James Cook

English mariner and explorer

• Born: October 27, 1728
• Birthplace: Marton, Yorkshire, England
• Died: February 14, 1779
• Place of death: Kealakekua Bay, Hawaii

With his inspired seamanship and his practical grasp of scientific method, Cook added greatly to world knowledge of geography and oceanography. His voyages led to British colonialism in the Pacific.

Early Life

James Cook was born in the small village of Marton in the northern county of Yorkshire, England, but he spent most of his boyhood in the nearby village of Great Ayton. His father was a Scottish farm laborer who had married a Yorkshire woman. His father’s employer, spotting young Cook’s potential, paid for the boy to attend the Great Ayton village school.

At sixteen years old, Cook was apprenticed to a grocer and haberdasher in the tiny Yorkshire fishing village of Staithes, but after eighteen months he persuaded his employer to release him, and with his parents’ backing he was reapprenticed to John Walker, a master mariner and coal shipper, at the nearby seaport of Whitby.

During the following nine years, Cook gained a wide experience in the harsh conditions of the North Sea and was promoted to serve as mate. In 1755, Walker invited him to command one of his ships—a major career opportunity that would have saved him, since talk of war was in the air, from the press gangs. He chose instead to volunteer for the navy as an able seaman, sharing the rough conditions and low pay of the mainly impressed crews. He soon rose to the rank of master—the most responsible noncommissioned rank in the navy of that time.

England and France in the mid-eighteenth century were the keenest rivals in an intense struggle among European nations for trade and territorial rights. In 1758, when war broke out between them over French conquests in North America, Cook set sail for Nova Scotia as master of HMS Pembroke. His meticulous survey of the St. Lawrence River contributed to the British victory at Quebec. After the peace treaty, he was sent back to Newfoundland as ship’s surveyor. Before Cook set sail, he married Elizabeth Batts, and a family house was eventually established in London’s Mile End. The couple had six children, but three died in infancy and the two oldest sons were killed at sea.

The authorities were impressed by Cook’s work in Newfoundland—his accurate charting and his observations of an eclipse of the sun—which showed him to combine a flair for seamanship and navigation with an understanding of scientific principles. In 1765, he was chosen to lead the first of the three voyages of discovery that were to make him a legend in his lifetime.

Portraits painted during Cook’s peak years depict him as a man with a commanding presence, a strong, bony face and prominent nose, piercing eyes, and the firm mouth of a strict disciplinarian. He was much admired and respected by the officers and men who sailed under his command, not only for his seamanship and leadership but also for his fair-mindedness and individual acts of kindness. They criticized him, however, for his tendency to favor secrecy over consultation and for his harsh excesses of discipline, especially on the final voyage.

Life’s Work

James Cook’s first voyage was sponsored by the Royal Society, a body of distinguished figures devoted to the furtherance of scientific inquiry, in conjunction with the Admiralty. Its official purpose was to sail to Tahiti (previously located by Captain Samuel Wallis) to observe the transit of Venus, an infrequent phenomenon in which the planet transverses the sun’s disc. It was thought that accurate observations of the transit, which were to be undertaken by observers from many different countries and vantage points, would contribute to the art of plotting longitude. This was of major importance to the seagoing nations, for despite the celebrated voyages of discovery over the centuries, land has been “discovered” and then “lost” again, because of the problems of longitude charting without adequate instruments for seafarers lacking Cook’s understanding of astronomy. Cook also had sealed orders to sail south from Tahiti in search of Terra Australis Incognito—a vast, paradisiacal, southern continent that philosophers had dreamed of and explorers had sought through the ages.

Cook, now commissioned as a lieutenant, set sail from Plymouth on August 25, 1768, in HMS Endeavour, with a company of ninety-four, including an eleven-man party from the Royal Society headed by the wealthy botanist Sir Joseph Banks, with an astronomer, an artist, and various servants. In the course of the voyage to follow, the observation of the transit of Venus was not wholly successful, and there were no sightings of the mysterious unknown continent. The main triumph of the voyage was Cook’s circumnavigation of New Zealand and his charting, despite being nearly shipwrecked on the then unknown Great Barrier Reef, of the east coast of New Amsterdam (Australia), thereby adding to the work on the other three coasts previously pioneered by the Dutch. When the Endeavour returned to Great Britain on July 13, 1771, Cook and Banks were welcomed back as heroes.

Despite an unsuccessful first try, neither Cook nor the Admiralty had given up hope of discovering the unknown continent. Admiralty orders for the second voyage again included a search for the unknown continent, this time in the Antarctic regions. A specially designed chronometer was supplied by the Admiralty to be tested as an aid to plotting longitude.

Cook, promoted to captain, was given command of HMS Resolution, which left Plymouth on July 13, 1772, accompanied by HMS Adventure, under Captain Tobias Furneaux. For three summers, the ships pummeled away at the Antarctic, reaching a latitude of seventy-one degrees, ten seconds—farther south than anyone had previously sailed—with the crews suffering excruciatingly harsh conditions. “I am now fully satisfied,” Cook wrote to John Walker, “that there is no Southern continent.”

In the winter months, Cook and company sailed the Pacific, putting in at various anchorages for repairs and supplies, making contact with the local populations, bartering beads, red feathers, and much sought after iron nails and axes, and distributing livestock and seeds. New islands identified included the Friendly Islands, the Hervey Islands, and New Caledonia, and Cook was able to explore New Zealand in further detail. During a long stay in Tahiti, Furneaux took on board a young Tahitian man, Omai, who would become the toast of London society.

Cook returned to England on July 29, 1775, and was again feted as a hero. The Royal Society elected him a member, and the Admiralty awarded him a retirement position as fourth post captain at Greenwich Naval Hospital, with a generous salary that was to ensure his family’s future. He accepted the position on condition that he be allowed to command an expedition again if the occasion arose.

Cook’s next opportunity came in 1776, while he was getting his journals ready for publication. The Admiralty was preparing an expedition to the North Pacific to try to establish a northwest passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic. The expedition was also to return Omai to Tahiti. Cook was given command of the Resolution; the sister ship, HMS Discovery, was commissioned under Captain Charles Clerke. By the time of departure, the American War of Independence had set England and America at war with each other, but it was too late to cancel the voyage.

The Resolution sailed from Plymouth on July 12, 1776, with so much livestock aboard that Cook compared it to Noah’s ark. A series of untoward circumstances, including damage to the Resolution’s masts and stormy seas, led to a six-month delay in reaching Tahiti, where Omai was returned to his people, and the loss of the first summer for Arctic exploration. Cook spent part of the voyage in further exploration; his major discovery was the Hawaiian group of islands, which he called the Sandwich Islands, after Lord Sandwich, at the Admiralty.

In the second summer, the two ships probed the whole of “New Albion”—the northwest coast of America—to see if there was any navigable eastward passage, and then sailed in appalling weather to the Bering Strait. Prevented from further Arctic exploration by solid ice, the ships returned to Hawaii intending to try again the following summer.

Cook’s reception by the Hawaiians was extraordinary. As soon as he stepped ashore, indigenous peoples prostrated themselves before him. He was treated with great pomp and ceremony, the significance of which he had little understanding. Historians have since suggested that Cook may have been mistaken for one of the Hawaiian gods, Orono, who, it was predicted, would return to the island by ship. The generosity of the Hawaiians was so great that they depleted their own stores, and after a month they hinted that it was time for the ships to leave. Not long after the departure, however, the Resolution developed rigging trouble and had no option but to return to the island.

During the third voyage, Cook seems to have been under considerable nervous strain. He suffered from bouts of ill health, and the explosive fits of temper for which he was renowned among the seamen became more frequent and intense. He grew impatient of theft by the islanders and even, on one occasion, burned down houses in an effort to get stolen property returned. The strain was intensified when Cook returned to Hawaii. The Hawaiians, perhaps having, in the interim, become doubtful of Cook’s status as a god, received the two ships with unexpected hostility. On February 14, 1779, during an onshore confrontation with them in Kealakekua Bay over some stolen property, Cook was stoned and stabbed to death. The Hawaiians were said to have shown deep regret for what had happened in the heat of the moment, and to have held Cook’s memory in high esteem.

After a funeral ceremony at sea, the expedition continued toward the Arctic with Captain Clerke in charge of the Resolution and John Gore, Cook’s second-in-command, heading the Discovery. The ships were again defeated by ice, and on the return voyage, Clerke died of tuberculosis. The two ships finally reached home in October, 1780.

Significance

Captain James Cook has captured the popular imagination over the centuries as a person of humble origins who rose through his own efforts to become one of the world’s great navigators. The second half of the eighteenth century was a period not only of intense rivalry between European nations for trade and conquest but also of dramatic expansion of scientific and geographical knowledge, aided by rapid advances in the development of instruments and navigational techniques. Cook’s genius for seamanship, combined with his capacity for meticulous surveying and charting and his understanding of astronomy and mathematics, exactly matched the needs of the moment.

Cook’s three great voyages of discovery brought prestige to Great Britain and helped to consolidate its position as a leading maritime and trading nation. By annexing territories for the Crown—usually by such simple ceremonies as carving an inscription on a tree or leaving a written declaration in a bottle on a mound of stones, according to the custom of the times—he laid the foundation for British colonial development in the Pacific. At the same time, it must be said, he sowed the seeds of destruction of the indigenous Pacific cultures.

Practical and down-to-earth, Cook dispelled two long-standing romantic illusions about world geography. His proof that there was no unknown continent and no navigable passage through the North American mainland was as valuable as his more positive findings. The imagination with which Cook conjured names for every new bay, river, or headland he charted was one of the few indications of romanticism in his own makeup. His log books and journals, giving vivid descriptions of the terrains he explored and of the lives and customs of the peoples he met, added greatly to the store of human knowledge, as did the botanical specimens and exotic artifacts brought back by Joseph Banks from the first voyage.

By strict control of his ships and ships’ companies, with rigid rules about hygiene and diet, Cook was able to eliminate scurvy from his vessels, thereby making an important contribution to the future health of the British navy. He was less successful, however, in his attempts to prevent his sailors from infecting the island communities with sexually transmitted diseases, and he was humane enough to express deep worry and regret about this in his journals.

Of all Cook’s achievements, perhaps the most important one for his century was his demonstration—especially on the second voyage, during which he sailed the equivalent of three times around the world and reached farther south into the Antarctic than had any previous explorer—that with proper management of men and resources, a ship could stay at sea almost indefinitely.

Bibliography

Barrow, John. A Chronological History of the Voyages into the Arctic Regions. London: J. Murray, 1818. Reprint. London: Newton Abbott, David and Charles, 1971. The reprint edition includes an introduction by Christopher Lloyd. The original title page explains that the voyage was “undertaken chiefly for the purpose of discovering a north-east, north-west or polar passage.” Provides historical and geographical context for Cook’s last voyage.

Beaglehole, John Cawte. The Life of Captain James Cook. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1974. This is the definitive account of Cook’s life and exploits, with an abundance of detail providing the historical, scientific, and geographical context. Includes reprints of charts, maps, paintings, and sketches, some by Cook himself. The text is so comprehensive and detailed that it is difficult to identify key points; chapter summaries would have been a useful addition.

Carrington, Hugh. Life of Captain Cook. London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1939. A good, standard account of Cook’s life and voyages, but it glosses over negative aspects. There are useful appendices on the personnel of the Endeavour, Cook’s family, and his ships, and comments on his controversial reputation in Hawaii. Contains a reproduction of a chart of the Pacific Ocean, drawn in 1756 and used by Cook on the first voyage, showing the limitation of geographical knowledge before Cook.

Collingridge, Vanessa. Captain Cook: A Legacy Under Fire. Guilford, Conn.: Lyons Press, 2002. Collingridge disputes the claim that Cook was the first person to discover Australia by recounting the story of her distant cousin, British aristocrat George Collingridge. In 1883, Collingridge visited Australia and found maps dating from 1542 through 1546. After some research, he discovered the maps were made by Dutch cartographers, based upon previous Portuguese maps. Collingwood intersperses the story of Cook’s explorations with the story of her cousin’s attempts to prove that the Dutch had discovered Australia long before Cook.

Cook, James. The Journals of Captain James Cook on His Voyages of Discovery. Edited by John Cawte Beaglehole. 4 vols. Cambridge, England: Hakluyt Society and Cambridge University Press, 1955-1967. Includes the full texts of Cook’s holograph journals as well as journals of Captain Clerke and others, and reprints of correspondence, documents, drawings, and paintings. A long introduction by Beaglehole assesses Cook’s strengths and weaknesses. The best primary source for the study of Cook.

Hough, Richard. Captain James Cook. New York: W. W. Norton, 1995. A popular biography, written in a readable narrative style. Hough argues that Cook provided a link between eighteenth century science and the coming Industrial Revolution.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. The Murder of Captain James Cook. London: Macmillan, 1979. A very full account of the third voyage with a detailed analysis of Cook’s death, putting forward the theory that the tragedy was a result of a change in Cook’s character.

Jopplen, Rodigar, and Bernard Smith. The Art of Captain Cook’s Voyages. 2 vols. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1985. A beautifully bound and produced book, with superb reproductions of prints and paintings associated with the voyages. Also contains a descriptive catalog of all the known original drawings of peoples, places, artifacts, and events connected with Cook and his voyages.

McCormick, Eric Hall. Omai: Pacific Envoy. Auckland, New Zealand: Auckland University Press and Oxford University Press, 1977. A comprehensive study of how Omai was brought to London and why his presence created so much interest. The analysis of the clash of cultures is of particular interest. Illustrations include reprints of all known likenesses of Omai.

MacLean, Alistair. Captain Cook. New York: Doubleday, 1972. A popular and very readable biography.