Baffin

William, an English navigator and writer. The date of his birth is not known. He was killed in 1622 in a fight with the Portuguese on an island in the Persian Gulf. He was pilot of the "good ship Discovery," which, in 1615, tried to find the Northwest Passage. On his return, Baffin wrote an account of the voyage. The original manuscript is preserved in the British Museum. The "Discovery" was the earliest English ship to visit the broad expanse between Greenland and British America. The name of the navigator has been preserved in Baffin Bay and Baffin Land.