"Mount Nelson (not Hammond)" adopted in the 11th Report of the Geographic Board of Canada, 30 June 1912. Mount Nelson was labelled on David Thompson's map of British North America, 1814, and on Arrowsmith's 1862 map of BC, et seq. Labelled "Nelson Peak" on some early maps (titles/dates not cited).

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

Named by David Thompson in 1807, after Lord Admiral Nelson (1758-1805). "Thompson crossed Howse Pass to reach Lake Windermere in 1807; news of Admiral Nelson's victory and death at Trafalgar had just arrived, and he named a conspicuous peak west of the lake Mount Nelson. Thus it came about that the name of a British admiral was given to a mountain at the headwaters of the Columbia before the source of that river was known with certainty." (The Purcell Range, J.M.Thorington, 1946, p.11). Thompson's c1808 sketch of Mount Nelson, reproduced from his "Narratives..." appears on p.5 of Thorington's book.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

Mistakenly called Mount Hammond by Windermere climber & mining engineer Charles Ellis in 1910, unaware that this was David Thompson's Mount Nelson. "I built a cairn, placing in it a flat flask containing a paper upon which is written: Mount Hammond, elevation 12,125 feet, September 2, 1910. Named in honor of the late Herbert Carlyle Hammond of Toronto. [signed] Charles D. Ellis. Gloria in Excelsis Deo." (from "First Ascent of Mount Hammond" by Charles Ellis, Canadian Alpine Journal Vol III, 1911, pp 14-25; so-labelled on map to accompany 1912 CAJ article.) Since that time surveys have confirmed the elevation of Mount Nelson as 10,772 feet. [note that "Mount Hammond" has since been applied to a mountain about 7 miles northwest of here, near Mount Farnham.]

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office