A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World: About Captain Cook
About this ebook
1772 April
I sailed from Deptford, April 9th, 1772, but got no farther than Woolwich, where I was detained by easterly winds till the 23d, when the ship fell down to Long Reach, and the next day was joined by the Adventure. Here both ships received on board their powder, guns, gunners' stores, and marines.
1772 May
On the 10th of May we left Long Reach, with orders to touch at Plymouth; but in plying down the river, the Resolution was found to be very crank, which made it necessary to put into Sheerness in order to remove this evil, by making some alteration in her upper works. These the officers of the yard were ordered to take in hand immediately; and Lord Sandwich and Sir Hugh Palliser came down to see them executed in such a manner as might effectually answer the purpose intended.
1772 June
On the 22d of June the ship was again completed for sea, when I sailed from Sheerness; and on the 3d of July joined the Adventure in Plymouth Sound. The evening before, we met, off the Sound, Lord Sandwich, in the Augusta yacht, (who was on his return from visiting the several dock-yards,) with the Glory frigate and Hazard sloop. We saluted his lordship with seventeen guns; and soon after he and Sir Hugh Palliser gave us the last mark of the very great attention they had paid to this equipment, by coming on board, to satisfy themselves that every thing was done to my wish, and that the ship was found to answer to my satisfaction.
At Plymouth I received my instructions, dated the 25th of June, directing me to take under my command the Adventure; to make the best of my way to the island of Madeira, there to take in a supply of wine, and then proceed to the Cape of Good Hope, where I was to refresh the ships' companies, and to take on board such provisions and necessaries as I might stand in need of. After leaving the Cape of Good Hope, I was to proceed to the southward, and endeavour to fall in with Cape Circumcision, which was said by Monsieur Bouvet to lie in the latitude of 54° S. and in about 11° 20' E. longitude from Greenwich. If I discovered this cape, I was to satisfy myself whether it was a part of the continent which had so much engaged the attention of geographers and former navigators, or a part of an island. If it proved to be the former, I was to employ myself diligently in exploring as great an extent of it as I could, and to make such notations thereon, and observations of every kind, as might be useful either to navigation or commerce, or tend to the promotion of natural knowledge. I was also directed to observe the genius, temper, disposition, and number of the inhabitants, if there were any, and endeavour, by all proper means, to cultivate a friendship and alliance with them; making them presents of such things as they might value; inviting them to traffic, and shewing them every kind of civility and regard. I was to continue to employ myself on this service, and making discoveries either to the eastward or westward, as my situation might render most eligible; keeping in as high a latitude as I could, and prosecuting my discoveries as near to the South Pole as possible, so long as the condition of the ships, the health of their crews, and the state of their provisions, would admit of; taking care to reserve as much of the latter as would enable me to reach some known port, where I was to procure a sufficiency to bring me home to England. But if Cape Circumcision should prove to be part of an island only, or if I should not be able to find the said Cape, I was in the first case to make the necessary survey of the island, and then to stand on to the southward, so long as I judged there was a likelihood of falling in with the continent, which I was also to do in the latter case, and then to proceed to the eastward in further search of the said continent, as well as to make discoveries of such islands as might be situated in that unexplored part of the southern hemisphere; keeping in high latitudes, and prosecuting my discoveries, as above mentioned, as near the pole as possible until I had circumnavigated the globe; after which I was to proceed to the Cape of Good Hope, and from thence to Spithead.
Ratings and reviews
About the author
About Captain Cook
Captain James Cook, FRS, RN (7 November 1728 – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the Royal Navy. Cook made detailed maps of Newfoundland prior to making three voyages to the Pacific Ocean, during which he achieved the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the Hawaiian Islands, and the first recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand.
Cook joined the British merchant navy as a teenager and joined the Royal Navy in 1755. He saw action in the Seven Years' War, and subsequently surveyed and mapped much of the entrance to the Saint Lawrence River during the siege of Quebec. This helped bring Cook to the attention of the Admiralty and Royal Society. This notice came at a crucial moment in both Cook's career and the direction of British overseas exploration, and led to his commission in 1766 as commander of HM Bark Endeavour for the first of three Pacific voyages.
In three voyages Cook sailed thousands of miles across largely uncharted areas of the globe. He mapped lands from New Zealand to Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean in greater detail and on a scale not previously achieved. As he progressed on his voyages of discovery he surveyed and named features, and recorded islands and coastlines on European maps for the first time. He displayed a combination of seamanship, superior surveying and cartographic skills, physical courage and an ability to lead men in adverse conditions.
Cook was killed in Hawaii in a fight with Hawaiians during his third exploratory voyage in the Pacific in 1779. He left a legacy of scientific and geographical knowledge which was to influence his successors well into the 20th century and numerous memorials worldwide have been dedicated to him.
