Billings, Iosif

Year of birth unknown; died 1806.

Billings was born in Great Britain. He became an officer in the Russian navy. From 1776 to 1780 he participated in J. Cook’s third expedition around the world. From 1785 to 1794, Billings and G. A. Sarychev led a Russian expedition whose purpose was to explore and survey the northeastern coasts of Siberia. Billings crossed the Chukchi Peninsula by reindeer sleigh and described its northern coast from the Bering Strait to Koliuchin Bay. He kept a journal of his voyages and drew up several maps. A cape and a settlement on the Chukchi shore of the East Siberian Sea are named after Billings.