James Cook Timeline

On 5 May 1768, based on the recommendation of Hugh Palliser, Cook, aged 39, was selected by the Admiralty to lead a three-year scientific expedition to the south Pacific Ocean. Earlier that year, the shipwright Adam Hayes had chosen the merchant collier Earl of Pembroke, renamed Endeavour, as the expedition vessel.

Image source: First voyage of James Cook

The expedition departed England on 25 August 1768 and headed south to round Cape Horn into the Pacific. The publicly stated goal was to observe the 1769 transit of Venus from Tahiti; the ship finally returned to England on 12 July 1771, anchoring in the Downs.

Endeavour arrived at Tahiti on 13 April 1769, where Cook's crew made the observations of the transit of Venus that were the publicly stated goal of the voyage.

Image source: Transit of Venus

In October 1769, Cook sailed to New Zealand and landed at Poverty Bay near the Tūranganui River, beginning European contact with New Zealand.

Image source: Poverty Bay

In January 1770, Cook arrived in Queen Charlotte Sound on the north coast of New Zealand's South Island.

Image source: Queen Charlotte Sound / Tōtaranui

On 19 April 1770, Point Hicks was sighted, and Cook's crew became the first Europeans to encounter Australia's eastern coastline.

Image source: Point Hicks

The crew stopped at Bustard Bay in May 1770, then proceeded north through the shallow and extremely dangerous Great Barrier Reef.

Image source: Great Barrier Reef

In October 1770, Cook stopped at Batavia (modern Jakarta, Indonesia), where Dutch dockyard facilities were used to inspect and repair damage from running aground on the Great Barrier Reef. He departed Batavia in late December 1770.

Image source: Jakarta

After departing Batavia, the expedition sailed to the Cape of Good Hope, then to the island of Saint Helena, arriving on 30 April 1771. The ship returned to England on 12 July 1771.

Image source: Saint Helena

A book about the first voyage, based on the journals of Cook and Banks, was published in 1773.

In 1772, Cook was commissioned to lead a second scientific expedition on behalf of the Royal Society with the objective of determining whether the hypothetical continent Terra Australis existed. He chose Resolution, a Whitby-built North Sea collier launched in 1770, of the same type as his previous ship.

Image source: Second voyage of James Cook

In late November 1772, the ships sighted their first icebergs. Cook performed an experiment in which his crew retrieved blocks of ice and melted them on board, producing good quality fresh water and proving drinking water could be obtained from sea ice.

Image source: Sea ice

After departing England, Resolution and Adventure travelled south to the Dutch Cape Colony and stopped at Cape Town in November 1772.

Image source: Cape Town

On 17 January 1773, the crews became the first recorded Europeans to cross the Antarctic Circle.

Image source: Antarctic Circle

In February 1773, in dense Antarctic fog, Resolution and Adventure became separated during the second voyage.

Image source: Disney Adventure

In December 1773, while ten members of Adventure's crew were ashore gathering provisions, a violent altercation occurred with a group of Māori, resulting in the deaths of all ten crewmen and two Māori.

Image source: Hochstetler massacre

Continuing her search for Terra Australis, Resolution headed south-east and reached her most southern latitude of 71°10′S in January 1774.

In early 1774, Cook experienced a severe gastrointestinal illness marked by prolonged abdominal pain and constipation.

In June 1774, the ship stopped to resupply at the island of Nomuka in Tonga, where most of the crew engaged in intimate relations with women.

Image source: Nomuka

Cook was the first European to set foot on New Caledonia in September 1774, and he claimed the land in the name of his king.

Image source: New Caledonia

Leaving New Zealand, Resolution proceeded home sailing south of Tierra del Fuego, stopping at South Georgia Island in January 1775, where Cook charted the coast and claimed the island group in the name of his king.

Image source: South Georgia

Two books about the expedition were published in 1777: one written by Cook himself, and another by the Forsters who had accompanied the voyage.

Cook's third expedition began by sailing south from England around Southern Africa into the Indian Ocean, stopping in December 1776 at desolate Kerguelen Island. There the crew discovered a message in a bottle left in 1774 by the French explorer Yves-Joseph de Kerguelen-Trémarec.

Image source: Third voyage of James Cook

At the end of January 1777, the expedition stopped for four days at Bruny Island, Tasmania, where they encountered Aboriginal Tasmanians.

Image source: Bruny Island

Proceeding to New Zealand, the expedition anchored in February 1777 near the location where ten crew members of Adventure had been killed during the second voyage.

In October 1777, on the Tahitian island of Mo'orea, a goat belonging to the expedition was stolen by a local inhabitant.

Image source: Moʼorea

Continuing northward, and after a brief stop at Kiritimati, the expedition became the first recorded Europeans to see the Hawaiian Islands on 18 January 1778.

Image source: Hawaiian Islands

Cook's two ships remained in Nootka Sound from 29 March to 26 April 1778, in a cove at the south end of Bligh Island on the northwest coast of North America.

Image source: Nootka Sound

By the second week of August 1778, Cook had sailed through the Bering Strait, crossed the Arctic Circle, and sailed into the Chukchi Sea in search of the Northwest Passage.

Image source: Bering Strait

By early September 1778 Cook was back in the Bering Sea on his way to return to Hawaii. He arrived in late November 1778, stopping first in Maui. His arrival during this second visit contributed to his status there as an akua.

Image source: Bering Sea

On 13 February 1779, a group of Hawaiians stole one of Cook's cutters, escalating tensions during his second visit to Hawaii.

Image source: Death of James Cook

On 14 February 1779, during his second visit to Hawaii, Cook was killed when a dispute with Native Hawaiians turned violent. A large scar on the right hand from his 1764 powder horn injury later confirmed that the recovered remains belonged to Cook.

Following Cook's death, Clerke assumed leadership of the expedition, and the ships left the bay on 23 February 1779.

Image source: Charles Clerke

Clerke died of tuberculosis on 22 August 1779, and John Gore, a veteran of Cook's first voyage, took command of Resolution and the expedition.

The surviving ships of Cook's third voyage returned home, reaching England on 4 October 1780.

One of the earliest monuments to Cook in the United Kingdom was erected in 1780 at The Vache by Hugh Palliser, a friend of Cook.

Image source: Hugh Palliser

In 1780, Joseph Banks, now president of the Royal Society, publicised Cook's legacy and had the society mint a commemorative medal.

Image source: Joseph Banks

Cook's coat of arms was granted in September 1785 and is the only known example of a posthumously granted coat of arms.

Banks used the fame surrounding Cook's voyages to help promote a new colony in Australia, and in 1788 the First Fleet arrived in what is now Sydney.

Image source: First Fleet

In 1822, the Philosophical Society of Australia placed a monument at Cook's supposed landing place in Botany Bay.

Image source: Botany Bay

There were no notable commemorations in England to mark the centenary of Cook's death in 1879.