Cook voyage a sensation
ON October 6, 1769, 251 years ago, Lieutenant James Cook recorded sighting the coast of New Zealand.
Where the Endeavour came to an anchorage. Cook named Poverty Bay.
It was the start of an amazing voyage of discovery that changed previous myths of a Great South Land in the South Pacific, while opening a new route to the Spice Islands (now Indonesia) and China.
In the early 18th century, world maps showed the region now occupied by Australia, New Zealand and New Guinea as one large landmass identified variously as Great South Land, Terra Incognita, Hollandia or Terra Australis.
It was supposedly rich in gold and other valuable resources.
By the 18th century, searches for the unknown land became entwined with exploration to discover a route west from Europe to the Spice Islands which were the source of spices prized in Europe for preserving and cooking meat, as well as disguising the smells of unwashed bodies and insanitary streets.
Spices probably reached the Mediterranean coast via the Silk Roads from China.
Merchants, mainly Venetian, grew wealthy shipping them from the Middle East to Europe.
In the 15th century, Spain and Portugal dominated European colonial expansion, but by the 16th and 17th centuries they declined as other nations developed.
Though Spain still retained an empire, the Dutch, English and French became rivals in the race to locate and take possession of Terra Incognita and to find a new way to the Spice Islands.
All were very secretive, but the British admiralty found a cover for further exploration when the Royal Society requested supply of a vessel to transport scientists to Hawaii to observe the transit of the planet Venus in June 1769.
The society was prepared to finance the expedition, and a vessel named Endeavour was provided to transport 11 scientists led by Joseph Banks.
The naval commander appointed was Lieutenant James Cook.
It all appeared very innocent but, before he sailed, Cook was given a sealed envelope which he was instructed not to open before completing the observations of Venus.
The envelope contained instructions that after the observation was completed, he was to sail across the Pacific Ocean, along latitude 40 degrees, to seek the Great South Land.
If it was located, he was to claim it as a British possession.
So, Cook headed the Endeavour southwest from Tahiti to tack back and forth along latitude 40 degrees.
On October 6, 1769, he sighted the east coast of the land Abel Tasman had called New Zealand.
Subsequently Cook proved that New Zealand was two islands separated by a strait now called Cook Strait.
After circumnavigating and mapping each island, proving that neither was connected to a larger land mass, nor to Van Diemen’s Land, it was deemed time to return to England, but Cook decided not to retrace the route of the voyage. Instead, he headed west.
A few days later, Point Hicks was sighted — it was the east coast of Terra Australis.
After a few more days, the Endeavour anchored in the bay Cook named Botany Bay, where he landed on April 27, 1770.
After a short stop, the Endeavour headed north, with Cook mapping the coastline and naming several features, but he did not determine the size of the Great Barrier Reef.
In early June he named Cleveland Bay, Cape Cleveland, and Magnetic(al) Island, and Joseph Banks landed with a detail to collect wood and water on one of a group of islands he called “Palm”.
Good time was made until the Endeavour struck a reef.
Cook remained calm and instructed his crew to fother (cover and seal with a sail) the gash in the hull, so that the vessel could limp to the coast where shelter was found in a river he called the Endeavour.
Nearby a camp was made near the site of the present Cooktown.
After repairing the ship, they continued north, rediscovered Torres Strait, planted the British flag on Possession Island and claimed the whole of the coast as NSW before continuing westward through the strait.
Eventually the Endeavour reached Batavia (Djakarta) in the spice isles, by then claimed by the Dutch, where further repairs were made before returning to London.
When reports of Cook’s discoveries and those of the botanists and scientists who sailed with the expedition were published, they caused a sensation, not unlike that in modern times when men walked on the moon.
The voyage had debunked the myths of the Great South Land and charted a route from the Pacific to the Spice Islands and China.
In 1901, it eventually led to the proclamation of the Commonwealth of Australia.