Known twentieth century books
Eighteenth century books
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The Endeavour: a haunting tale Whelan, Edna. 1995
Captain Cook's Endeavour Marquardt, Karl Heinz. 1995
Aboard Endeavour Stannard, Bruce. 1995
Sailing Endeavour Petroff, Peter and Ferguson, John. 1994
The Endeavour: A Collector's Souvenir Allan, Harriet B. 1995
Turanganui a Kiwa, Landfall 1993
James Cook in Newfoundland, 1762 - 1767 Whiteley, William H. 1975
Captain Cook’s approach to Oregon Elliott, T. C. 1974
The Captain Cook Myth Robertson, Jillian. 1981
In this book Dava Sobel writes a fascinating story of John Harrison, a man of simple birth with no formal education or training in watchmaking, who was able to perfect a chronometer which allowed men of the sea to determine longitude. Larcum Kendall copied Harrison's chronometer, and it was carried by Cook on his second and third expeditions. He also took with him three additional chronometers made by John Arnold. The Longitude Act of 1714, issued in the reign of Queen Anne, provided prize money for the person who could invent a way to determine longitude. Dava Sobel's book will delight CCSU members with the history of John Harrison's forty-year quest for the coveted prize.
Published in 1995 by Walker and Company, 435 Hudson Street, New York. New York 10014 USA.
Reviewer: John Dusel
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1308, volume 19, number 3 (1996).
Edna Whelan, "The Endeavour: a haunting tale"
Living in Whitby as I do, makes one constantly aware of the sea around us and I have always had an affinity for boats and for the adventurous voyages of famous sailors and navigators. Not only was Captain Cook apprenticed here and sailed from the harbour but also the famous Captain William Scoresby and his son Captain William Scoresby Junior were born near Whitby and sailed from here to the Arctic. Whitby itself has a charm all of its own and being an old sea port has retained much of its old buildings including the fishermens' cottages and narrow yards; the various old Halls and the famous Abbey and the Parish Church of St. Mary's standing high on the cliff top overlooking the sea.
There are so many tales of ghosts and hauntings here that when walking down the streets one is never sure whether the person in front of you is real or not and glancing up the narrow entrances of the yards one thinks that maybe the figure flitting across the way is strangely vague and misty in shape. Along the river-side past the harbour there is an old derelict boatyard which always appears to be haunted to me. Unfortunately the yards where Captain Cook's boats were built are now gone, and a small part of the harbour here has been filled in to make way for car parks and a super market and so I cannot imagine any self-respecting ghost ever walking there.
That is how the haunting tale which I have written first came into my head.
Written by: Edna Whelan
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1308, volume 19, number 3 (1996).
Karl Heinz Marquardt, "Captain Cook's Endeavour", 1995.
This book, published in a series called "Anatomy of the Ship", contains 100 pages of drawings of every aspect of the Endeavour imaginable, including the ship's wheel - elevation and plan. The author, a ship modeller and draughtsman, precedes the drawings with a detailed description of the hull, fittings and rig. He quotes from Beaglehole's book of the First Voyage the parts that you and I would easily miss, for example in identifying how many spare anchors were carried.
One piece that caught my eye is the discussion as to whether there were four or five windows on the stern. Marquardt says that Sydney Parkinson's sketch of the ship "finally lays to rest the false assertion that the Endeavour had five stern windows, a myth which has haunted all models and paintings of the ship. The central window was a dummy, added for purely aesthetic reasons. Arguments about the number of actual windows should never have arisen, since the size of the helmport in the lower counter and the quarterdeck shows that the rudder stock passed up through the cabin enclosed in a rudder-trunk, a solid wooden protective casing, which took up the whole space between the two centre counter- timbers and thus the space behind the so-called 'centre-window' and no shipwright would give a window to a rudder-trunk. Its bogus nature is further confirmed by Parkinson's sketch, which shows shutters on only the outer four windows, the dummy centre window not having them as it did not need them." The Australian replica has four windows, but the one at Stockton has five!
Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1273, volume 26, number 1 (2003).
Bruce Stannard, "Aboard Endeavour: Cook's voyage 1768-1771",1995.
Bruce, a former member of the CCSU, conceived the idea of the Endeavour replica as a permanent showpiece at the National Maritime Museum in Sydney's Darling Harbour. A maritime historian and a member of the museum's Council, it was he who set out to raise the necessary A$15 million11. This book is aimed at schoolchildren, and is written in the form of the imagined diary of midshipman Isaac Smith aboard Cook's ship. The colour illustrations by Sandra Laroche are beautifully executed, and give a good idea of what it must have been like during the voyage. Some appear to be based on paintings made at the time by Sydney Parkinson, and one or two from later voyages.
Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1274, volume 26, number 1 (2003).
Peter Petroff and John Ferguson, "Sailing Endeavour: Including helpful extracts from the journal of James Cook, navigator", 1994.
This book is about life aboard the Endeavour Replica. Introduced by Bruce Stannard, it has 68 superb photographs of the Replica, which give a real feel for what the original must have looked like. I was disappointed that there were none in colour, but I suppose that would have made the book quite expensive. The accompanying text is short and snappy, and just right in explaining life aboard without getting bogged down in detail, and without using too much sailing jargon! There are separate sections called rain, wind & spray, the weather deck, masts & spars, the rigging, the sails, working the ship, make & mend, as well as one, of course, on James Cook, navigator.
Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1274, volume 26, number 1 (2003).
Harriet B. Allan, "The Endeavour: A Collector's Souvenir",1995.
This book has 24 colour photographs of the Endeavour Replica, plus some of Cook and his crew. The text is a mix of Cook's life, how the replica was built, and descriptions of what life would have been like aboard. There are separate sections called the ship, the wheel, the weather deck, the lower deck, the scientists' quarters, and the Great Cabin. Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1274, volume 26, number 1 (2003).
"Turanganui a Kiwa, Landfall: James Cook's first landing in New Zealand, 1769" was published in 1994 by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust, Gisborne Branch Committee, PO Box 1241, Gisborne, New Zealand; 24 pages (21 x 28cm); card cover; several coloured photos and sketches; $NZ8 (includes international surface postage).
This publication is an extensively revised version of a booklet published in 1969 to mark the bicentennial of Cook's landing in New Zealand. It focuses on the period between the 9th and the 29th of October 1769 which Cook spent in the East Cape area, from his landing at the mouth of the Turanganui River (modern-day Gisborne) to his departure from Cape Runaway. The events are related using extracts from the journals of Cook and Banks with additional material from Gore, Monkhouse, Parkinson and Wilkinson.
Included is an interesting article written in 1888 by the missionary William Williams describing Cook's visit to Poverty Bay. It examines the visit from both sides and is accompanied by a map of the mouth of the Turanganui River with the sites of the various events marked. The publication of this article resulted in land being set aside for the current Cook Landing memorial. Other articles cover the nature of the area in 1769, the Admiralty instructions, Cook's biography and the circumnavigation of New Zealand. The booklet also features a high altitude photo of Poverty Bay looking towards East Cape accompanied by a key showing a number of the places mentioned by Cook, and his chart of the East Cape area.
The booklet is well produced and should appeal both to Cookophiles and others, such as tourists, who want to find out more about Cook.
Reviewer: Norman Wansbrough
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 1136, volume 18, number 2 (1995).
William H. Whiteley. Published by the Newfoundland Historical Society in 1975.
James Cook first came to Newfoundland in the summer of 1762, at the age of 34. The next six years of his life were given to the survey of Newfoundland waters, a period during which he married and began to raise a family.
This period is sketchily documented, after all he did not know he was going to become famous later on.
But there is a book, or rather a pamphlet, that deals exclusively with this period:
When Cook left Newfoundland in the autumn of 1767, he had compiled a series of coastal charts unparalleled for nautical detail and fisheries information. All of his charts contain detailed soundings, with locations of rocks, reefs and safe anchorages. They are large enough in scale to be of practical assistance to vessels navigating inshore waters. The observations that accompany each chart give sailing directions, with comments on tides, currents, winds and compass variations. Appropriate notes are added on watering places, timber stands and fishing places which would be useful to fishing adventurers.
In August, 1764, when Cook was surveying in a cutter near Cape Norman. a large powder horn exploded in his right hand. As a result, Cook bore a scar till his death. The next time he was in London he brought out a box of medicines at his own expense.
Cook experimented with the brewing of "spruce beer" in various harbours, compunded from treacle and the tender green tips of the spruce tree. The experiments were put to good use in the Pacific.
These activities are described in this marvellous booklet in more detail than anywhere else. And it helps you decide which stamps of Canada, Newfoundland and St. Pierre & Miquelon could be used to describe this important period in Cook’s life.
Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 347, volume 4, number 4 (1981).
Introduced by T.C. Elliott. Published by the Oregon Historical Society in 1974.
Cook first sighted land a little south of Yaquina Bay on the morning of March 7th, 1778. The weather was unpleasant and he could not anchor or heave to safely near the coast. When off Cape Arago on the 1lth his ships were driven out to sea by storms and his next landfall was above latitude 47 on the coast of Washington.
His examination of Oregon, then, was limited to five days during not very clear weather, over a range of about 150 miles of the coastline, but was never nearer than three leagues, or about ten miles, to the shore.
The short introduction by Mr. Elliott is followed by a reproduction of Cook’s journal for that period, a very useful map of what probably took place and some excellent photographs (including the three capes he named).
Reviewer: Ian Boreham
Originally published in Cook's Log, page 347, volume 4, number 4 (1981).
Jillian Robertson, published by Angus and Robertson in 1981.
I have read a book about Captain Cook that doesn’t talk so much about HIM as about the misconceptions and romancing that his name has generated in Australia.
The book points out that while Cook was outstanding as a scientific navigator, he has become a superhero for many Australians for the wrong reasons, Many people believe that Cook discovered Australia, that he was responsible for the country’s colonisation and he was in some way Australia’s founder.
The book examines Cook’s contact with Australia and those of other explorers and discoverers, such as the Dutch, the Portuguese, William Dampier and Sir Francis Drake.
The colonisation of Australia by the British did not come about by Cook’s recommendation, but was the result of the advocacy of Joseph Banks and James Matra. The latter produced in 1783 a pamphlet entitled "A proposal for establishing a settlement in New South Wales".
The second half of the book is devoted to describing how the first Cook memorials were erected in -Australia, and the memory of Cook became idolised.
Here are some of the items mentioned.
In 1822 a brass plaque was erected by the Philosophical Society of Australasia on Point Sutherland where an aborigine said he had, as a boy, seen Captain Cook and his men scramble ashore 52 years earlier.
The first free-standing memorial at Botany Bay was a pub!
The Banks Inn was opened in 1842 by Thomas Kellet. It was soon extended to become the elegant Sir Joseph Banks Hotel.
Australia’s first Cook statue was erected on 27th October, 1874 in the Sydney suburb of Randwick.
On 27th March, 1869 the foundation stone for a Cook statue was laid in Hyde Park, Sydney. For 10 years, only the pedestal ever got completed, until on 25th February, 1879 a statue was finally put on top. (It was made in England.)
The book is easy to read, and contains a great deal of detail on how several early Cook memorials came about. It ends with the following paragraph:
"When Captain Cook’s name is applauded in Australia the gratitude is misplaced. He wasn’t interested in Australia, and had small faith in its possibilities. His achievement lies not in what he added to the maps of the world, but in what he took away: Terra Australia Incognita. What Australia owes to its ‘discoverer’ - the continent’s fifth? tenth? fifteenth? - has been greatly exaggerated. He charted Australia from Cape Everard to Torres Strait and he did it well. That’s all."
Reviewer: Ian Boreham