Cook's First Voyage: Transit of Venus and Pacific
James Cook sailed from Plymouth in August 1768 in a converted Whitby collier, and returned three years later having redrawn the map of the Pacific. The stated purpose was astronomical. The transit of Venus across the sun in June 1769 could be timed from widely separated points on earth to give the scale of the solar system, and the Royal Society wanted an observer in the southern Pacific. Cook was chosen over a gentleman candidate because he was an outstanding surveyor — he had charted the St Lawrence for Wolfe's fleet and then the whole coast of Newfoundland — and because he had come up through the merchant service and knew the ship type. He observed the transit at Tahiti, where the measurements were less precise than hoped because the planet's edge blurred against the sun. He then opened sealed orders directing him to search the southern ocean for the great southern continent. He found New Zealand instead, and charted 2,400 miles of both islands in six months with an accuracy that stood for a century, establishing that it was not a continental promontory. He then struck the east coast of Australia at Point Hicks in April 1770, followed it north for 2,000 miles, ran onto the Great Barrier Reef and spent seven weeks repairing, and claimed the coast at Possession Island. Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander collected some 30,000 plant specimens, 1,400 of them new to science. Thirty-eight of the ninety-four who sailed died, almost all of dysentery at Batavia on the way home.
- Year: 1768 CE
- Category: Exploration
