Gilbert and Ellice Islands French captain Louis Duperrey was the first to map the whole Gilbert Islands archipelago. He commanded "La Coquille" on its circumnavigation of the earth (1822–1825). Funafuti atoll was named Ellice's Island after Edward Ellice, a British politician and merchant, by Captain Arent de Peyster, who sighted the islands in 1819 sailing on the ship "Rebecca". Ellice owned the cargo of the ship. The name Ellice was applied to all nine islands, of what is now Tuvalu, after the work of English hydrographer Alexander George Findlay. The Gilbert and Ellice Islands were formerly designated an ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country code "GE"
Gilbert Islands Chinese communities in the smaller countries of the South Pacific: Kiribati, Nauru Tonga and the Cook Islands (Macmillan Brown Working Paper Series) [Online]. Available: http://www.pacs.canterbury.ac.nz/documents/Microsoft%20Word%20-%20Willmott_WP17.pdf (accessed 6 February 2012). Gilbert Islands The Gilbert Islands (; formerly Kingsmill or King's-Mill Islands) are a chain of sixteen atolls and coral islands in the Pacific Ocean about halfway between Papua New Guinea and Hawaii. They form the main part of Kiribati ("Kiribati" is the Kiribati rendition of "Gilberts"). The atolls and islands of the Gilbert Islands are arranged in an approximate north-to-south line. As the crow flies it is approximately between the northernmost