Captain Cook Discovers the Ends of the Earth

Overview

Almost half the globe was a mystery before James Cook began his voyages. By the time he was finished, it was clear that there were no large landmasses left to be discovered on the planet. He proved that the legendary southern continent, terra australis, did not exist and showed that there was no practical Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Cook also discovered Hawaii, New Caledonia, and many other remote islands. He was the first recorded individual to travel below the Antarctic Circle. His voyages made major contributions to science, especially botany, and helped establish good nutrition as the way to prevent scurvy.

Background

All the inhabited continents had been discovered before Captain James Cook (1728-1779) began his three major voyages of discovery, but nobody knew this fact. Large portions of the Southern Hemisphere remained unexplored. Maps showed blank space or terra australis, a legendary southern continent filled with fantasy creatures.

Symmetry was one of the main arguments for the southern continent. Should not there be as much land in the Southern Hemisphere as in the Northern? The known landmasses of the Southern Hemisphere only amounted to about a quarter of those of the Northern. Wind patterns were also used to make the case, and it was even declared that more land was necessary to keep the Earth's motion in balance. By Cook's time, the imaginary terra australis had already shrunk considerably. For centuries, it was thought to connect Africa to Ceylon, but that idea was destroyed by Bartolomeu Dias's (1450?-1500) trip around the southern tip of Africa in 1488. Abel Tasman (1603-1659) sailed completely around Australia, proving it was not the great southern continent. He also showed that there was open ocean—and plenty of it—between Africa and Australia. Other voyages (by the French) found islands, providing hope that the South Pacific was the place to look.

The British, both a naval and commercial power, were especially keen to find the southern continent. They had the opportunity for surreptitiously undertaking a search thanks to an astronomical event. On June 3, 1769, there would be a transit of Venus across the Sun. This event was of both practical and academic interest. Observations of the transit could be used to get a better estimate of the mean distance from Earth to the Sun, and these estimates could be used for celestial navigation. The Royal Society, therefore, decided to sponsor an expedition to Tahiti to observe the transit. Alexander Dalrymple (1737-1808) might have been the logical choice to lead the expedition. He was a member of the Royal Society, a nobleman, and Britain's self-proclaimed expert on terra australis. But Cook, who was none of these things, was the society's choice. He was an experienced seaman who had a record of taking meticulous readings. He had done an expert survey of the difficult passages of the St. Lawrence River in 1766. He had also observed an eclipse of the Sun in Newfoundland and sent his calculations to the Royal Society.

Cook's first two decisions as head of the expedition were critical to the success of this voyage and later ones. First, the ship he selected was not a flashy warship, but a sturdy, flat-bottomed collier, a choice that may have saved him from disaster when he discovered the Great Barrier Reef and ran the ship aground. Second, he made the health of his crew an obsession, insisting on strict hygiene on his ship and introducing a variety of foods aimed at preventing disease, especially scurvy. As a result, there were relatively few fatalities—perhaps just one from scurvy—on Cook's three voyages during a total of almost eight years at sea. By comparison, only 55 out of the original 170 members of the crew of Vasco da Gama (1460-1524) safely returned home from their voyage of a little over two years. Most of those lost had died of scurvy.

On Cook's first voyage (1768-1771), after the astronomical observations were complete, he set sail in search of terra australis. On the trip, he discovered the Admiralty Islands and the Society Islands. He also circumnavigated New Zealand and determined that it consisted of two islands. He explored the east coast of Australia, to the delight of Joseph Banks (1743-1820), the ship's botanist. Banks was a prominent and wealthy scientist, who, at his own expense, had brought along a stash of scientific equipment, an assistant, and four artists. In addition to collecting botanical specimens, he investigated the wildlife and later showed that almost all native mammals of Australia were marsupials. The presence of mammals that were more primitive than those on other continents became an early indicator of evolution.

The second voyage (1772-1775) involved a systematic search for the southern continent. Cook circumnavigated the globe, traveling west to east and venturing as far south as he could. Cook discovered New Caledonia, the South Sandwich Islands, and South Georgia. He was the first individual to travel below the Antarctic Circle, where he found unnavigable ice, harsh winds, and no evidence of terra australis. By traveling over 60,000 miles (100,000 km), Cook succeeded in proving a negative, and his reputation for precision and reliability was such that his evidence and conclusions were accepted as fact.

Cook's third voyage (1776-1779) took on a less ancient myth, that of the Northwest Passage. Columbus's idea of sailing west to reach Asia had not died, even though the Americas were in the way. Explorations to the south had shown the only way through was via Tierra del Fuego, at the southernmost tip of South America. This trip was about an 8,000-mile (13,000-km) detour, and it was hoped that a way through navigable rivers and inlets of North America would provide a more direct option. Fifty other explorers, including Henry Hudson (1565?-1611) and John Cabot (c. 1450-1499), had probed the North American continent from the east. Cook took on the project from the west. He went from Vancouver up along the coast of Alaska and continued north until he found himself once again in unnavigable, icy waters. He proved that there was no practical way through North America, although attempts continued into the next century, often with disastrous results. Cook found his own disaster on his return from the north. He stopped at the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), which he had discovered earlier. This second visit led to a quarrel and he was killed by the natives.

Impact

Cook's voyages essentially ended the age of exploration. While the Antarctic continent remained unexplored and many remote regions within the known continents still held secrets, there were no more undiscovered lands. Most people accepted Cook's conclusions about terra australis because he was universally respected as an honest, competent, and meticulous navigator. Cook's journals, however, did not discourage people from traveling to remote regions. His detailed descriptions, especially of the abundant wildlife, sent whalers, hunters, and traders into the regions he had explored. Cook, though, did shift the focus from exploration to development, and, by providing a more realistic map of the globe, he indirectly freed up funding for other ventures, including the digging of the Panama Canal.

The discoveries made on Cook's voyages had major geopolitical ramifications. Hawaii ultimately became a U.S. state. Cook also established claims to Australia and New Zealand that made them important British colonies and, later, nations with distinctive cultures and histories. While Abel Tasman's encounter with the Maori (1642) had been bloody, Cook dealt with them diplomatically and established friendly relations (1769). He led the way in opening Oceania to trade and European influence. In the following century, almost all the remaining inhabited regions were claimed by Germany, France, England, and the United States. Missionaries went and converted the local populations to Christianity. They also brought devastating diseases, including smallpox, tuberculosis, and measles. Cultural changes, including Western-style governments and modern technologies, took hold in these regions.

From the start, Cook's voyages were scientific. Astronomy may have been the primary purpose of the first voyage, but the most important contributions were to botany. A mother lode of new plant species was brought home by Joseph Banks. These species became the basis for Kew Gardens and, indeed, the establishment of botany as a separate scientific discipline. The practice of including a scientist on exploratory voyages became fashionable, most notably Charles Darwin (1809-1882) on the Beagle and T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) on the Rattlesnake. The role of science officer also found a place in popular culture, reaching an apotheosis of sorts with Spock on Star Trek.

Banks went on to make scientific expeditions to Iceland and the Hebrides and to serve as president of the Royal Society for over 40 years. Of equal value were the contributions of Banks as a sponsor to rising stars of science, including Robert Brown (1773-1858), who discovered the cell nucleus and Brownian motion. Banks also became a strong advocate for the settlement of Australia and is sometimes called the "Father of Australia."

On his second voyage, Cook himself made a key contribution to science, for which he was honored with the Copley Medal. Cook wrote about his experiences in using different foods to prevent scurvy. Though it would be over a hundred years before the role of vitamin C in his success was understood, Cook provided a practical solution to scurvy that helped the British dominate the seas for the next century. He also helped provide a basis for the science of nutrition. Our understanding of the role of vitamins in preventing scurvy, rickets, beriberi, and pellagra is owed in part to the attention and diligence of Cook.

Cook's voyages led to an incident that was to capture the public imagination. William Bligh (1754-1817) was shipmaster under Cook. In 1787 Bligh was given command of his own ship, the Bounty, and received orders to transport breadfruit from Tahiti to the West Indies. Bligh's crew, led by Fletcher Christian, mutinied. Bligh, set adrift in a small craft with his officers, achieved one of the great feats of navigation, traveling over 4,000 miles (6,000 km) in an open boat to reach Timor in the East Indies. Bligh lived to testify against the mutineers. The story of the mutiny on the Bounty entered popular culture and Bligh's name became synonymous with a harsh taskmaster.

PETER J. ANDREWS