Truman Safford found IC 843 = Sf. 3, along with IC 842, on 3 May 1866. This galaxy was probably originally discovered by Lawrence Parsons, the 4th Earl of Rosse on 24 Apr 1865 and catalogued as NGC 4913. On the same observation he discovered NGC 4912, NGC 4916 and IC 4088. Parsons assumed he was observing the NGC 4914 field, but the discovery sketch that shows 4 nebulae (and one suspected neb) is a reasonably good match with a field 8° further south. NGC 4913, labeled as Gamma in the diagram, matches IC 843. Sue French originally suggested this identification.

400/500mm - 18" (4/30/11): fairly faint, very elongated 7:2 NW-SE, 45"x12", contains a very small brighter nucleus. IC 4088 lies 5.6' SSE, NGC 4916 is 10' NE and NGC 4922 is 11' NNW. This galaxy is identified as IC 843 in all modern catalogues. See identification notes for NGC 4912.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb