Robert FitzRoy

Vice-Admiral Robert FitzRoy FRS (5 July 1805 – 30 April 1865) was an English officer of the Royal Navy, politician and scientist who served as the second governor of New Zealand between 1843 and 1845. He achieved lasting fame as the captain of HMS Beagle during Charles Darwin's famous voyage, FitzRoy's second expedition to Tierra del Fuego and the Southern Cone.

FitzRoy was a pioneering meteorologist who made accurate daily weather predictions, which he called by a new name of his own invention: "forecasts".^[2] In 1854 he established what would later be called the Met Office, and created systems to get weather information to sailors and fishermen for their safety.^[2] He was an able surveyor and hydrographer. As Governor of New Zealand, serving from 1843 to 1845, he tried to protect the Māori from illegal land sales claimed by British settlers.^[3] He was Governor of New Zealand from 1843 to 1845.

In 1851, FitzRoy was elected to the Royal Society.

In 1854, on the recommendation of Vice Admiral Francis Beaufort and the President of the Royal Society, FitzRoy was appointed as chief of a new department to deal with the collection of weather data at sea, with the title of Meteorological Statist to the Board of Trade and a staff of three. This was the forerunner of the modern Meteorological Office.