that night in early October 1864, five have large position errors, and another is a star. The discussion of NGC 1474 has more details. ===== NGC 1142 = NGC 1144. See NGC 1141. ===== NGC 1143 = NGC 1141, which see. ===== NGC 1144 = NGC 1142. See NGC 1141. ===== NGC 1146 is a group of four stars near d'A's position. He mentions a triple star near to the south -- that is what Brian Skiff and Tom DeMary have taken as the object itself, Brian noting that it is the southeastern of two groups of stars. For some time, I had thought that the NGC number applied to both groups. Seeing d'A's full description has finally made it clear that I was wrong. However, d'A is also wrong when he comments that he can see nebulosity mixed in with the cluster at a power of 226. Perhaps some of the fainter stars nearby lent the appearance of nebulosity on a less than perfect night. Finally, Wolfgang Steinicke got the right asterism a decade ago during his early work on the NGC. ===== NGC 1147 is probably lost. There is no object within five degrees of the nominal position that matches Muller's description (m = 15.0, Dxd = 0.4x0.2, extended 180 deg; star 9.5 mag following 25 sec, north 1 arcmin). I had the thought during preparation of ESGC that it might be identical with NGC 1157, a few degrees south, but there is no bright star in the right direction from that galaxy. ===== NGC 1157 is probably not NGC 1147, which see. ===== NGC 1170 may have been the tail of a comet. It was found by C.S. Pierce at Harvard on the last day of 1869, and was verified by Joseph Winlock. The description in Harvard Annals, Vol. 13, Part 1, reads, "J.W. and C.S.P. independently think the sky generally bright f and a little n of the comet for 14' or more (several fields according to C.S.P.). [The approximate place in Table VIII results from comparison with the comet.]" The comment in square brackets is from the author of the paper, probably J.W. In Table VIII, the only information is the position 02 54 10, +26 31 (1860), and the Remark, "Comet 1869 III p neb 2m 31s, a little s." I haven't yet done the library work to know if the comet's tail stretched off to the northeast from the head. But the description makes it possible that this is the correct explanation for this NGC entry. ===== NGC 1171. See NGC 1197. ===== NGC 1173. This is one of four objects (the others are NGC 1176, 78, and 83; N1176 has the story) that Bigourdan found scattered around NGC 1175 in December of 1884. Bigourdan's published north polar distances for the four are all one degree too large. The other three are stars, but this one is a mystery at the moment. I suspect that Bigourdan has misidentified his comparison star, but will have to look around the field some more for another that he might have used instead of the one he claims to have used. Whatever the case, there is nothing in Bigourdan's position, which comes from two accordant measurements on 17 December. About 40 arcsec to the southwest is a faint double star that he probably could not have seen (based on the fact that he had difficulty with NGC 1177). He adds a curious note to his description: "At the end of the measurements, I could see the object very well: the sky, very clear at just that moment, had been a little unsettled." This is what leads me to believe that he has misidentified his star field. ===== NGC 1174 = NGC 1186. Swift's position for N1174 is just 1 minute of time off. Otherwise, his description is a good match for NGC 1186, including the bright double star about 5 arcmin northwest: it does indeed point to the galaxy. Dreyer corrects the relative position of the double star and the galaxy in a note in IC1 where he also repeats Spitaler's suggestion that N1174 and N1186 are identical -- but for a different reason. See N1186 for that story. Coincidentally, Swift's incorrect position for N1174 lies near IC 1872, a group of 3-4 stars exactly at Bidschof's micrometric position (it was also independently found by Bigourdan, but his observation was published too late to be included in the second IC). Somehow, these two numbers have avoided being equated over the years. Even RNGC simply called N1174 "Not found." ===== NGC 1175. See NGC 1176 and NGC 1177. ===== NGC 1176, 1178, and 1183 are all stars in the vicinity of NGC 1175. Bigourdan's published north polar distances are all 1 deg too large, but he has correctly identified his comparison stars. Re-reducing his positions puts them directly on top of faint stars in the field. Another object found at the same time (N1173, which see) is apparently lost, or is the victim of a misidentified comparison star. Also, Bigourdan had trouble seeing N1175's one real companion galaxy, NGC 1177 = IC 281. Even though his measurements of N1175 itself are good, this was obviously not a well-seen field for him. ===== NGC 1177 = IC 281. N1177 was found by Lord Rosse, and clearly measured by him with respect to N1175. The NGC position is good, and LdR also mentions the brighter star 32 arcsec northeast of N1177. However, this has not prevented Swift from claiming the galaxy as one of his discoveries, so it has an IC number as well as its original NGC number. Bigourdan claimed to have found four "novae" in the field (N1173, 76, 78, and 83; see N1173 and N1176 for more), but three are clearly stars (the fourth, N1173, may be too, but I wonder if Bigourdan misidentified his comparison star for it; see N1173 for more). In spite of his four "discoveries," Bigourdan had trouble seeing N1177. He observed N1175 on two nights, could not find N1177 on the first of those, and saw it only vaguely on the second, commenting that the light of the brighter star mentioned by LdR prevented him from measuring it. ===== NGC 1178 is a star. See NGC 1176 for the discussion. ===== NGC 1182 is almost certainly = NGC 1205. Both objects were found by Ormond Stone with the 26-inch refractor at Leander McCormick. As with all of the nebulae published in the first AJ paper from LM, the positions are crudely given to just a full minute of time and an arcminute. In this case, the two positions flank the actual position, with NGC 1182 being about a minute of time to the west, and NGC 1205 about two minutes east (this latter error is a common one in the Leander McCormick lists). The declination is within an arcminute in both cases. There are no sketches for either of these. Stone's descriptions of the nebulae are almost identical (m = 15.5, Dxd = 0.7x0.3, extended 120deg; *10 PA = 240deg, dist = 2.5 arcmin and m = 14.0, Dxd = 0.7x0.3, extended 25deg; *9.5 PA = 240deg, dist = 3.0 arcmin). Only the magnitudes and position angles are different enough to attract attention. Howe suggested that the two objects were the same, and put the star 8 seconds west and 2 arcmin south of the galaxy (I measure 8.1 seconds and 1 arcmin 27 arcsec; the separation is 2.47 arcmin). I suspect that the position angle of 25 degrees is a transcription error for "125"; the difference in magnitude could be the result of different observing conditions. There is a galaxy, NPM1G -09.0141, closer to the position for NGC 1205 and with a star at approximately the right distance and position angle. But the galaxy is considerably fainter than NGC 1182. Its position is also off in declination as well as RA, so I think it is unlikely to be Stone's second object, especially since he makes the eastern one brighter than the western. ===== NGC 1183 is a star. See NGC 1176 for the discussion. ===== NGC 1186 = NGC 1174 (which see for more). In the NGC, Dreyer notes that both Lord Rosse and d'Arrest looked for N1186 in vain. However, it was seen and consistently described by both WH and JH at much the same position. Until Spitaler's observation appeared (in AN 3030, which I've not seen), Dreyer must have been puzzled by this as both LdR and d'A were fine observers. The galaxy has a pretty low surface brightness, and with at least two 14th mag stars superposed, it would have been rather difficult to see, especially in long-focus telescopes. However, there is no doubt that both Herschels saw it, and the identity is not in question. Swift's RA for N1174 is just 1 minute off, and his description of the double star 5 arcmin northwest clinches that identification, too. ===== NGC 1197. Well, I can't find this one, either. There is nothing at Swift's position, and his description -- "pF, cE, pS; sev vF sts nr" -- could fit any of a dozen galaxies within a few degrees in any direction. He apparently found only one other galaxy on the same night (NGC 1171), and that is close to his nominal position. So, searching for a systematic offset won't help. A search of the surrounding POSS1 fields turns up no digit errors in the ten's places of RA and Dec that would nail an appropriate object. So, this object may well be lost. Wolfgang's identification, by the way, is a star about an arcminute west of Swift's position. Swift's description pretty well rules out this ID. ===== NGC 1198 = IC 282, which see. ===== NGC 1202 is positively identified by the wide double star at PA = 45 deg, d = 4 arcmin, mentioned in Stone's description. The galaxy is not, by the way, identical to IC 286 (which see) -- Bigourdan "observed" them on the same night in December of 1890. ===== NGC 1205 = NGC 1182, which see. ===== NGC 1212 = IC 1883. As with NGC 1213, Swift found this galaxy in October of 1884, and made an error in estimating its RA. Thus Barnard thought it a nova when he found it sometime later. Barnard's observation, like many others of his in IC2, is unpublished -- he apparently sent it directly to Dreyer. In this case, this object is the first of a group of five near Algol that appear in IC2 (the others are I1884 = I290, and I1887 = I292, I1888 = I293, and I1889 = I294; see IC 290 for notes on them). Swift explicitly notes the proximity to Algol in his notes for several of the galaxies. As I mentioned, his positions are not good, so misled Barnard into believing that all five galaxies were "novae" when all, in fact, are included in NGC or IC1. Thus, all have IC2 numbers, too. In this case, Algol is west-northwest by several arcmin. Swift's galaxy can be identified by his note "Right angled with 2 sts." The figure actually looks more like an equilateral triangle, but is close enough to provide strong support for this object as being the one that Swift saw. ===== NGC 1213 = IC 1881. Swift found NGC 1213 in October of 1884, soon after he began observing with the 16-inch refractor at Warner Observatory in Rochester, New York. As was to be his practice for the next 14-15 years, he "measured" the position of his "nova" by centering it in the eyepiece of his telescope, then reading the setting circles. This led to many mistakes in his positions. Swift's RA of this object is far enough off that Bigourdan thought it was probably also a "nova" when he rediscovered it in January of 1891 (the object that Bigourdan labels "NGC 1213" is a star). Though Bigourdan's observations of the galaxy are especially poor because of its low surface brightness, it is almost certainly the same object that Swift saw. Both of their descriptions are apt (including Swift's "F * close n"), and Bigourdan suggests in his that the galaxy might be NGC 1213. ===== NGC 1233. Is NGC 1235 (which see) possibly equal to this? ===== NGC 1235. Is this perhaps = NGC 1233? Found by Swift on one of his more productive nights, N1235 is one of 13 nebulae observed on 21 Oct 1886. Aside from NGC 58 (which see) which has a 1 minute error in RA, the other 12 objects have no significant systematic offsets in their true positions from Swift's discovery positions. If N1235 is indeed N1233, then it would be the lone exception with a 23.6 arcmin error in Dec. So, though the description (what there is of it) fits, I'm not comfortable with this identity, and consider it provisional at best. ===== NGC 1237 is most likely the double star about 30 seconds west, and a minute south, of Muller's position. It fits his description, including the position angle, and Muller himself notes "**?" ===== NGC 1240 is probably the double star 34 sec east and 3.7 arcmin south of WH's position. His description, from one observation on 12 Sept 1784 ("Suspected, 240 left a doubt; eF and vS, most probably 2 close stars; between 2 stars," quoted by Dreyer in the 1912 Papers collection) fits perfectly, and there is nothing else in the area that matches. The position difference is not unexpectedly large for WH's early observations. ===== NGC 1241. See NGC 1243. ===== NGC 1242. See NGC 1243. ===== NGC 1243 is a double star first seen by JH. There are two nebulae here, N1241 and N1242, both discovered by WH (though nearly two years apart). JH saw the brighter (N1241), but thought his father's description of the fainter's position ("... about 1 arcmin north-following II 286 [N1241]") wrong -- it isn't, but JH never saw the fainter (N1242). Curiously, neither did d'A who picked up the same two objects as JH, N1241 and the double star. The first observation at Birr turned up both of WH's nebulae, but not JH's double star, so the sketch made that night shows only the two nebulae and some field stars. JH thought that the orientation of the sketch must be wrong since it did not agree with his own observation. He made a comment to that effect in the note in GC, which certainly confused the situation. It was not until Dreyer looked at the field in November 1877 with the 72-inch that all three objects were observed together for the first time. Dreyer's measurements pinpoint all three, but he still describes N1243 as a nebula, making it the second brightest of the three. His description and sketch from that night is an accurate repesentation of the field -- except that he still believes N1243 to be nebulous. ===== NGC 1251 is a double star. It is so close to Coolidge's position that Reinmuth had no trouble identifying it as the NGC object. This is one of many asterisms in the list of "nebulae" found visually at Harvard in the late 1850s. ===== NGC 1252 is a sparce cluster (or random scattering of stars) 20 arcmin north of JH's position. His description (Star 8m, the chief of a cluster of 18 or 20 stars) fits perfectly, and his NPD for the star is very close to exactly 20 arcmin too large. This suggests a simple digit error in his NPD. ===== NGC 1257 is a double star. Bigourdan saw this object on two nights, but only estimated its position once. Since the BD position of his comparison star is also an estimate (and is actually closer to a slightly fainter star about 1.7 arcmin east-southeast), the NGC position is off. Consequently, the number N1257 has been mistakenly assigned to CGCG 540-073 in RNGC, PGC, and RC3. Bigourdan's estimated position, however, falls within an arcminute of the double, and he notes the two neighboring stars in his description. The identity is secure. ===== NGC 1264 is UGC 2643. Bigourdan's position is within 5 arcsec of the GSC position, so there is no doubt about the identification. RNGC has mistakenly put the number N1264 on CGCG 540-085, which is about 5 arcmin southwest of the real NGC 1264. ===== NGC 1269 = NGC 1291. Though JH claims to have seen them on the same night (1 November 1836), I think that he has some mistake in his records. His data and description for NGC 1269 are identical to those for NGC 1291 on that night with two exceptions. First, the RAs differ by 2 minutes 34 seconds, and second, he adds a diameter to his description of N1291 (90 arcsec), while N1269 has none. Otherwise, the data are the same: NPDs 131d 43m 11s, and descriptions "vB, R, gmbM (hazy)." He has two observations of N1291 (on the second night, he called it a "mottled, but not resolved" globular cluster). His RAs for the two nights differ by 10 seconds, and he suggests that one is in error. Not knowing which one, he simply took the mean value and used that for GC. The galaxy is so large that both positions fall within the image. The identity was first suggested by Robert Innes in a note in Monthly Notices 62, 468, 1902. He could not find N1269, but had no trouble seeing N1291. Dreyer, in his IC2 Note, did not go so far as to repeat the supposition of identity, but succinctly summarizes the other evidence. I don't think there can be any question of the identity of the two numbers -- though without seeing JH's observing logs for that first November night of 1836, I of course cannot say this with utter certainty. ===== NGC 1272. See NGC 1279. ===== NGC 1275 is the brightest galaxy in the Perseus Cluster and a strong radio source, as well as a fascinating object in other wavelengths. See NGC 1279. ===== NGC 1276 is a double star mixed in with the many galaxies in the Perseus Cluster. Dreyer himself found it while making micrometric measurements of the cluster galaxies in 1876. Fortunately, he has recorded his measurement of the object (352.3 degrees position angle, 291 arcsec distant from NGC 1278) so that we can positively identify it. I make the PA 352.5 and the distance 283 arcsec, not significantly different from Dreyer's numbers. ===== NGC 1278 = IC 1907, which see. Also see NGC 1276 for which this serves as Dreyer's micrometric reference point. ===== NGC 1279 is accurately located by Lord Rosse's micrometric offsets from his reference star which is directly between NGC 1272 and NGC 1275. It is certainly not the fainter galaxy superposed on the corona of NGC 1275 as suggested by LEDA. ===== NGC 1289 = IC 314, which see. ===== NGC 1291 is also NGC 1269, which see. ===== NGC 1304 is also probably NGC 1307. WH's position for N1304 is pretty good, being only 3 seconds off in RA and 2 minutes in Dec. Leavenworth's RA, though, is a minute of time east of the galaxy, and his note mentions a nearby star of magnitude 9.5 eight seconds east and 3 arcmin north. The star is closer to 6.5 seconds west (not east), 3.2 arcmin north, and has a V magnitude of about 11.8. All in all, the star is not a very good match to Leavenworth's description. But given the size of the 26-inch at Leander McCormick, it could well be that he simply overestimated the brightness. And there are cases known where he confused the directions in his field (I'll see if I can find a few others in these notes). There is a fainter galaxy (KUG 0319-047) about 5 seconds on east and 1.5 minutes north of Leavenworth's position, but the neighboring star for that galaxy is only four seconds west and 3.4 arcmin north. This star, too, is considerably fainter than Leavenworth's estimate (V about 11.7). Wolfgang originally chose this galaxy as NGC 1307. While it would probably have been within reach of the 26-inch, I still favor equating Leavenworth's nebula with WH's. N1304 would certainly be easier to pick up while sweeping, and Leavenworth's neighboring star more closely matches his estimated offsets, if not his indicated direction. ===== NGC 1307 is probably NGC 1304, which see. ===== NGC 1312. The RC3 is wrong in equating this with UGC 2711. This is actually a double star, as are many of the first "nebulae" found at Harvard by Bond and his colleagues. The positions of these are generally very good, and their descriptions and those of the surrounding fields make clear just what the early observers were seeing. ===== NGC 1316. See NGC 1317. ===== NGC 1317 is also NGC 1318. Curiously, the position for this galaxy is virtually the same in Schmidt's Fornax Cluster list (AN 88, 138, 1876) as it is in JH's catalogues, yet Schmidt calls it a new nebula. Schmidt complains that there are not very many reference stars in the declination zone of the Cluster, so he has instead referred his positions to those of JH's nebulae in the area. Thus, I am not surprised to see that Schmidt's position for NGC 1316 (given with JH's number h2527) is nearly identical to JH's. But it is surprising that Schmidt did not see that the first of his "Faint new" nebulae is at JH's position for N1317 (h2529). There are several other errors in Schmidt's list of stars and galaxies, suggesting that he threw it together quickly without checking either the GC or JH's southern catalogue very carefully. Whatever happened, this identity is certain and was first noted (to my knowledge) by the de Vaucouleurs in RC1. Knox Shaw at Helwan in a 1912 list, and Carlson in her 1940 list of NGC corrections, both simply noted N1318 as not found, but did not suggest the identity. ===== NGC 1318 = NGC 1317, which see. ===== NGC 1327. This is L.M. 105, found by Ormond Stone with the 26-inch refractor at the Leander McCormick Observatory in Virginia. He describes it simply as "vS, neb?" and assigns a magnitude of 16.3. His position is typically uncertain with nothing resembling his description nearby. There is a faint galaxy (MCG -04-09-008) 0.6 minutes of time east of his RA and at the correct declination. Since the early Leander McCormick positions, not just Stone's, tend to be too far west, this object is a logical candidate. However, Delisle Stewart examined a Bruce reflector plate taken at Harvard's Arequipa station in Peru, and noticed a faint triple star near Stone's place. ESO has suggested that the wide triple about 2.5 arcmin north of Stone's place is Stewart's object. Since the stars in the triple are 13th and 14th magnitude, and since they are spread out along a line nearly an arcminute long, I doubt that they would appear as a "vS" nebula of the 16th magnitude in the 26-inch, even on a night of spectacularly bad seeing. Stewart created some additional confusion by simply precessing Stone's crude position to equinox 1900. This, together with his comment in Harvard Annals 60, "3 vF sts, close together, no neb," summarized by Dreyer in the IC2 Notes, would lead us to believe that the triple is at Stone's position. All of this makes me unhappy with Stewart's hypothesis, but I've nevertheless retained the triple in the main table as a possibility for N1327. ===== NGC 1330 is a group of five or six stars -- probably with several more fainter involved -- exactly located by Stephan's micrometric position. Efforts to identify it with galaxies in the area are futile. ===== NGC 1331 = IC 324, which see. ===== NGC 1333. Though there is no question about the identity of this nebula, its early observations with small telescopes were contradictory enough to lead to suggestions that it might be variable. The note in Auwers's 1862 appendix to WH's catalogue makes it clear that Tuttle's observation of 1859 has the directions of the field inverted. This probably contributed to the perception of variability. Interestingly, part of the object seems to be a collapsing protostar (see Sky and Telescope, January 1997, pages 15 and 16 for the story). Is it thus possible that N1333 really is variable? Depending on the density, position, and orientation of dust clouds around the protostar, and the possibly changing intensity of the star itself, variability from our point of view is not out of the question. This is apparently the cause of the variability of the nebulae around T Tauri (NGC 1554 and NGC 1555, which see), and perhaps also explains the variability of NGC 2261 (also which see). ===== NGC 1334. See IC 323. ===== NGC 1340 is certainly identical to NGC 1344, just as Dreyer first suggested in the NGC note. Swift looked for it with his 16-inch from Lowe Observatory on Echo Mountain but could not find it. He wrote that it should be "struck out" in a note appended to his third list of new nebulae found at Lowe. As Dreyer notes, JH saw this in two different sweeps, but only crudely estimated the position in the first of those (JH says "Transit missed while observing another nebula"). That estimated position was far enough off that when he was assembling his CGH table of nebulae back in England, he thought he had two different nebulae. Lacking any other evidence, he took a rough mean between his position and his father's for NGC 1344. And there is another tale to tell. WH used a star he called "12 Eri" as the reference star for his offsets for the galaxy. I depend on "Sky Catalogue 2000.0", Vol. 1, for Flamsteed numbers, so was not happy to find no listing for "12" Eridani (11 and 13 are there, but not 12). A search based on WH's offsets and the modern position for N1344 shows that 12 Eri is probably alpha Fornacis. But this position is 20 seconds and 10 arcmin off JH's for N1340 -- no wonder he thought there were two nebulae here! In any event, there is only one. It's RA is close to that for NGC 1340 and its Dec is close to that for NGC 1344. Sometimes, it just takes teamwork to get things right. ===== NGC 1344 = NGC 1340, which see. ===== NGC 1356 is the brightest of a group of four galaxies, clearly interacting with at least two of the others. The companion that I've listed in the table is the nearest companion to the main galaxy, actually being superposed on the southwestern arm. It is difficult to tell from the IIIa-J survey plate (the DSS) whether this is a galaxy or a group of knots in the arm, but the 2MASS image clearly shows it to be a galaxy. It's redshift is close to that for N1356 itself. ===== NGC 1367 = NGC 1371. Ormond Stone found NGC 1367 sometime in 1885 or 1886, and as with the other nebulae in the first Leander McCormick list, gave its RA to only a full minute of time. This put it about 20 seconds of time west of NGC 1371 (accurately placed by the Herschels) and earned it its own entry in NGC. However, Stone made the magnitude 13.0, actually one of the brightest in the LM list of "new" nebulae, and he has a ninth magnitude star 5.0 arcmin north- east of his nebula. That star is there (as is a fainter one about 3 arcmin northeast), making the identity with N1371 certain. ===== NGC 1369 is probably ESO 358-G034 = MCG -06-09-004, a fairly bright Fornax Cluster galaxy that JH missed. This is one of the nebulae found by Julius Schmidt with a 6.2-inch refractor in Athens in the 1870s (others include NGC 1318 and NGC 1378, both of which see). His table in AN 2097 has stars and galaxies listed in RA order, and is full of errors. In this case, there is an entry for a bright star immediately following his entry for this nebula. If the star is SAO 194404, and if it and Schmidt's nebula share the same incorrect RA minutes of "27" instead of "30", then the nebula is ESO 358-G064. I do not see any other star/galaxy pairs in the cluster near the same declination that would fit as well. Schmidt's data are clearly estimates: he assigns a magnitude of 5.6 to the star, while the modern V magnitude is 7.3. His position -- with the RA corrected -- is 03 35 12, -36 29.2 (precessed to B1950), while that for the SAO star is 03 35 11, -36 27.4. For the nebula, he has 03 35 05, -36 26.8 compared to 03 34 51, -36 25.2, not particularly good matches. But as I said, I do not see any other reasonable candidates. ===== NGC 1378 is a double star found by Julius Schmidt with a 6-foot (focal length) refractor during his survey of the Fornax Cluster area from Athens in the early 1870s. His position is off in RA by about 3 seconds of time, but the double is the only object in the area that he might have picked up. His "description" reads "F. new" (in the original German, "S. neu") so it is not much help. The Mt. Wilson and Helwan observers came to the same conclusion, so RNGC has the same identity. For SGC, I consulted Schmidt's paper in AN 2097, and saw no reason to differ with the earlier concensus. ===== NGC 1382 is another of Julius Schmidt's discoveries in the Fornax Cluster. As given in his table, his RA is about 40 seconds of time off a galaxy that de Vaucouleurs (in his 1956 monograph on bright southern galaxies) called "NGC 1380B". Carlson had already included N1382 in her 1940 list of NGC/IC corrections, and deV noted that N1380B was the same galaxy. I think that he was reluctant to adopt the identification because he did not have Schmidt's list at hand, so could not check it himself. Since there is no other reasonable candidate for NGC 1382, I adopted the identity for SGC, and still think it is pretty solid. ===== NGC 1384. There is a faint double star very close to Marth's position, though the brightest galaxy in a scattered cluster about 2 arcmin south fits Marth's description ("Nebulous star 13m") very well -- it has a star superposed about 5 arcsec southwest of the nucleus. The galaxy/star pair are also considerably brighter than the double star, and are within Marth's usual error circle. So, while it's possible that the double is Marth's object, it is much more likely to be the galaxy with the superposed star. ===== NGC 1392 was found by Swift on 13 February 1887 about 5 arcmin north of a brighter "nebula" which Swift took to be Comet 1887-I three degrees south of its predicted position. There is nothing in either of the places given by Swift in his sixth list for either object. Nor is there anything three degrees north where the comet was supposed to have appeared that night. However, the center of the Fornax cluster is one and a half degrees north. I think it's likely that Swift saw two of the galaxies there, but choosing two out of the 15-20 that he could have seen would be pure guesswork. Similarly, Lauberts's guess in ESO (ESO 358-G040) is based on a reliance on the 1 degree difference in declination more than it is on the likelihood that Swift actually saw the object: ESO 358-G040 has a total visual magnitude around 16.2, likely putting it beyond Swift's limit, especially given the far southern declination. A third possibility is raised by Kreutz in a note following Swift's list in AN. Kreutz notes that the offset of Swift's position from that predicted for the comet by Finlay is 38 minutes east, and 4 degrees 1 arcminute south. However, searching at Finlay's place for a double nebula turned up nothing, either. Other objects found by Swift on the same night include NGC 1797 and NGC 1799, both very near Swift's positions for them; and NGC 2589, like NGC 1392, not found at Swift's position (see Herbert Howe's note in MN 61, 29, 1900, copied into the IC2 Notes). In the end, NGC 1392 is another of Swift's nebulae "not found." ===== NGC 1396. The galaxy chosen by me for SGC is the only reasonably match to the original position by Schmidt in his short paper on the Fornax Cluster. Unfortunately, Schmidt's table in that paper has several errors, some perhaps typos, some perhaps observational. In any event, given the size of his telescope, and the problems in his table, the SGC galaxy is as good a match to Schmidt's observation as I can make. ===== NGC 1408 is another of the new "nebulae" found by Schmidt during his survey of the Fornax Cluster area. There is nothing at his position, but during my sweep across the area for SGC, I noted two double stars nearby. The fainter and wider double is northwest of Schmidt's position, and the brighter but closer pair is southeast. Though I've listed both in the main table, with question marks, neither seems particularly likely to me to be mistaken for a nebula. This should be checked at the eyepiece, though. In any event, N1408 is currently unidentified. See NGC 1378 and NGC 1396 for more on Schmidt's Fornax Cluster work. ===== NGC 1411 may also be IC 1943, which see. ===== NGC 1412 = IC 1981. This is the only galaxy near Herschel's position that he could have seen. As with NGC 324, Herschel's RA is correct, though his declination is off. ===== NGC 1415 = IC 1983, which see. ===== NGC 1416 has suffered a bit in the literature. It was discovered by Frank Muller at Leander-McCormick before he and his fellow observers there were measuring good positions for the nebulae they were finding, so it has an NGC declination that is about 3.5 arcmin off. In addition, the two bright stars just south are described as "* 8.7, nr; * 8.6, n 2'". The actual place of the "* 8.6" is south by 3.5 arcmin, while the "* 8.7" is 1.5 arcmin south. This apparently confused Herbert Howe, too. He wrote in his second MN paper, "Muller gave this nebula as 2' north [sic] of a star of mag. 8.6. It is really south [sic] of the star. There is another star of equal mag. about 5' south of the star mentioned. The position of the nebula is 03 36 41, -23 02.4 [1900.0]." What Howe should have said is "Muller gave this nebula as 2' south of a star of mag. 8.6. It is really north of the star. ..." Still, he did get the galaxy's position right, assuming that this really is the one that Muller saw. Dreyer copied Howe's corrected declination into a note for IC2. Carlson had this to say in 1940 about the object: "NGC correct, W" where the "W" is the source of the note, a Mt. Wilson photograph. She has a footnote on the object that reads "Howe's correction (D III) to NGC not confirmed" ("D III" refers to Dreyer's Notes in IC2). Unfortunately, she is wrong as the NGC declination lands between the two bright stars; Howe is right. So, nobody has got it completely right. This leads me to question Howe's identification, which is the usual one adopted by every catalogue since that includes the galaxy. However, there is no other galaxy in the area that has two bright stars close to it. So, this is most likely Muller's object. ===== NGC 1420 is a triple star at d'Arrest's position. The identity is nailed down by d'A's mention of the "* 13 10.5 seconds preceding [at about the same] declination." That star is there. ===== NGC 1424. See NGC 1429. ===== NGC 1425 may also be IC 1988, which see. ===== NGC 1426. See IC 1983 = NGC 1415. ===== NGC 1427. See NGC 1436. ===== NGC 1429 is lost. Leavenworth describes it as "15.5, 0.3 x 0.2, E 180 deg, gbMN; 2nd of 2." The first of two is NGC 1424 which carries this description in the Leander McCormick list: "15.2, 0.2, R, gbM; 1st of 2, one of which is GC 763 [N1424]; * 10 p 15 sec." The description of Leavenworth's "2nd of 2" matches the one galaxy in the area. But that is it. The star 15 sec west of the galaxy is 13th magnitude, and there is an 11th magnitude star half that distance northwest. Why did Leavenworth not mention that? I think that Leavenworth has misidentified the known galaxy so that his description applies to a different pair altogether. But which pair? I don't see any other in the area that matches the descriptions. So, NGC 1429 is another lost NGC object until someone with sharper eyes than mine has a go at the problem. ===== NGC 1432 is the reflection nebula around Maia in the Pleiades. Though the brightest part of the nebula is to the north-northwest of the star (see e.g. Barnard's description in AN 3018), I have simply adopted the position of Maia itself. See NGC 1435 for more on the Pleiades nebulosity. ===== NGC 1434 may be the galaxy I chose for ESGC at 03 43.8, -09 50. This has a star of about the right brightness 20 seconds east and 3 arcminutes south that might match the star in Muller's description. He put the 8.5 mag star at 25 seconds east and 3 arcmin north. If he made a mistake in his direction, the ESGC galaxy would fit his description. NGC 1445 (which see), suggested as a possible identity for N1434, also fits Muller's description, but it has no star anywhere near that could be Muller's. I think this identification is less likely. ===== NGC 1435 is the part of the reflection nebula around Merope extending almost directly south by 10 to 15 arcmin from the star. For some time, I had thought that it and IC 349 (which see) are identical. However, reading Barnard's careful observations of the Pleiades in AN 3018 (where he announces the discovery of IC 349), it became clear that the IC object is actually a brighter knot in the larger Merope nebula, and very close to the star itself. Under normal conditions, Merope's light swamps the knot, so it is not surprising that it was not found until the keen-eyed Barnard turned the Lick 36-inch refractor on it (though Pritchard claims an earlier image on a plate taken at Cambridge in the late 1880's; see Herbig's article in AJ 111, 1241, 1996 for a complete history of IC 349). NGC 1435, however, is fairly easily seen on good nights with much smaller telescopes. I've picked it out with a six-inch, and I suspect that any good scope of four inches or more would give a view of it. ===== NGC 1436 is almost certainly identical with NGC 1437. JH saw 1436 twice, but not on the meridian, so did not derive an accurate position for it. The one position he gives is a rough one from his working list for Dunlop 562. He has this to say about it: "... I have reason to believe this RA too great and the NPD also materially in error -- perhaps 126 35 [instead of 126 45] would be preferable." His single observation of N1437 is from a different sweep with a secure position. But his diameter estimate of '4"' must be in error as he calls the galaxy "vL". I would guess that the diameter should read "4'". This would match Dunlop's estimate of 3.5 arcmin. Unfortunately, the rough position in the CGH Observations was precessed and copied into the GC with very little to warn us about its inaccuracy. Only in the "1?" entries in the columns in GC marked "No. of Obs. used." is there a hint of the problem. Dreyer did not carry those over, but just copied the summary description and position directly from GC. So it is that JH's careful notes in his early work have been lost in the later collections. In any event, the first suggestion that I've been able to find that N1436 is N1437 comes from Harold Knox Shaw in Helwan Observatory Bulletin No. 15, 1915 -- but even that is indirect and found under his entry for N1437, not N1436. For N1436, Knox Shaw says, "Nothing here. [N]1427 answers fairly well to the description and there are several other similar objects not far away." For N1437 he writes, "vF, pL, vlE, prob. spir., prob. = Dunlop 562." I've found one other observation of N1436, that by Schmidt in his Fornax Cluster paper in AN 2097. There he has it in the penultimate place in his table of stars and nebulae, and labels it "h 2581". He gives only a position "3h 35m 11.8s -36 23 49" for 1830 with no description. This is correct only if the minute of RA is changed to "37". Then, it falls within a few arcsec of the modern position for N1437. So things stood until I did SGC in the mid-70s at ROE. There I stumbled across the missing N1436 again (see below), and scribbled this note in my copy of Dunlop's paper: "Though Herschel saw Dunlop 562 in two sweeps, he was not able to get an accurate position for it. His estimated position, however is nearly that of N1437 for which he did obtain a good place in a third sweep. The descriptions are similar, so the identity is assumed." This overlooks the 22 arcmin difference in the declinations (ahem), but for the RA, it is not so bad ... (ahem). Well, N1436 is a reasonable choice, especially since JH has his note about the 10 arcmin correction to the Dec. Knox Shaw's suggestion of N1427 strikes me as very unlikely as both the RA and Dec are well off JH's estimated position. Finally, I first became aware of this puzzle during my years as an amateur astronomer in the late 1950s. NGC 1436 appeared in the copy of Norton's Star Atlas that was my introduction to the sky. I was curious about this because the object did not appear in any other list of deep sky objects that I had at hand. What was this thing that the NGC claimed was a very bright globular cluster? Twenty years later, I had my answer. Now, after nearly another 30 years, I'm FINALLY writing it all down. Patience reaps its rewards. ===== NGC 1437 also probably carries the number NGC 1436, which see. ===== NGC 1440 = NGC 1442. WH's offset from 54 Eridani should be 1 deg 10 armin north rather than the 10 arcmin that he recorded for II 594. Though JH and Dreyer both noticed this, as did Auwers and Schoenfeld (see the GC and NGC Notes), they both also included both of WH's entries for the galaxy. JH has a curious note appended to his two observations of this in the CGH Observations: "N.B. Both observations agree in making the degree of PD 108 -- whereas it appears in the reduction of my Father's observations as 109." Taken at face value, it shows how obvious this particular error was. But it is recorded under h2583 = H II 458 which has the correct offset from its comparison star, 20 Eridani. As I noted, it is WH's observation for II 594 that is incorrect. So, even JH was somehow confused here. In any event, the galaxy has two NGC numbers and the identity is certain. By the way, this turns out to be probably also identical with NGC 1458. See that number for that story. ===== NGC 1441. See NGC 1443 and NGC 1446. ===== NGC 1442 = NGC 1440, which see. ===== NGC 1443 is a star. Tempel found it while observing NGC 1441, 1449, 1451, and 1453. His description says that his nova forms a trapezium with N1441, N1449, and N1451 -- indeed it does. Tempel probably has another star here, NGC 1446, that also made it into the catalogue. See it for more. ===== NGC 1445 is clearly identified by Muller's 9th magnitude star, 2 arcmin away in position angle 330 degrees. Some of the Leander McCormick positions and descriptions are sufficient for pretty solid identifications of the objects. This galaxy has also been suggested as a possible identification for NGC 1434 (which see), but I think that is unlikely -- there is no 8.5 mag star 25 seconds east, 3 arcmin north (or south for that matter). ===== NGC 1446. This is probably a star roughly 2 arcmin south of Tempel's position. He says of it, "... follows N1441 by 16 seconds [and is] +3/4 arcmin" (a crude translation of "... und folgt 16 seconds auf [GC] 772 +3/4'.") If the plus sign is switched to a minus sign, the star I've included in the table is Tempel's object. He has another nova here that is certainly a star. See NGC 1443 for details. ===== NGC 1448 = NGC 1457, which see. ===== NGC 1449. See NGC 1443. ===== NGC 1450. Howe corrected Swift's RA which is 16 seconds too large, an error this object shares with three others that Swift found the same night (NGC 652, N1509 = IC 2026, and N1594 = IC 2075). See NGC 1677 = NGC 1659 for more about this night of Swift's observing. ===== NGC 1451. See NGC 1443. ===== NGC 1452 = NGC 1455, which see. ===== NGC 1453. See NGC 1443. ===== NGC 1454 is probably the star that Steve Gottlieb and I have independently fingered. It matches the description given by Muller, and -- in particular -- there is a considerably brighter star just where Muller notes it: "* 9.5, P 240 deg, distance 3.2 arcmin." My thanks to Steve for bringing this back to my attention; I had lost the identity in my hand-written notes (how many others are there, I wonder?!). ===== NGC 1455 is probably identical to NGC 1452. The position, by Leavenworth at Leander McCormick, is pretty poor, but the description exactly fits the nucleus and inner bar of NGC 1452. In particular, the position angle mentioned by Leavenworth (30 deg) is just that of the bar. The RNGC galaxy is certainly the wrong choice -- it has too low a surface brightness to be seen even with a 26-inch refractor. ===== NGC 1456 is a double star. One component looked nebulous to Lohse; other than that, his description -- "D * 10-12, comp. nebulous (130 deg, 9 arcsec)" -- is good. ===== NGC 1457 = NGC 1448. JH has only one observation of NGC 1448; its RA is exactly 50 seconds in error. He has three accordant observations of NGC 1457 at the correct position, yet modern observers -- following Shapley-Ames -- have used the number 1448 for the galaxy. Strange people, astronomers. The identity was first suggested by DeLisle Stewart in the big list of new nebulae which he found on Harvard plates in the 1890's and early 1900's. There, he noted that N1448 was "Not seen, error for 1457 which is identified." In spite of this correction coming from a paper which they must have known, Shapley and Ames chose to use the number 1448 rather than 1457. Strange people, cataloguers ... ===== NGC 1458 is probably identical with NGC 1442 = NGC 1440 (which see for that story). This is one of Leavenworth's Leander McCormick discoveries with an RA that is about 2 minutes of time too large. When that is corrected, his observation falls on NGC 1440, with his description pretty well matching the bright inner part of the galaxy. This is not a certain identification, though. There is no sketch, and Leavenworth did not mention any nearby stars which we could use to verify the identity. Nevertheless, I'm fairly confident of the match, so use colons in the position table rather than question marks. ===== NGC 1464 = NGC 1471. Once again, the Leander McCormick RA from Leavenworth is about 2 minutes of time too large. But Leavenworth has left us a sketch that accurately portrays the galaxy and three of the stars nearby. In particular, he has the size (which he simply records as "vS") right, and his position angle of 45 degrees is correct as well. Swift's position is closer to the modern position, but his description is a bit peculiar when he claims "... forms equilatoral [sic] triangle with 2 sts." It does form a triangle with two nearby stars -- the two brighter ones shown in Leavenworth's sketch, in fact -- but the triangle is far from equilateral. In spite of this, I do not doubt that this is the galaxy which Swift saw -- his position is too close and there are no other nearby galaxies which could be his object. So the identity, at least in my mind, is secure. ===== NGC 1471 = NGC 1464, which see. ===== NGC 1474 is probably the same as IC 2002 at 03 51 45.9, +10 33 37 (B1950.0 from GSC). In addition to the problem with the original position, RNGC got the Dec sign wrong, and that incorrect sign was copied into NGC 2000.0. NGC 1474 was discovered in early in October 1864 by Albert Marth using William Lassell's 48-inch reflector at Malta, and was only observed once. The position is rough, as are many of Marth's. Of the other nine objects that he found that same night, two (N1141/2) have declination errors of 30 arcmin, another (N7575) has a 1 degree dec error, and two others (N7519 and N7593) have RA errors of 30 seconds of time. IC 2002 was found 21 Dec 1903 by Javelle with the large refractor at Nice. He measured the galaxy micrometrically, so the IC position is pretty good. This galaxy is UGC 2898 = MCG +02-10-003, and also occurs in CGCG. While Marth's description ("very faint, small, round") does not match Javelle's very well, especially in ellipticity ("... elongated along the meridian ..."), there is no other galaxy in the area that Marth is likely to have seen. Nevertheless, the N1474 identification with I2002 must be an uncertain one. Perhaps N1474 is really another star. ===== NGC 1475. The galaxy about four arcmin west of the NGC position is most likely the object that Leavenworth found. He mentions a 14th magnitude star four arcmin northwest of the nebula; there is no such star there. However, four arcmin southwest of is just such a star. Given the otherwise good description of the object, the incorrect direction is probably a simple transcription mistake. I missed the object when scanning for ESGC, so it is not included in the early editions of that catalogue. ===== NGC 1479 and NGC 1480 are a lost pair of nebulae seen only by Frank Muller at Leander McCormick. He made careful notes of the field for each nebula (N1479: "1st of 2; nebulous **, PA 170 deg"; N1480: "2nd of 2; * 10 f 30 sec."), but these don't help to identify the objects. There is just no pattern of nebulae and stars in the area of his positions that could match the descriptions. ===== NGC 1480. See NGC 1479. ===== NGC 1487 is an interacting system with at least two bright components. There are a couple of other smaller knots involved, and the faint plumes stretch over at least 10 arcminutes. The GSC position is a blend of the three brightest components; it seems to represent the system pretty well. JH saw only a single object here, but did note the two stars nearby which make a neat triangle with the galaxy. (The triangle symbol in the NGC description is just that rather than another reference to Dunlop's list.) ===== NGC 1488 is a double star. Listed as a "Star 12 involved in nebulosity" in the Markree Catalogue, it was picked up by Auwers for his 1862 list of new nebulae appended to his reduction of WH's positions. Auwers adds a note which reads, "Place from the Markree Catalogue. I've not looked for it myself." The Markree position (03 57 12, +18 25.8; B1950.0) is very good and points exactly at the double. The object (CGCG 466-003) suggested as N1488 in several modern catalogues is far too faint to have been picked up by the Markree observers. The position for the double in the main table is a mean of the GSC positions for the individual stars. ===== NGC 1491 is a diffuse nebula found by WH. His description is very good, as is his position. Dreyer nevertheless used the micrometric position measured by Engelhardt. This is refers to a star about 1.5 arcmin east of the brightest part of the nebulosity; WH mentions the star explicitly: "... a pL star in it towards the following side, but unconnected." The position I've adopted follows WH, and applies to the center of the nebula. ===== NGC 1498 is probably the triangle of three stars centered about 2 arcmin west of the NGC position. Curiously, WH's original observation reduces to a position 34 seconds of time on further west (there is nothing in that field but a few 18th magnitude galaxies). The NGC position comes from GC; did CH make an error in her reduction of her brother's observations or did JH somehow miscopy his aunt's MS? Or did they have access to other information in the sweep that led them to change the position? GC has no notes on the object, and Dreyer's 1912 note to WH's observation, "There is no very pronounced cluster near the place," is not very informative even if it is accurate. The only other historical evidence comes from Auwers's reduction: he gets the same answer I do, 34 seconds west of the NGC position. Assuming that the asterism is indeed the object that WH saw, we now find it about 40 arcsec across, and matching WH's description pretty well. Could he have glimpsed some of the much fainter stars in the field as well? They might add a "depth" to the asterism that would make it appear to stand out even more from the surrounding field and take on the appearance of a richer cluster. ===== NGC 1499 is the brightest part of the very extensive California Nebula, so called since its outline more or less resembles the outline of the state. Barnard's position -- apparently sent to Dreyer in a letter, since it is not in any of his published notes -- is just off the nebula to its east. The position I've adopted is more or less the center of the brightest portion of the nebulosity on its northeastern edge. ===== NGC 1509 = IC 2026. NGC 1509 was found independently by Swift and by Muller (who claimed two observations; he left us no sketch). Dreyer adopted Swift's position (which is 12 seconds of time too large) and description, though Muller's descriptive data certainly match what Swift recorded. (See NGC 1677 = NGC 1659 for more on other nebulae which Swift discovered on this night of 22 October 1886.) Bigourdan tried to find the galaxy a few years later in December of 1890, but could not see anything at the NGC position ("Searched with care, but in vain"). His second observation seven years later was only slightly more successful: when his measurements are reduced, they point to a star east of the galaxy. However, he also saw the galaxy on that second night, and measured it, too. Supposing it to be new -- it is not at the NGC position, of course -- he listed it among his novae, so it received the IC number. There is a fainter galaxy just to the west of NGC 1509 that is often taken as IC 2026. I'm not surprised that Bigourdan and Swift missed it; its magnitude is around V = 15, and it does not have a bright nucleus. However, Muller, working with the 26-inch at Leander McCormick, has picked up fainter galaxies. Perhaps he observed on poor nights, or perhaps he could only see high surface brightness objects with the long-focus refractor. He makes NGC 1509 only 0.1 arcmin in diameter, which means that he saw only its core. Finally, the 1893 list of micrometrically measured nebulae from Leander McCormick includes a nebula claimed to be NGC 1509. Unfortunately, only the declination was measured, so the object cannot be unambiguously identified. However, even the measured declination does not agree with the accurate value from Bigourdan and the modern sources. This measurement probably refers to a star (the description given in the 1893 paper bears this out). ===== NGC 1516 is a double galaxy which is identical to NGC 1524 and NGC 1525. See those for the story. ===== NGC 1523 is only a group of 5-6 stars. JH's position is good, but his description from a single night is sparce. Delisle Stewart first saw the object as a group of stars on a Bruce plate from Arequipa, then Andris and I picked it up during our surveys of the southern sky in the 1970's. At first glance there are only four stars here. However, at least two of them appear to be blends of fainter stars, so there are probably at least six stars altogether in the asterism. ===== NGC 1524 and NGC 1525 are the two components of NGC 1516, a double galaxy found by WH. The pair, however, was not seen as double by WH, nor JH from the Cape of Good Hope; it was finally resolved by Ormond Stone on 31 December 1886 (within a month of the centenary of its discovery on 30 Jan 1786). The Herschels' positions are good, but Stone's, as is common for the objects he and his colleagues found at Leander McCormick in the mid-1880s, is well off. In this case, his position is over 2 minutes of time too far east. The pair is identified by Stone's sketch, however. It has the relative sizes and orientation correct, so there is no doubting the identity with WH's nebula. ===== NGC 1525 is the southeastern of a pair of galaxies first seen by WH that became NGC 1516. See NGC 1524 for the story. ===== NGC 1538 =? IC 2045, and IC 2047. N1538 is perhaps the brightest galaxy in a small cluster. Stone's sketch (at least my copy of the sketch), however, seems to point to IC 2047, the second brightest. Unfortunately, his position, as poor as usual, falls near yet another galaxy in the cluster. It was this object that has been taken to be N1538 by Howe in 1901 and Reinmuth in 1928. So, the NGC identification is not at all certain. Observing logic suggests IC 2045, the sketch suggests IC 2047, and Stone's crude position has led to the third galaxy. All three are in the table of positions. ===== NGC 1539 may be CGCG 488-001, which is about 1 minute east and 4-5 arcmin north of the NGC position, correctly copied from Marth's table. Marth has only one observation of the object, and there is nothing near his position that would match his description. The CGCG galaxy is bright enough that Marth could have seen it, and the 1 minute/5 arcmin offset puts his position within his usual accuracy of the galaxy, so I've retained it as a possible identification for the NGC entry. ===== NGC 1540 is probably the southern galaxy of the interacting pair. It is somewhat brighter and more concentrated than the northern. ===== NGC 1550 = NGC 1551, which see. ===== NGC 1551 = NGC 1550. WH made a recording or transcription error of exactly one degree in the NPD of II 464, placing it on the parallel with his comparison star (44 Eridani). D'Arrest could not find the object and was the first to suggest that it might be the same as N1550, just one degree north of WH's place. Dreyer added a note to this effect in NGC, and later adopted it as a "definitive" answer to the problem, as indeed, it seems to be. JH has a comment in GC about the object, noting a 5 arcmin difference between CH's reduction and Auwers's. He attributes this to CH using an incorrect NPD for the comparison star. He says nothing about the larger one degree error. Finally, while I'm splitting hairs, WH's description in Dreyer's 1912 edition of the Complete Papers reads, "F, vS, r," while GC and NGC both have "F, S, R". Since JH had access to WH's records, it may be that he corrected another mistake. Or it may be that Dreyer or his typesetter made one. A check of the original paper in Philosophical Transactions could eliminate at least one of these possibilities. A look at the Herschel Archives at the RAS (or at any library which has the microfilm version) would be needed to check the other. ===== NGC 1554 and NGC 1555 are both involved with the young variable star T Tauri. They are among the most notorious of the nebulae found during the 19th century as they are the only nebulae certainly known to vary in brightness -- even to the point of disappearing, as NGC 1554 has done. They are most likely reflection nebulae, created as thick dust clouds near the star move about, mostly casting shadows, but occasionally letting "shafts of sunlight" out to illuminate the surrounding dense interstellar gas and dust. Nebulae were first noticed around the star by Hind in the 1850's, and were later observed by d'Arrest, Struve, and Dreyer among others. Dreyer has brief synopses of the observations in the NGC and IC Notes, and points (in the IC2 Notes) to a paper by Barnard in Monthly Notices which details most of the history of the T Tauri nebulae up to about 1900. For all the fuss that these nebulae created in the 19th century, they are all quite small and very faint at the present time. As I noted above, NGC 1554 is not visible on the Palomar Sky Survey plates (taken in the early 1950's). Also not visible is a nebula seen only by Bigourdan (B. 144; mislabeled as B. 143 by him in his big table). He makes its position 04 19 09.5, +19 21 51 (B1950.0) from a single observation on 12 Dec 1890. This is about 4 arcmin southeast of T Tauri in a blank patch of sky. Still, observers might find it fascinating to monitor the area for changes. ===== NGC 1557 is a clump of 10-15 stars that cover an area of 15 arcmin by 10 arcmin a few degrees northwest of the LMC. JH's position applies to SAO 256073, but the clump is centered about 5 arcmin south. That is the position that I've adopted. ESO, Wolfgang Steinicke, and Tom DeMary put the declination closer to the star, but that misses JH's "loose and straggling" cluster. The few stars marked "N1557" in the Hodge-Wright Atlas are northwest of JH's object. ===== NGC 1560 is not IC 2062 as I supposed in RC2. I2062 (which see) is a star. ===== NGC 1570 = NGC 1571. JH's declination is 10 arcmin off for N1570, but his RA and description insure the identity with N1571 which he saw in a later sweep. ===== NGC 1571 is also NGC 1570, which see. ===== NGC 1575 = NGC 1577. Muller's RA is 23 seconds of time too small, but his note about the "* 9.5 P[A] 185 deg, [distance] 2 arcmin" insures the identity with Swift's 29th nebula in his third list. Swift's RA is very close to being correct but his declination is further off than Muller's. Swift also mentions the "* nr s", so it is clear that they found the same galaxy. The identity was first noted by Herbert Howe in a paper that appeared in the first issue of Monthly Notices for 1900. Dreyer has this as a note in IC2, simply saying "1575 = 1577 (Ho.)." ===== NGC 1577 = NGC 1575, which see. ===== NGC 1586. See IC 371. ===== NGC 1590. See IC 2074. ===== NGC 1593 = NGC 1608 = IC 2077. Neither of the NGC observers did very well by this galaxy. Marth has the RA 1 minute too small, and LdR has it 30 seconds too large along with a declination that is 8.5 arcmin off. In addition, LdR notes the nearby star as "south" of the galaxy rather than north (an error that Dreyer caught before he prepared the NGC). Javelle, however, has one observation that is within 10 arcsec of the galaxy -- he got it right. Reinmuth first suggested the identity of NGC 1608 with IC 2077, but I think that the identity with NGC 1593 had to wait until I ran across it doing ESGC. ===== NGC 1594 = IC 2075, which see for the story. Briefly, Swift's RA is off by 17 seconds of time (see also NGC 1677 = NGC 1659 for other interesting tidbits about the nebulae Swift found this night of 22 October 1886). This misled Bigourdan into thinking he had found a new nebula. Howe had corrected the RA for Swift's object, and Dreyer put the correction into an IC2 Note. However, Dreyer did not catch the identity with IC 2075 even though its position is only 30 arcsec off Howe's corrected place for N1594. This also had an impact on IC 2080 (which see) which shares the same RA error as NGC 1594. ===== NGC 1599 may also be NGC 1610, which see. ===== NGC 1600. See NGC 1610. ===== NGC 1608 = NGC 1593 = IC 2077. See NGC 1593. ===== NGC 1610 is probably one of the faint nebulae in the NGC 1600 group -- but which one? There is nothing at Leavenworth's position, and his description (m = 15.5, D = 0.2 arcmin; R, bMN) could match any of the several fainter members of the group. Among the more likely candidates are NGC 1599, and RNGC 1610. N1599 is at the same declination and is just over a minute of time west of the nominal place of N1610. However, it has a bright star just 1.1 arcmin east-northeast which Leavenworth would almost certainly have mentioned had he seen this galaxy. The RNGC identification is also possible, but is 7 arcmin south and 1.4 minutes of time east of Leavenworth's place. Neither of these options is particularly compelling, but are still worth noting. ===== NGC 1619, like N1610, is probably one of the faint members of the NGC 1600 group. It was found by Lewis Swift on 22 December 1886 along with N1621, N1627, N1628, and N1699. Unlike those other four, however, there is nothing at all near Swift's place. Again, as with N1610, there are two candidates for N1619 that seem more likely to me. RNGC 1610 is two minutes of time west and 8 arcminutes north, while the 51st object in Reinmuth's 1932 list of nebulae is 1 minute 20 seconds west and 28 arcmin north. I'm not convinced that either of these is Swift's lost nebula, but I note them in any event. ===== NGC 1621 = NGC 1626, which see. Also see NGC 1619. ===== NGC 1626 = NGC 1621 is another galaxy independently discovered by Swift and by one of the Leander McCormick observers, Francis Leavenworth in this case. Leavenworth left us no sketch of this object, but mentions a bright star north-preceding -- the star is 10 seconds west and 3 arcmin north. Curiously, Swift does not say anything about the star, though it must have been an outstanding object in his large field around the galaxy. This is one of the discoveries that Swift sent in a letter to Dreyer and later published in his 6th AN list. The letter to Dreyer apparently had a bit more detail as Dreyer adds "lbM" to the NGC description, otherwise the same as Swift's terse "eF, S, R" in the AN list. As usual, Leavenworth's declination is very good, but his RA is 50 seconds of time too far east. Swift's position is within 40 arcsec of true, so even without a word for the star, the galaxy is clearly identified. ===== NGC 1627. See NGC 1619. ===== NGC 1628. See NGC 1619. ===== NGC 1632 is probably = IC 386 (which see), but could possibly be IC 382. ===== NGC 1639 is a triple star. JH has it in a single sweep with an accurate position and description; he also mentions the two stars flanking it. Herbert Howe was the first to note that JH's object is an asterism, and Dreyer copied his note into the IC2 Notes. ===== NGC 1641 may be the clump of stars centered about 4 arcmin northwest of JH's position. He describes his object as a "pL, p rich, irreg R cluster; p m comp M; 5'; stars 11...16." There are only about 15 stars scattered across a 9 arcmin by 6 arcmin area. If this is JH's object, it must look better at the eyepiece than it does on the Sky Survey films or on the DSS. ESO apparently has the same object, as does Brent Archinal in "Star Clusters", though Brent puts the center about 3 arcmin southeast of the mean of mine and ESO's, and makes the diameter only 5 arcmin. The object labeled "N1641" in the Hodge-Wright Atlas is a pair of faint interacting galaxies (ESO 084-IG025) that JH could not have seen. The galaxies were further misclassified as an open cluster, and appeared as number 6 in the Shapley-Lindsay list. ===== NGC 1649 is probably NGC 1652. JH has only one observation of NGC 1649 in Sweep 523 that puts it about 9 arcmin south and 6 seconds preceding NGC 1652 (his original data for N1649 are 04 38 43.3, -69 08 37 for 1830). This is only a few arcsec from the star SAO 249073, but JH makes no mention of a nearby bright star in his observation. NGC 1652 is an LMC cluster which JH observed on three nights (Sweeps 508, 653, and 759) with fairly accordant positions (the unweighted mean is 04 38 49.2, -68 59 56). Note that JH did not record N1652 in the sweep in which he found N1649. Also interesting are his descriptions: they are virtually identical in sweeps 523 and 759. He writes `F, R, gbM, 30",' and `F, R, gbM, 35",' respectively. The descriptions in sweeps 508 and 653 make the cluster `vF, S, R, gbM, 12" ' and `vF, S, R'. Since the difference in declination is close to 10 arcmin (a digit error that JH and others made several times), and the RA's are not very much different -- many other CGH observations also show RA differences of six seconds or more of time, especially as far south as the LMC -- I think that the two NGC numbers refer to the same object. Hodge and Wright came to the same conclusion in the LMC Atlas, but are rather cautious and say, "Possibly NGC 1652. Declination off by 9'." (Another very similar case is NGC 241 and NGC 242 in the SMC. See those for the discussion.) However, just eight arcmin south of NGC 1652 is a faint LMC cluster (ESO 055-SC031 = KMHK 022) that Lauberts, in ESO-B, suggested might be NGC 1649, though with two question marks and a note commenting on the declination difference. He also has N1649 = N1652 with one less question mark. KMHK (Konzitas et al, A&AS 84, 527, 1990) do not use the NGC number on the cluster, and apparently did not notice the ESO-B entry. Bica et al (AJ 117, 238, 1999), however, use N1649 for the cluster, and also note the ESO entry. Jenni Kay has also picked up the faint cluster with her large reflector, so it is not impossible that JH saw it while sweeping. In an email to Jenni and to Mati Morel (who alerted me to Jenni's observation) I wondered, though, if the SAO star might hinder JH's ability to see the very faint cluster. It certainly did not get in Jenni's way! In response, Mati listed eight cases where JH found objects near bright stars (V < 9.5) in the LMC. JH mentions the star (or stars) in only four of his descriptions, so the presence of the star alone would probably not be an obstacle to his having seen the cluster, assuming that it (the cluster) is bright and large enough to have attracted his notice during a sweep. So, I do have a bit of doubt about the identity of NGC 1649 -- but not much. ===== NGC 1652 is probably also NGC 1649, which see. ===== NGC 1655. This is one of 20 new nebulae found by J. G. Lohse with a telescope at "Mr. Wigglesworth's observatory," and sent directly to Dreyer in the form of a private communication. Thus, the only readily available information we have on them comes from the NGC itself. In this case, that includes the position and the description, "pB, R, gbM, * 10 s." There is a star of about 10th magnitude 2.5 arcmin south of Lohse's position for N1655, but there is nothing at all at that position. Delisle Stewart searched for N1655 on a Harvard plate, and could not find it either. He has an intriguing note attached, however: "... a hazy star p 1 minute, same Dec." I don't even see that "hazy star" on the POSS1 prints; is it a defect on the Harvard plate? So, N1655, too, is presumeably lost. ===== NGC 1659 = NGC 1677, which see. ===== NGC 1663 is probably the poor, scattered cluster about 45 seconds of time following WH's single position. This is one of his earlier objects (10 Feb 1784), so the position problem -- if it is one -- may be understandable as part of his learning curve. His description "A cluster of large and small scattered stars, not rich" certainly fits. There are about two dozen stars scattered over an area 12 arcmin by 10 arcmin with a 4 arcmin by 4 arcmin core containing half the stars. WH's position itself sits in a void surrounded by a weak annulus half a degree across of scattered stars, strongest on the following side (where the cluster noted in the previous paragraph sits). Is this the object that WH actually saw? If so, I suspect that he would have noted the annular structure. My best guess is the cluster following his position. Visual verification would not go amiss. ===== NGC 1665. See IC 2091. ===== NGC 1667 = NGC 1689, which see. Also see IC 394 and NGC 1677 = NGC 1659. ===== NGC 1671 may refer to the same galaxy as IC 395. Swift's description ("pF, pS, R, pB * nr sp") matches I395 (a later discovery also by Swift) pretty well, but the position is over a degree off in declination, and 43 seconds of time off. None of the other objects found by Swift on the same night (2 October 1886) have position errors anywhere nearly that large, and there is no suggestion of systematic offsets in either coordinate among the other objects. So, this is probably another lost object, though the I395 connection is not totally outrageous. ===== NGC 1674 and NGC 1675 are "Two faint nebulae in the same field" found by J. G. Lohse at "Mr. Wigglesworth's observatory." Lohse did not publish any data for these, but sent them directly to Dreyer who included them in the NGC. As with NGC 1655 (which see), which Lohse found in the same part of the sky, there is no trace of these at Lohse's given position. Three arcmin south is a group of six faint stars about an arcmin across, but we would need visual observations to tell if these could be mistaken for two nebulae. ===== NGC 1677 = NGC 1659 with a 5 minute error in its RA. It is not IC 2099 as I had supposed when I went over the field for ESGC. Here is the story. Swift found 14 nebulae on the night of 22 October 1886. In general, his positions are pretty good, being on average out by +5 seconds in RA and just +17 arcsec in declination. However, these numbers exclude two objects, NGC 1689 and NGC 1677. Both have RA's in Swift's fifth list (and in the NGC) which are 5 minutes of time too large. (In addition, another group of four objects from this night, NGC 652, N1450, N1509 = IC 2026, and N1594 = I2075, have a mean RA offset of +15 seconds of time). The identifications are secured by Swift's declinations (which are within 20 arcsec in both cases), and by his descriptions which are accordant with the Herschel's (for N1659) and with Stephan's (for N1667). In addition, these are among the brightest three or four objects that Swift found this night, and thus are the least likely to have been overlooked by other observers. ===== NGC 1689 = NGC 1667 is five minutes of time off its true position. See NGC 1677 = NGC 1659 for more on the nebulae that Swift found this night of 22 October 1886. ===== NGC 1692 is another of the Leander McCormick nebulae which was sketched. The sketch confirms the SGC and NGC 2000.0 identification with the galaxy called "A0453-20" in RC2. ===== NGC 1699. See NGC 1619. ===== NGC 1707 = IC 2107 (which see for more) is an asterism of four stars with a fifth (considerably fainter) just north. JH's RA is 30 seconds of time too large; this misled Bigourdan into rediscovering the object. Reinmuth was apparently the first to notice that the two numbers apply to the same object. ===== NGC 1708 is a large cluster of stars of magnitudes 10 to 14, about 20 arcmin by 12 arcmin in size, and elongated north to south. It is centered about 7 arcmin southeast of JH's position, but nevertheless is unmistakeable. This is one of RNGC's "nonexistent" clusters. Personally, I don't see how they could have missed it. ===== NGC 1709. Is this also = NGC 1717 (which see)? ===== NGC 1710 = IC 2108, which see. Once again, a poor position from the early lists out of Leander McCormick led to enough confusion for Bigourdan that the galaxy received two numbers in Dreyer's catalogues. However, Bigourdan eventually caught his mistake (after seeing the list of micrometrically measured nebulae from Leander McCormick), and made the identity himself in his own big table of micrometric measurements. The object which he initially measured as N1710 is nothing more than a faint star. ===== NGC 1712. The first of three "clusters" involved in nebulosity in the Large Magellanic Cloud, this has only one observation by JH while the others, NGC 1722 and NGC 1727, have three each. Also, JH notes them as "the [second/third] of a series of clustering patches," while NGC 1712 has no such comment. Even though JH calls it "A pB, S cluster", it is actually composed of several clump of stars, including foreground stars, covering an area of about 3 arcmin by 2 arcmin. Since it is ill-defined, the positions from various sources are not in very good agreement. Nevertheless, the identity is pretty clear. ===== NGC 1713. See NGC 1717. ===== NGC 1714 is a compact, annular HII region in the LMC. On the DSS1 image, there is a bright knot on the east side, and a short extension to the west, with no obvious cluster involved. Nor is there an obvious "central" star. I suspect that inspection of the DSS2 images would show considerably more detail. ===== NGC 1717. Dreyer gives 04 56 36, -00 19.2 (B1950.0) as the position of this object. There is nothing at all in that place, not even a faint star. So, the identity of this NGC entry is not known with certainty. However, we do know that it is either a star, or it is NGC 1709. Here is the story. Reading through Lord Rosse's descriptions of N1719 (bear with me here), it looks as if the "3 vF neb" seen on 15 Jan 1845 are NGC 1709, 1713, and 1719. This assumes that Dreyer's comment "The two upper (sic) ones are probably h339 (N1713) and h340 (N1719)" is meaningful and correct. This would probably point to N1709 as the third nebula -- but what does Dreyer mean by "upper"? The northern-most or (assume an inverted field) the southern-most? LdR goes on to say that d'Arrest, in his observation of N1719, has a star 13-14 4.7s p, and 80" north (as, indeed d'A does, along with a detailed description in Latin that I must translate one of these days). This must be the object that Dreyer is refering to in NGC when he says "(? F *)." There are two other stars, one perhaps double, in the same area. So, it is possible that one of these was mistaken by LdR as a faint nebula (many other of the stars to receive NGC numbers are also from LdR's observations). LdR looked again at NGC 1719 on two other nights, and could find no trace of a nebula northwest of it. So, it may be possible that he mistook NGC 1713 for NGC 1719 on that first night. Since there is a galaxy northwest of N1713 -- NGC 1709 -- this hypothesis would then make NGC 1717 = NGC 1709, as I suggested above. Since there were no other observations of the area published before the NGC appeared, we are left with four candidates for N1717. All but NGC 1709 are stars northwest of NGC 1719. Two of those stars are bright enough to be in GSC. Here are the positions (B1950.0) of all three stars: 04 56 52.2 -00 19 16 HCo Slightly elongated image -- perhaps double? 04 56 45.91 -00 18 11.2 GSC 04 56 56.55 -00 18 42.9 GSC Brightest of the three -- most likely candidate star. So, we are left with a puzzle. There may be other relevant observations in the post-NGC literature, but it's unlikely that they will help sort out this particular problem. ===== NGC 1719. See NGC 1717. ===== NGC 1722 is the second of three "clustering patches" in the LMC (the others are NGC 1712 and NGC 1727, both of which see). It is pretty ill-defined, and involves a considerable amount of nebulosity. It is probably better described as an association than a cluster. The three brightest patches in the association make up IC 2111, which also see. ===== NGC 1727 is actually a group of three HII regions and their associated stars. JH's size, "3 arcmin long, 90 arcsec broad" make clear what he saw, so the position that I've estimated on the DSS refers to all three patches. Most of the other positions refer to only the northwestern of the three. ===== NGC 1730 = IC 2113. This is one of the bright Leander McCormick nebulae that the Herschels could probably have picked up. However, it was apparently first seen on 12 November 1885 by Francis Leavenworth. It is one of the rare nebulae in the first LM list to have more than a single observation, but its position is still given to only a full minute of time. It is also one of the few to have two sketches from LM -- the first is Leavenworth's discovery sketch, the second is by Frank Muller from 16 February 1887. The sketches are similar, but Leavenworth claims two nebulae, while Muller -- correctly -- has a nebula with a superposed star. Leavenworth's measurement of the separation (10 arcsec at PA = 110 degrees) is, however, correct. The star can be easily seen in the 2MASS image superposed just a few arcseconds northwest of the nucleus of the barred spiral, within the inner ring. By the way, the NGC misattributes the object to Ormond Stone rather than to Leavenworth. In between the two LM observations which led to the sketches, Lewis Swift picked up the galaxy on 9 October 1886 and published it in his fifth list of new nebulae from Warner Observatory in Rochester, NY. His position for the galaxy is one of the best he ever published, falling just a few arcseconds from the nucleus (statistics suggests that this happens now and then). Fortunately, Dreyer used this position for the NGC. Well, OK, you say, but what about IC 2113? That was found by Barnard and is apparently one of the several discoveries that he sent directly to Dreyer. I find no trace of it in any of his papers on nebulae, at least in those papers that I've collected. His position for the galaxy is nearly coincident with Swift's, so I have to assume that neither he nor Dreyer checked the NGC closely. Comparison stars for this also figure in the uncertain identifications for IC 400, which see. ===== NGC 1736. JH's position is toward the middle of the western "lobe" of the nebula. This is where the brightest stars are located, including the "chief of which in the anterior part of the neb [was] taken." In the one sweep when he estimated the size of the nebula, though, he made it four arcmin long and 2.5 arcmin across, almost exactly what we seen on the short exposure DSS1 V-band plate. The position I've adopted is more toward the intersection of the "lobes" and is more representative of the entire nebula. One last note on this: this is not identical to either IC 2115 or 2116, in spite of what ESO claims. See I2115 for more on this. ===== NGC 1737 is part of the NGC 1743 star-forming complex in the LMC. See NGC 1745 and IC 2114 for more. There is no obvious cluster directly associated with it, but there are many stars in the area. NGC 1737 itself is very faint in the DSS1 V-band image. ===== NGC 1743. See NGC 1745 and IC 2114. ===== NGC 1745 is a diffuse nebula -- probably an emission nebula -- in the NGC 1743 complex in the LMC. John Herschel's position was an estimate based on his measured positions for NGC 1743 and N1748, but it is close enough to the correct position to identify the nebula without question. It is pretty well- seen on the IIIa-J film of the area, and on the DSS2 images, though is just barely seen in the DSS1 short-exposure V-band image. N1745 is called a star cluster in the ESO/Uppsala catalogue, but this is wrong. Furthermore, there is no cluster at the ESO position, but just a group of faint stars. ===== NGC 1746. This is a curious case, found by d'A while searching for NGC 1750 (which see) = H VIII 43. He describes it as a poor cluster, and places it about 10 arcmin north of WH's place -- but nevertheless calls it H VIII 43. Dreyer apparently thought it a separate object since he gave it a new GC number in the GC supplement. There is a group of about a dozen faint stars at d'A's place, and a much more extensive group at WH's place (see the note for N1750 for a description). While I'm doubtful that d'A's object is worth numbering, I'm going to follow Dreyer as closely as possible and retain both objects at something like their original positions. I must note, however, that Galadi-Enriquez et al (A&AS 131, 239, 1998) have shown that this group of stars is neither astrometrically nor photometrically a real cluster. It is no more than a random clump in the rich Milky Way field in Taurus. ===== NGC 1748 = IC 2114, which see. Also see NGC 1745. ===== NGC 1750 may be the same object as NGC 1746 (which see). If so, there is a 10 arcminute error in the declination for N1746. The group of stars I see on the POSS1 close to WH's place consists of about 20 9th to 12th magnitude stars scattered over an area 25 arcmin by 12 arcmin, with the long axis at PA roughly = 125 degrees. I put the cluster center about 3 arcmin east of WH's RA. Reinmuth claims this to be the central group in a very large cluster also containing N1746 and N1758. Galadi-Enriquez et al (A&AS 131, 239, 1998) have confirmed the reality of this cluster as well as NGC 1758. They have also shown, however, that the clump of stars I call NGC 1746 (which see) near d'A's position is not a true cluster. ===== NGC 1757 is nonexistent. JH claims to have seen it once on 20 Feb 1830, saying of it, "A very large space affected with nebulous streams in zigzags up and down. (N.B. Such observations require several verifications. The opportunity has not occured in this case.)." He never got back to this and it has never been seen since. Lord Rosse and his observers tried six to eight times. The actual number is uncertain. In the 1861 monograph, LdR says "Looked for seven times. Not found," while the 1880 monograph says "Looked for 6 times in the years 1848-58, not found", and adds another attempt on 30 December 1867: "Night bad; suspected slightly luminous appearance in spots, but not very decided." (Dreyer in the NGC note says six times). Neither Tempel nor Spitaler could find it, and Reinmuth did not locate it on the Heidelberg plates. I searched for this on the sky survey prints and later on the DSS, as well as in the IRAS infrared images. The closest nebulosity is over 20 arcmin from JH's position and does not agree at all with his description. In any case, the whispy stuff is far too faint to be seen visually. Even JH came to doubt his observation. His GC note reads, "A very large diffused nebulosity, distributed in zigzags. This has been looked for seven times by Lord Rosse and not found. Its existence is therefore very doubtful." ===== NGC 1758. See NGC 1746 and NGC 1750. ===== NGC 1760 is a diffuse nebula in LMC, probably an HII region, south-southwest of NGC 1761 (which see). It just barely shows on the DSS1, and is associated there with a line of 9 or 10 stars. JH's sketch of the field is fairly close to what we see on the IIIa-J and IIIa-F plates (DSS2) of the area, though. ===== NGC 1761, though often called a "cluster", is actually a star cloud in LMC. JH mentions a double star of 9th magnitude in it -- I suspect this is a foreground Milky Way star. The star cloud is centered about an arcminute southeast of the double star. Most others have taken the position of the double as that for the star cloud but, using DSS1, I've given an estimate of the center of the cloud itself. ===== NGC 1763 is a bi-lobed complex of HII regions and star clusters in the LMC. JH's descriptions and positions from five different sweeps are appropriate, though he was not happy with one of his RA's. It's possible that the numbers IC 2115 and 2116 refer to parts of N1763. See them for that story. ===== NGC 1767 is one of a number of nebulae and clusters in the LMC that JH found with a 5-inch refractor. Beginning on 2 November 1836 and continuing through 26 March 1837, JH worked across the Cloud in 34 different zones with his refractor. He does not give us many details of his work on these zones, but if we assume to zeroth order that he worked steadily on these, given that there are 144 days between his beginning and end dates, that would allow him 4.24 days per zone. This would allow us to guess at the discovery dates -- or at least the years -- in which he discovered the objects. Since N1767 was put into zone 9, it was probably one of the earlier objects found, so November or December of 1836 is a reasonable guess as to its discovery date. ===== NGC 1770 is a large complex of clusters and HII regions in the LMC. The various positions for it reflect the difficulty in determining its center -- even JH had trouble. His two RA's are discordant by nearly 40 seconds of time. But when we examine the field, the limits of the star forming region are pretty clear. On DSS1, that center is about 40 arcsec southeast of the 9th magnitude star that JH noted in his second observation. Also see IC 2117, one of the HII knots in the southern part of this star cloud. ===== NGC 1781 = NGC 1794. Dreyer reprints as an NGC note JH's note from the GC explaining the choice of RA's from three different stars in WH's sweep from 6 Feb 1785 -- JH unfortunately picked the wrong RA. Ormond Stone found the object independently at Leander McCormick about a century after WH picked it up. But he, too, has the RA wrong. Fortunately, Stone has left us a sketch of the galaxy and nearby field stars which positively identify the correct object. Even without the sketch, Herbert Howe corrected the RA and suggested that the two NGC numbers refer to the same object, assuming the 3 minute of time RA difference noted by JH. Howe's observations led to Dreyer's IC2 notes nearly a decade later, and also to Dreyer's notes in his 1912 edition of WH's complete papers, and finally, to Dreyer's 1912 MN list of NGC corrections. ===== NGC 1785 is an asterism of about 5 stars superposed on the LMC. It was found by JH in Zone 9 of his special sweeps of the Large Cloud with "an equatorially mounted telescope of five inches aperture, and seven feet focal length, by Tulley, which had served me for the measurement of double stars in England ..." The position is good, and it is accurately plotted on JH's wonderful map of the LMC. ESO suggested two different objects as candidates for N1785. One was a chain of 5-10 stars (of which JH's object is the south-western end); the other was Shapley-Lindsay 150, a faint LMC open cluster about 20 arcmin south-east of JH's astersim. This latter is much too faint to have been seen during sweeps with a five-inch refractor, and the position is well off JH's. ===== NGC 1787 is a large (20 arcmin by 15 arcmin) cloud of stars in the LMC. This number has been applied to SL 178, but that is a faint, small cluster that JH did not see. On the Hodge-Wright Atlas, I put the center about five arcmin northwest of JH's, but either will serve to identify his cluster. ===== NGC 1790 is a group of about a dozen stars of 10th to 12th magnitude scattered around JH's position. It probably looks better at the eyepiece than it does on the Sky Survey prints; JH calls it "A pretty object," while RNGC puts it into the "nonexistent" category. JH's position is about 3 arcminutes east of the apparent center on the POSS1 blue plate. ===== NGC 1794 = NGC 1781, which see. ===== NGC 1797. See NGC 1392. ===== NGC 1799. See NGC 1392. ===== NGC 1814 is a cluster in the LMC star cloud NGC 1820, which see. ===== NGC 1816 is a cluster in the LMC star cloud NGC 1820, which see. ===== NGC 1820 is a large cloud of stars in the LMC, 8 arcmin by 5 arcmin, rather scattered on the DSS1. It contains several fainter, smaller clusters, two of which (NGC 1814 and NGC 1816) JH saw. The position I estimated on DSS1 is the approximate center of the entire complex. ===== NGC 1837. JH calls this "Scattered, more than fills the field." This tells us that JH's object is at least 15 arcmin across. The position I've given is for a clump of four stars near the center of JH's "cluster." ===== NGC 1838 is a scattered and pretty poor association in the LMC. JH's 7th magnitude star is on the western edge, so his position is off of the more modern ones that point to the center. I make the size 7.5 x 7.0 on DSS1. ===== NGC 1845 is a large, scattered cloud of stars in (or superposed on) the LMC. Its center is northwest of JH's 9th magnitude star by 2-3 arcmin, and I make the approximate size on DSS1 15 x 10 arcmin. ===== NGC 1854 and NGC 1855 are the "core" and "halo," respectively, of a stellar association in LMC. JH picked up NGC 1854 in five different sweeps, but only noticed NGC 1855 in one -- looking at DSS1, I can see why he recorded the the objects this way. The "core" is a much more prominent object than the "halo." I make the center of NGC 1855 slightly preceding NGC 1854; JH obviously has them reversed. Brent Archinal was, as far as I know, the first to point out the core/halo structure of the object(s) in "Star Clusters." ===== NGC 1855 is the extended outer part of a stellar association in the LMC; NGC 1854 (which see) is its birght, compact core. ===== NGC 1869. I make the center of this large (10 x 9 arcmin), scattered star cloud somewhat northwest of JH's position. ===== NGC 1874, NGC 1876, NGC 1877, and NGC 1880 are four emission nebulae and the many bright stars they envelope in a large, complex, star-forming region in the LMC. ESO did not provide separate positions for the first three (and put "N1880" on NGC 1874), so the positions I've adopted come from my measurements on DSS, from GSC, or from offsets to GSC stars. JH's positions are excellent for the first two, adequate for the third and fourth -- but those last two come from a sketch drawn on 17 Jan 1838, not from one of the sweeps, so I'd expect lesser accuracy for them. All four of the nebulae and clusters, by the way, are shown in JH's sketch (it is Plate III, No. 6 in his CGH volume), so can be pretty positively identified (but see NGC 1877 for a little doubt). To my embarrassment, I did not do this the first time I went over the field. Bob Erdmann caught the mess -- I had put the position for NGC 1880 on NGC 1877, and had missed N1880 altogether. I've just fixed it (thanks, Bob!). ===== NGC 1876 is the largest of a group of four nebulae and star clusters in the LMC. See NGC 1874. ===== NGC 1877 is one of a group of nebulae and star clusters in the LMC found by JH. Even though his sketch has it just south of NGC 1876, there is nothing exactly at the position he shows. There is an elongated complex of stars and nebulae centered just southwest of his knot. I've adopted a position close to the brightest nebular knot in this complex for N1877. This knot is easily seen on the DSS1 image. See NGC 1874 for more. ===== NGC 1880. See NGC 1874. ===== NGC 1882 is probably not NGC 1884, which see for more. ===== NGC 1884. During my early work on the LMC Atlas, I identified this with NGC 1882. But that is unlikely as JH found both objects during the same sweep. There is nothing obvious at JH's position matching his description ("eF, 2' diam."), and I entered it simply as "Not found" going through the NGC a few years ago. For now, that is how I'll leave it. ===== NGC 1891 is the scattering of stars somewhat following JH's position. That position is for the brightest star (SAO 195771), a double on the western side of the cluster. There are about 20 stars covering an area 19 arcmin by 14 arcmin. They may be a dispersed open cluster, but could just as well be a random collection of field stars. ===== NGC 1893 is a cluster found by JH. As noted by Brent Archinal in "Star Clusters" and in an email from Wolfgang Steinicke, it is embedded in a large, faint nebulosity found by Max Wolf and listed as IC 410. JH apparently did not see the nebula as he makes no note of it. While Wolf noted stars in his nebula, his note is primarily concerned with the nebula and not the stars. So, applying the two numbers to both objects is incorrect, though it has been done often in the 20th century catalogues. ===== NGC 1896. A nine degree error in declination was introduced in the GC, and copied intact into the NGC. The Herschels' original positions are good, and point to a scattering of about 20 9th to 12th magnitude stars. This may not be a real cluster, but that determination will depend on detailed studies of proper motions and photometry of the stars. This group, by the way, is not OCL 450 (in the Prague catalogue). That is a much more distant, much fainter cluster about half a degree north-west of NGC 1896. ===== NGC 1901 is a scattered grouping of Milky Way stars superposed on the Large Magellanic Cloud. The position I list in the table is for the eccentric core a few arcminutes northeast of the center of the entire group. JH's position applies to the seventh magnitude star on the southern edge of the group. Coincidentally, there is a much fainter LMC cluster just a couple of arcmin from JH's position. ESO took this to be the NGC cluster, but it is not. ===== NGC 1908. WH has only one observation of this on 1 Feb 1786 where he says, "Diffused extremely faint nebulosity. The means of verifying this phenomenon are difficult." JH and Dreyer took this to mean that the nebula was only suspected, so that is how it is entered in the GC and NGC. WH places the nebulosity 1 min, 26 sec east, and 7 arcmin south of Eta Ori. There is nothing here on either of the POSS1 plates, nor on the SERC EJ plate. However, 7 arcmin north of Eta Ori there is a very faint, very diffuse sheen of nebulosity (I make the approximate position 05 23.0, -02 20). But could WH have seen this? I very much doubt it. So, I've tentatively labeled this "Not found." ===== NGC 1909. WH has one observation of this "Strongly suspected nebulosity of very great extent." He makes its size "Not less than 2 deg 11 arcmin of PD and 26 sec of RA in time." These numbers come from his offsets from Rigel: 11m 09s east to 11m 35s east, and 1 deg 19 arcmin north to 52 arcmin south. While this whole area is covered with a very diffused, very low surface brightness nebulosity, I do not see anything that WH could have seen easily. In particular, there is no nebula stretched out north to south as WH describes. However, at about the right distance WEST of Rigel, there is such a nebula, IC 2118. It is bright enough that WH might have seen it during his sweeps, and it more or less matches his description. So, I am going to suggest, pending visual confirmation, that IC 2118 is the object WH found, and that he wrote "east" rather than "west" in his log book. ===== NGC 1911 may be NGC 1920. JH has N1920 in seven different sweeps, but not in the one sweep when he found N1911 -- that is Sweep 522. The declinations are within an arcminute, but the RA is different by 1m 20s. The extra 20 seconds bothers me, so I've put a colon on the identity. JH's eight different descriptions are pretty well accordant, though he does have the size of the nebula range between 20 arcsec and 2 arcmin (he puts N1911 at 30 arcsec). I also checked the possibility of a systematic position offset among the other 37 objects that JH recorded in that very productive sweep through the northern part of the LMC -- there isn't any. One curious thing turned up, however: N1911 is the ONLY object in the sweep that was not seen in any other sweep. A final note: JH suggests that this and N1915 may be the same. I don't think so; see N1915 for more on this. ===== NGC 1915. JH has this in only one sweep (760 on 2 Jan 1837), and calls it only "eF, pL." However, he adds, "(Possibly the same with No. 2826 [NGC 1911], but the nebulae are so crowded that they may with equal probablility be different ones.)" I don't think it is the same as N1911 (which see). The descriptions are too different, and N1911 is probably the same object as N1920. So, what is N1915? JH's position is about an arcminute northwest of the center of a stellar association 3 arcmin by 2 arcmin across (coincidentally, there is a faint cluster on the northeastern edge of the association). The object shows up clearly on the Southern Sky Survey IIIa-J film, somewhat less clearly on the 2nd generation DSS image, and not at all on the quick V plate used for the DSS distributed on CD-ROM. The association is, admittedly, pretty faint to have been picked up visually. Still, JH was careful, had keen eyesight, and didn't miss much in the LMC that he could have seen. Another possibility is that N1915 is a second observation (in the following sweep on the next night, 3 Jan 1837) of NGC 1919 which JH also describes as "eF, L ...". He goes on to add, however, "... irreg R, 4' diam. Resolved into small stars with nebulous light." That is a perfect description of NGC 1919, a cluster immersed in a reflection nebula. Is it possible that JH missed the stars the first time around? ===== NGC 1919 may also be NGC 1915, which see. ===== NGC 1920. See NGC 1911. ===== NGC 1927. JH has one observation that reads "All about this place (05 26 20, -08 24.9; B1950.0), there exists diffused nebulosity." In fact, there is none. Dreyer comments in a Note to the NGC, "Looked for three times at Birr Castle; twice the sky was fancied to have a milky appearance." There is certainly no nebulosity on the POSS1 plates, nor on the SERC EJ plate. Also, JH originally made this an observation of his father's V 38: that identity is shown in his 1833 catalogue. However, his position differed enough from WH's that he made them separate objects for GC; Dreyer followed suit for NGC. There, H V 38 = NGC 1909 (which see). In short, NGC 1927 is "Not found." ===== NGC 1932 and NGC 1933. JH found a faint nebula -- actually a compact star cluster in the LMC -- here, and observed it four times. His mean position is just a few arcsec from the center of the cluster, which ended up with 1933 as its NGC number. On the last night JH observed N1933, he also noticed a very faint, very small nebulous object 80 arcsec west of his brighter object. When reducing his observations, he noted it "curious" that he picked up this fainter object only once. The object turns out to be a 13th magnitude star, though other fainter stars in the area may contribute to its nebulous appearance. Lauberts, of course, found only one non-stellar object in the area, so assumed that N1932 = N1933. This incorrect equality is noted in ESO. ===== NGC 1933. See NGC 1932. ===== NGC 1935 is also IC 2126, which see. It is a small HII region in the LMC, found by JH, who measured it in four sweeps. He noted it as part of a group of nebulae and clusters. ===== NGC 1936 = IC 2127, which see, is another of the HII regions in this part of the LMC found by JH. He has it in six different sweeps, and his position is very good. ===== NGC 1938 is an open cluster in the LMC situated just 0.7 arcmin northwest of NGC 1939, a globular cluster. ESO did not give separate coordinates so I've adopted that for NGC 1939 from GSC and have measured the offset to N1938 from the brighter cluster. JH's position and descriptions are good, though he did not resolve either cluster. In particular, his micrometric measurement of the offset of N1938 from N1939 (distance = 50 arcsec, PA = 339.1 degrees) is very good. ===== NGC 1939. See NGC 1938. ===== NGC 1952 = M 1 = The Crab Nebula. This is the prototypical supernova remnant (from SN 1054), and is now a large, bright nebula. I have adopted the position of the pulsar near its center as the nebula's position as well. The pulsar, by the way, is the southern of the two stars of similar brightness near the nebula's center. There is evidence, however, that in this case at least, the star has a large proper motion -- it is no longer at the center of the nebulosity implied by the measured expansion of the knots and filaments, but is several arcsec to the northwest. This is taken as evidence for an asymmetric supernova explosion which gave the star a powerful kick and set it off at high velocity. In spite of all this, I'm sticking with the position of the pulsar as the center of the nebula for the time being. Perhaps I'll change my mind in a few thousand years when the star is well away from the center of the expanding gas cloud that Messier placed first in his famous list. ===== NGC 1955. See NGC 1974 = NGC 1991. ===== NGC 1961 = IC 2133 is another of the identifications that Dreyer himself made. He has the long explanation in a note in his 1912 edition the Scientific Papers; briefly, WH's comparison star had incorrect coordinates in one of the catalogues that CH was using during the reduction. When the right coordinates are used, WH's position is still 22 seconds out, but the identity with Bigourdan's object (Big. 385 = IC 2133, which see) is certain. There is nothing else nearby that WH could have mistaken for the galaxy. ===== NGC 1963 is an apparent cluster of about 20 stars, roughly arranged in the shape of the number 3 (JH describes it that way, and it still appears that way on the southern sky survey -- and on the southern sky for that matter). PGC and RC3 are clearly wrong in using the number for the bright spindle galaxy which is really IC 2135 = IC 2136. ESO, however, got it right. See IC 2136 for more. ===== NGC 1968. See NGC 1974 = NGC 1991. ===== NGC 1974 = NGC 1991 is a stellar association in the northern part of the LMC. JH calls it the fourth in a line of four (though he did not measure the first, so that does not have an NGC number). He also made a one minute error in the RA of NGC 1991. This was first caught, as far as I know, by Paul Hodge and is noted in his and Francis Wright's LMC Atlas. The observation leading to N1974 is the only one in the field not from Sweep 760 on 2 Jan 1837. The DSS image shows a field very much as JH describes it: "... a great line of rich clusters which are connected by abundant scattered stars. (The first not taken.)" The other NGC objects are NGC 1955 and NGC 1968. The western- most, which JH did not measure, is at 05 25 32.4, -67 31 49 (B1950.0). All are wreathed in loops and tangles of nebulosity, probably supernova remnants and HII regions. Curiously, all but the first of the associations appear to be double on the DSS image. JH's positions fall in between these concentrations, so I've estimated the centers of them, and have measured the approximate centers for each concentration. It may be that there are no really separate clusters here, just one large, extended, star-forming region. ===== NGC 1976 = M 42. I have adopted the position of the Trapezium as the position of M42. This helps us avoid the problem of trying to decide on a geometric center for the nebula. See also NGC 1982 = M 43 and IC 429 for other notes about the Orion Nebula and the large, complex region of star formation around it. ===== NGC 1982 = M 43. For this, and many other emission or reflection nebulae with clearly identified embedded stars, I have adopted the position of the star as that for the entire nebula. This follows the precedent set by the visual discovers who noticed that many of the nebulae are usually (though not always) brightest in the vicinity of the stars. There is a curiosity in the NGC listing for M 43. WH's first "Very Faint" nebula is in the vicinity, so GC and NGC suggest that it might be equivalent. This probably bothered Dreyer a bit, as he added a note to WH's observation when he edited the Complete Papers: "III 1 is an appendage to the north of M43." WH's own observation seems to support this, and it is well-known, too, that he tried to not include any of Messier's nebulae or clusters in his own lists (though several did creep in, including M8, M20, and M82). ===== NGC 1985 has been called a planetary nebula in the past, but is now generally accepted as a reflection nebula. There are several other such nebulae nearby, including UGC 03327 = MCG +05-14-001. In spite of its inclusion in two galaxy catalogues, that object is almost certainly a nebula within the Milky Way Galaxy. One or the other of these two, N1985 or U3327, is included in van den Bergh's 1966 catalogue of Galactic reflection nebulae. I've not checked yet, so it may be possible that that entry refers to both objects as well as to the other fainter reflection nebulae in the field. ===== NGC 1988. Suspected of variability by its discoverer (Chacornac, in 1855), this has never been seen by any other observer. Dreyer has a brief history in the NGC Notes. The NGC position comes from GC where JH gives a source as "Les Mondes, No. 9." This was apparently a short-lived journal or newsletter; there is no trace of it in the indexes of major astronomical libraries in the US, nor in the library of the Paris Observatory. Fortunately, Chacornac also published his position in Comptes Rendus 56, 637, 1863, a publication which is still very much with us. The only things in the area on the POSS1 are two or three stars. Chacornac's accurate position corresponds to the western-most of the the stars, a 10th magnitude object with two much fainter companions just a few arcsec east. My guess is that the "object" was perhaps a reflection or flare from zeta Tauri which is only 5 arcmin to the southeast, possibly enhanced by the faint stars around the 10th magnitude "primary." ===== NGC 1990. In spite of this nebulosity having been "seen" by WH, JH, and Dreyer, as well as by several amateurs in recent years, there is no trace of it on any photograph of the area. JH suggested that the nebulosity extends at least 12 arcmin north and south of Epsilon Orionis, while Dreyer makes it more extensive to the south. (On the POSS1 red plate, the star is apparently close to the center of an extended, striated nebulosity. This, however, is not visible on any other photo, including several color photos that would certainly show a red nebulosity if it existed. This striation is a defect on the red plate, apparently caused by imperfections or reflections in the red Plexiglass filter.) It is just possible that this may be another case like IC 349 (which see) which is so close to Merope as to be not easily imaged. Until Eps Ori is imaged in such a way that the star can be removed to show the nebulosity that the Herschels and Dreyer claimed to have seen, I have no choice but to call NGC 1990 an illusion. Also see NGC 7088 for another well-known case of an illusory nebula "seen" by many experienced observers. ===== NGC 1991 = NGC 1974, which see. ===== NGC 1995 is a double star, seen only once by JH. It is about two arcmin west-northwest of NGC 1998; JH's position is within 25 arcsec of the GSC position of the brighter of the stars, so the identity is certain. ===== NGC 1996. Another of RNGC's "nonexistent" clusters, this is clearly apparent on the POSS1, and is centered just an arcminute east of the NGC position. The 30 or so stars are scattered over an area of about 15 arcmin by 10 arcmin (the long axis is at PA = about 20 degrees). But is it a real cluster? To answer that, of course, will take a study of the area, with proper motions and photometry for the suspect stars. ===== NGC 1998. See NGC 1995. =====