John Herschel discovered NGC 1845 = h2770 on 24 Nov 1834 and simply noted the position was "the general middle of the same cluster [field containing NGC 1837 = h2769]." On a second sweep he gave the more detailed description, "a star 9m the second in magnitude and near the centre of clustering groups which run together and form a cluster which fills the whole field. vl comp M; st 11...16m." His two positions refer to different objects: probably the small cluster S-L 232 to the northeast of HD 269070 and the much larger star cloud itself (LH 26 association). Uranometria 2000 misclassifies this object as a bright nebula. The Hodge-Wright LMC Atlas identifies S-L 232 as NGC 1845.

600/800mm - 25" (10/10/15 - OzSky): at 318x; very large star cloud/association (LH 26) completely filling the 19' field. At the northeast end is the small open cluster S-L 232, which is often taken as NGC 1845. It appeared as a moderately bright, nebulous patch, roundish, 30" diameter, unresolved. A mag 11.2 star is 0.9' SW. The star cloud generally trends northeast to southwest (from S-L 232), stretching ~20'x10', and includes the open cluster NGC 1833 and 1837 at the southwest end. The cloud includes a stunning mix of bright (a few mag 9.5 stars are Milky Way stars), numerous mag 12-13 stars and faint stars over the glowing LMC background haze of myriad unresolved stars.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb