John Herschel discovered NGC 3920 = h996 on 28 Mar 1832. Although he gives no visual description, he mentioned "Follows III 341 [NGC 3911] on same parallel." He was confused on the identification of H. III 341 and assigned the nova to the wrong object. Because of this confusion, the identifications of[NGC 3911 and NGC 3920 are reversed in all modern catalogues. This error is discussed in Malcolm Thomson's Catalogue Corrections, WSQJ April 1989 and CGCG Corrections. See Harold Corwin's identification notes.

400/500mm - 17.5" (4/15/93): very faint, small, round, ~30" diameter. A mag 10.5 star is just off the west edge (40" W of center) which hinders observation. NGC 3911 lies 10.5' E. The identifications of NGC 3911 and NGC 3920 are reversed in all catalogues.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb