Edward Francis Burney

From The Space Library

British artist born in 1760 and member of the famous Burney family. His first cousin was Frances "Fanny" Burney noted novelist. Another cousin was James Burney who was aboard the Endeavour with Captain Cook. Edward Burney exhibited at the Royal Academy in London and created several speculative aeronautic and space themed images. Some of his images are in the collection of the Smithsonian Air and Space museum.

In 1959 the London Chelsea antique vendor Anthony James discovered a bound portfolio of Burney's illustrations of a space explorer he called "Q.Q. EsQre". The portfolio included 19 illustrations which were sold at auction that year. It is believed that the Royal Aeronautical Society library purchased the collection but at least one of the images was sold separately at Christies auction house in 1998.

The speculative space flight images, which are believed to have been created by Burney in 1815, show QQ sitting in a conical craft accompanied by a set of equipment including a space helmet, an oxygen tank, supplies and a "motometer". QQ is launched into space by a cluster of cannons but ends up in the court of the Emperor of China. Several images were featured in the Illustrated London News at the time of their discovery in 1959 and the original paperwork sent to the media by James stated that the images covered three separate space voyages and were intended as illustrations for an unknown space novel. It is believed that Burney deliberately made Q.Q. look like the Duke of Wellington.