Hi Jacquie,
I don't know how much information you have collected, but this may be of some interest to you.
It is Herschels hand written notes about his 'discovery' of a comet-looking object (previously mistaken as a star), which was Uranus. He explains Uranus' location in the FOV of his scope.
First, at the top of his notes he dates it March 12 at 5:40 am and reports his observations of Mars and Saturn.
Now for the exciting bit!
Then below that, dated Tuesday March 13 when looking around the Pollux area he writes:
"Pollux is followed by 3 small stars about 2' and 3' distance.
(?) as usual, p h
in the quartile near ζ Tauri (Zeta Taurus)
the lowest of the two is a curious other Nebulous star or perhaps a Comet.
Then he strikes out the following:
preceeding the star that preceeds ν Geminorium (Nu Gem)
? about 30"
then continues in his note:
a small star follows the Comet at 2/3 of the field's distance
Now, without knowing the FOV he was using it makes it hard to determine his distance of '2/3 of the field's distance'. I also do not know the quality of his optics.
I get from his notes that he sees 3 small stars only 2 - 3 minutes of arc from Pollux in the direction of ζ Tauri, but then he says "in the quartile
near ζ Tauri!" He also says Pollux is 'followed by' the 3 stars. That would put them on the opposite side of Pollux away from ζ Tauri.
In my thoughts of his notes I 'think' he saw Uranus near ζ Tauri (in the quartile of ζ Tauri). His notes say he saw it near ζ Tauri, and Cartes du Ciel tells us that Uranus was between ζ Tauri and M35 on the 13th March 1781, so how he can say the 3 stars 2' - 3' from Pollux is beyond my understanding.
But we can work out for sure that he saw it right near ζ Tauri
I hope all this helps. My Brain now hurts trying to work it all out to this point.
Here are his actual hand written Notes:
http://www.sciencephoto.com/image/36...,_1781-SPL.jpg
Photo Credit: Royal Astronomical Society/Science Photo Library
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