by Rob Mundle
With Great Britain being a world leader in astronomy at this time, it was no surprise that, during their 12 November meeting, members of the Royal Society agreed that everything possible should be done to most effectively observe the transit. It was decided that a committee would be appointed to select the most suitable observation sites around the world, nominate the people best qualified to act as observers, and select what equipment should be used. Not unfortuitously for Cook, one of the members of this committee was Dr John Bevis, the man who first brought Cook’s name to the attention of the Society, following his report on the eclipse over Newfoundland in August 1766.
At their first meeting, Bevis and his fellow Transit Committee members agreed that of all the places being considered for observing the transit, the one farthest from England – a location somewhere in the South Seas – would provide the most important reading. This was because of the prolonged trajectory that Venus would be taking across the face of the sun when seen from that part of the world. Amsterdam and Rotterdam islands, both in what is now the Kingdom of Tonga, were among the sites suggested. The two other locations in the northern hemisphere were Norway’s North Cape and Hudson Bay in Canada.
The emphasis placed on the South Seas data meant that a suitable ship had to be readied as soon as possible to ensure that the observers would be at their destination well before the transit occurred. Equally importantly, the expedition required substantial funding to cover the costs of men and equipment. With the limited time available before the ship would need to sail, the committee elected to ask the government to provide a vessel, and make a direct approach to King George III, requesting £4000 to cover the expedition’s costs. This letter, written in February 1768, was fulsome in its content.
In establishing the crucial nature of the venture, the members reminded His Majesty that a successful mission would ‘contribute greatly to the improvement of Astronomy, on which Navigation so much depends’, and that ‘the British Nation has been justly celebrated in the learned world, for their knowledge of Astronomy, in which they are inferior to no Nation upon Earth, Ancient or Modern’. The letter warned that this status could be under threat, however – as ‘several of the Great Powers in Europe, particularly the French, Spaniards, Danes and Swedes are making the proper dispositions for the Observation thereof’. Therefore, the reasoning continued, it would ‘cast dishonour’ upon Britain should it ‘neglect to have correct observations made of this important phenomenon’.
Much to the delight of the Royal Society, the King agreed to the request within two weeks of having received it.
When considering potential candidates to serve as observers on the Society’s behalf, the Astronomer Royal, Reverend Nevil Maskelyne, proposed that thirty-year-old Alexander Dalrymple would be ‘a proper person to send to the South Seas having a particular Turn for Discoveries, and being an able navigator, and well skilled in observation’. It was also proposed at the meeting that Captain John Campbell – ‘if he pleases to go’ – would be an able commander of the ship. Campbell, himself a member of the Transit Committee, was a seafarer of considerable ability who, like Cook, had his origins in the English coastal coal trade. The Society then wrote to all those whom they considered to be suitable candidates and asked if they would take up the position nominated for them.
To the great surprise of many, Campbell declined the offer, while Dalrymple, who accepted, clearly defined in his response to the Society’s president, the Earl of Morton, the parameters of his involvement. ‘I shall most certainly not let slip an opportunity of making an Observation so Important to Science as that of the Transit of Venus,’ he declared, before adding: ‘However, it may be necessary to observe that I can have no thought of undertaking the Voyage as a Passenger going out to make the Observations, or on any other footing than that of having the management of the Ship intended for the service.’ The committee did not immediately reject this condition, so it was assumed by all – including Dalrymple – that he would be the commander of the South Seas expedition, as well as an observer.
Within the Royal Society, Alexander Dalrymple was known for being a man of self-promotion. The Scotsman first came to the attention of its members through the publication of pamphlets and a booklet dealing with discoveries in the South Pacific. He was always a noticeable presence at Society dinners and other gatherings, all the while using his persuasive manner to have members believe that he was an able navigator. However, while he could not be described as a fraud, the distance between reality and fantasy appeared to be broad.
At the age of fifteen, Dalrymple sailed to Madras, in India, where he became an employee of the East India Company. He was an avid reader, something that fostered a spirit of adventure and a desire to explore the East Indies. He eventually became deputy secretary of the company’s Madras operation and later, very briefly, the deputy governor of Manila, which was under British occupation at the time. When it came to his professed ability as a seafarer, though, there was no evidence to suggest that he had achieved anything of note under sail, nor served an apprenticeship, let alone acted as commander of a ship … But that didn’t matter to him; he wanted to command this voyage to the South Seas. Truth be known, Dalrymple held an underlying desire to explore what he could of the region and thus claim full recognition for anything he might discover.
While making the proud announcement to the Transit Committee that King George had agreed to support the expedition, the Earl of Morton confirmed that he had recommended to the Lords of the Admiralty that Dalrymple command the vessel, which the Royal Navy would supply. However, the response from their Lordships regarding this recommendation was far from positive. The Admiralty advised that it saw such an appointment as being ‘entirely repugnant to the regulations of the Navy’. The First Lord, Sir Edward Hawke, mindful of previous failures under similar circumstances, is reputed to have declared that he would rather cut off his right hand than permit anyone but a ‘King’s Officer’ to command one of His Majesty’s naval vessels. From that point, there was only one solution: the voyage to the South Seas would become a project for the Royal Navy.
The first step in that direction came on 5 March when the Admiralty directed the Navy Board to nominate a vessel from within the fleet that would best suit the demands of the expedition. It soon became apparent that there was nothing immediately available, so, at the end of the month, they adopted the only alternative: to purchase a ship.
Two colliers of similar design were chosen, Valentine and Earl of Pembroke, of which, following comparative surveys at Deptford, Earl of Pembroke was found to be in better condition. The selection of this vessel was confirmed in a letter to the Secretary of the Admiralty on 29 March:
… we desire you will acquaint their Lordships that we have purchased a cat-built Bark, in Burthen 368 Tons and of the age of three years and nine months, for conveying such persons as shall be thought proper, to the Southward for making observations of the passage of the planet Venus over the Disk of the Sun, and pray to be favoured with their Lordships’ directions for fitting her for the service accordingly, in which we presume it may be necessary to sheath and fill her bottom, and prepare her for carrying six or eight light carriage guns of Four pounds and eight swivels … and in other respects as the nature of the voyage may require … And that we may also receive their commands by what name she shall be Registered on the list of the Navy.
The purchase price was £2800 and the ship was renamed His Majesty’s Bark Endeavour. (While the common belief is that ‘bark’ referred to the ship’s rig, it actually defined the build of her hull.)
With Campbell and Dalrymple out of the running for the role of leader, the Admiralty had numerous contenders from which to choose a master for Endeavour, including Samuel Wallis and John Byron. Both of these men had recently explored areas of the Pacific on expeditions that were symbolic of a shift in focus by the Admiralty and the Royal Society towards the South Seas, following Britain’s victory in the Seven Years War. The First Lor
d of the Admiralty at that time, the Earl of Egmont, initially sent Byron aboard HMS Dolphin in 1764, then Wallis as captain of the same ship in 1766. In doing so, he signalled the start of a long period of British interest in the region.
Both Byron and Wallis were well qualified to command the Society’s upcoming mission. Their past explorations contrasted favourably with Cook’s complete lack of experience in this field, an issue that left the acclaimed maritime surveyor seemingly outside the list of contenders for the role. Despite being a highly capable seafarer, Cook could only lay claim to having been the master of Grenville – a 68-ton schooner, some 60 feet in length, with a crew of just twenty. Somehow though, possibly because of the pressure of time, his name started to surface in conversations, both at the Royal Society and within the Admiralty. As those discussions progressed, and expertise was being considered, Cook’s lack of comparable experience began to be outweighed by strong references in his favour from two of his champions: Hugh Palliser and Secretary of the Admiralty Sir Philip Stephens. The Lords listened and were soon won over by this strong belief in Cook. He would be the commander.
The minutes of the Royal Society’s meeting on 5 May formally acknowledged that Cook would be appointed as master of the ship and leader of the expedition, on behalf of both the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge and the Royal Navy, and that he would be one of the designated observers of the celestial event, along with Charles Green, former assistant to the Astronomer Royal. Cook attended this meeting, the minutes of which noted too that he ‘accepted the employment in consideration of such gratuity as the Society shall think proper, and an allowance of £12 a year for victualling himself and the other observer in every particular’. He also accepted the offer of 100 guineas from the Society for his work as an observer.
Twenty days later, Cook received a letter from the Admiralty confirming the appointment – and a promotion:
Whereas we have appointed you First Lieutenant of His Majesty’s Bark, the Endeavour, now at Deptford, and intend that you shall command her during her present intended voyage; and, whereas, we have ordered the said Bark to be fitted out and stored at that place for Foreign Service, manned with seventy men … and victualled to Twelve months of all species of Provisions … except Beer, of which she is to have only a proportion for one month and to be supplied with Brandy in lieu of the remainder: you are hereby required and directed to use the utmost despatch in getting her ready for the sea accordingly, and then falling down to Galleons Reach, take in her guns and gunners’ stores at that place and proceed to the Nore for further orders …
As a lieutenant, Cook was one rank below that of a captain in the Royal Navy, but by being commander of Endeavour, he was recognised as ‘captain’. His rate of pay was 5 shillings per day.
When all elements were taken into consideration, his appointment could be seen as nothing short of remarkable in the annals of the Royal Navy. Nevertheless, the decision-makers were confident they had the right man – one of high character and few words who bore the preferred traits of a seafarer, commander, navigator and leader of men.
While he was absorbing the pleasing, and very unexpected, opportunities that were unfolding for him, one can only wonder if Cook’s mind ever flashed back to that day in Mr Sanderson’s store in Staithes. The day when he held a seemingly magical South Sea Company shilling in his hand – the coin that conjured magnificent visions of ocean adventures and new frontiers, and altered the course of his life.
The parameters of the Endeavour expedition changed quite considerably with the return to England of Captain Samuel Wallis aboard HMS Dolphin, just five days before the Admiralty penned the letter of appointment to Cook. When Wallis departed in 1766, his orders were to sail on an east–west circumnavigation of the world, first through the spectacular but treacherous Straits of Magellan, near Cape Horn, then into the South Seas. The expedition was designated as a voyage of discovery that, it was hoped, would finally prove the existence or otherwise of Terra Australis Incognita – the Great South Land – the theoretical landmass in the mostly unexplored South Seas region of the southern hemisphere. The same region constituted a huge part of the Pacific Ocean.
Unfortunately for Wallis, his exploration efforts were curtailed by a severe southern hemisphere winter, a damaged rudder, and a leaky ship – the latter problem possibly caused in part by an activity in Otaheite (Tahiti), the mountainous and supremely beautiful tropical island he had just discovered. This ‘activity’ involved the removal of many of the ship’s iron hull nails, iron being a material previously unknown to the islanders, and so immediately highly prized. Crewmen were said to have bartered the nails for ‘love’ – as explained most succinctly by Cook biographer Beaglehole: ‘welcoming and tender were the brown beautiful girls, with tattooed thighs and chaplets [garlands] of sweet-smelling flowers, though a little mercenary it is true – so that the ship almost fell to pieces as ardent spirits in her company wrenched out the nails that were the price of love …’
All three factors combined to make it impossible for Wallis to comply with his orders to conduct an extensive search for undiscovered lands. Instead, the only way he could keep his ship afloat with any level of confidence, and keep his men safe, was to promptly set a course for Batavia (only for many of his crew to die there due to dysentery), then the Cape of Good Hope, before turning north for home. When Dolphin finally reached England in May 1768, Wallis delivered to the Admiralty and the Royal Society news of his important discovery – Tahiti. It was, he explained, a place in the South Seas that was ‘one of the most healthy as well as delightful spots in the world’. He named this place ‘King George the Third’s Island’ in honour of the British monarch.
The discovery of King George’s Island, as Cook and others would soon refer to it, meant that there was now another location to be considered by the Transit Committee. Three months remained before Endeavour was due to sail, a reality that led to Wallis suggesting most strongly that his discovery was the ideal place, mainly because it offered easy access to the shore and a safe anchorage. Society members respected his judgement: King George’s Island it was. Via a subsequent letter to the Admiralty, this new discovery became Endeavour’s destination.
There was a second request of note to the Lords from the Society, regarding the inclusion of a research group aboard the ship:
… Joseph Banks, Esq., Fellow of this Society, a Gentlemen of large fortune, who is well versed in Natural History, being desirous of undertaking the same voyage, the council very earnestly request their Lordships that in regard to Mr Banks’s great personal merit and for the advancement of useful knowledge, he also, together with his suite, being seven persons more (that is eight persons in all) together with their baggage, be received on board of the ship under the command of Capt. Cook …
Banks’ closest associate among the supernumeraries was the naturalist Dr Daniel Solander, a man who would contribute much to the research that would come from the expedition. There were also two artists in the group, Sydney Parkinson and Alexander Buchan; and, as assistant naturalist and personal secretary to Banks, Herman Diedrich Spöring – a man with a leaning towards the study of history and, like Solander, a Swede. Of the four servants accompanying this group (their inclusion took the number in the party to nine), James Roberts and Peter Briscoe were from Banks’ Lincolnshire estate; the other two (described as ‘negroes’) were Thomas Richmond and George Dorlton.
What the Royal Society didn’t mention was that 25-year-old Banks would also be taking his two dogs – a greyhound named Lady, and a spaniel. They were to be used for hunting and retrieving wildlife specimens.
In a letter written at the time to legendary Swedish botanist Carl Nilsson Linnaeus, Royal Society Fellow John Ellis said that Banks was expected to invest an incredible £10,000 of his own wealth in the project. He also explained the role that Banks, Solander (a former student of Linnaeus) and their entourage would play on the voyage:
No people ever we
nt to sea better fitted out for the purpose of Natural History, nor more elegantly … they have all sorts of machines for catching and preserving insects; all kinds of nets, trawls, drags, and hooks for coral fishing; they have even a curious contrivance of a telescope, by which, put into the water, you can see the bottom at a great depth, where it is clear …
London-born Banks was a close friend of Lord Sandwich, who was First Lord of the Admiralty on three occasions during this era, so there was little surprise when the Admiralty approved this request in late July. It is highly likely that the decision was made even easier with the knowledge that Banks intended to contribute such a large amount of money to the expedition. Regardless, it was a resolution that placed even greater pressure on the already tight schedule to have Endeavour refitted and ready to sail, as considerably more would need to be done to accommodate the independent group. Time was already running short, and Venus would wait for no man.
No doubt Cook would have met Banks at Crane Court, while attending the meeting to discuss his appointment as commander and an observer for the expedition. There are reports that the two men showed considerable respect for each other from the outset, but, of course, it would have been impossible for any third party to imagine what it was they were witnessing with this initial encounter. It was the start of a friendship that grew to become the most powerful and successful union in the history of exploration on earth.
