by Rob Mundle
Banks wrote of their wretched predicament: ‘our case was truly desperate, no man I believe but who gave himself entirely over, a speedy death was all we had to hope for and that from the vastness of the breakers which must quickly dash the ship all to pieces was scarce to be doubted. Other hopes we had none.’
But suddenly, silent prayers were being answered …
‘There’s a breeze,’ one of the anxious tars would almost certainly have shouted as he felt it waft across his craggy, weather-beaten face.
Others would have agreed in unison, at the same time sensing that its direction meant they just might be able to avoid catastrophe. They looked aloft – yes, the sails were stirring – and with that a sense of urgency took over.
Orders shouted from the quarterdeck called for the braces and sheets to be quickly trimmed, so that the ship’s canvas wings could capture every ounce of force from this faint breeze that was fanning through the rig. The morsel of relief that came when the sails began to fill was magnified considerably when it was realised that Endeavour was responding to the helm. The helmsman had steerage – she was ever so slowly making headway, and that would enable her to be guided away from the menacing white water thundering onto the coral a stone’s throw away.
Even so, the captain and his most experienced seamen knew they were far from being out of the reef’s grasp, simply because it was impossible to say how long the gentle breeze would prevail. Was this puff their lifesaver, or simply the Sirens tormenting them like a cat pawing at a half-dead bird?
Whichever scenario proved to be true, at this moment it was taken for the desperately needed miracle they had prayed for, and the fact that it came from a desirable direction made the moment even more remarkable.
Minutes later, Endeavour, still rolling in response to the large swells, was one boat-length away from the reef … then two … then three … That was until, within ten minutes the torture returned: the benevolent breath disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.
Anxiety returned to the heart of every man.
Pages of scrunched-up paper were thrown over the side and into the water to check on the ship’s rate and direction of drift. They confirmed the worst. The threat was re-emerging.
But again a miracle: the slightest of breezes prevailed and moved them to a safer distance. As the sea now became illuminated by the rising sun, the lookout shouted out that there was a channel ahead. Soon another development assisted them, in the form of a change in the tide.
And so, on Thursday, 16 August 1770, a twist of fate – a quirk of nature in the form of an ever-so-gentle and unexpected puff of wind – had changed the course of history. Cook and his men were spared from the fatal consequences of a horrendous shipwreck, one that might have remained a maritime mystery forever; one that would have deprived the world too soon of the greatest maritime navigator, explorer and cartographer of all time.
CHAPTER ONE
From Farm Boy to Seafarer
It was 1745, and James Cook – a strapping, brown-haired, brown-eyed Yorkshire lad more than 6 foot tall – had not long been in the coastal village of Staithes, in England’s north-east, when he began to realise that the sea would be his destiny. For the seventeen-year-old, it was a slow transition initially, from fascination, to obsession, and then fact.
First settled by the Vikings around 900 AD, Staithes is a tiny fishing village compressed into a gorge, with a winding, ribbon-like stream, the Roxby Beck, meandering through its midst. During Cook’s short time there, the village comprised irregular-sized stone and brick residences of one or two levels, squeezed together along narrow thoroughfares, and most with their front doors opening out onto the street. All the houses had steeply sloping chimney-topped roofs of terracotta or slate. What legitimate wealth there was in the town came from the sea – Staithes boasted one of the largest fishing fleets in England – and the mining of alum and other minerals from the cliffs surrounding the village. Additional, illegitimate wealth resulted from the place being a haven for smugglers and their vessels.
Cook had gone to Staithes to start his working life as a junior assistant to a merchant, haberdasher and grocer named William Sanderson. As he had wandered along the cobblestoned High Street back on that first day, looking for Mr Sanderson’s shopfront, his height and strong build would have made him conspicuous among the locals. At the same time, he no doubt sensed he was negotiating a somewhat claustrophobic, man-made cavern, thanks to the proximity of the residences to the street. It was an environment that was totally foreign to his upbringing amid the rolling green hills about 20 miles inland. And life in Staithes appeared to be far more exciting than what he had known in the country, where he had often helped his father, a farm worker, toil in the wide open fields. Here the air was filled with the smell of the sea and seaweed, and the waterfront was a mass of fishing boats, fishing nets and fishermen who had returned from the sea, or were preparing to head out.
Young Cook had come to work for Sanderson in the hope that one day he himself might become a merchant. He was already well qualified for such an occupation, having demonstrated a considerable aptitude in arithmetic at school, and Mr Sanderson, as a ‘grocer’ – a merchant who traded in ‘gross quantities’ of a remarkably wide range of products, including foodstuffs and household goods – needed someone who had aptitude for numbers.
Apart from the experience of being employed in the shop, where he slept under the counter each night – a practice not uncommon for apprentices of the day – the young farm boy became intrigued by the vibrancy of life in the busy little seaport. The harbour at Staithes opens onto the North Sea (which in that era was commonly referred to as the German Sea or Oceanus Germanicus), a location that led to many a well-travelled sailor patronising Sanderson’s waterfront premises. Inevitably during these visits, Cook’s fertile mind would be filled to overflowing – regaled and liberally nourished by colourful stories of adventure on the high seas and the excitement that came through visiting ports near and far.
The impact of such stories was so profound on Cook that after only a few months in Staithes, his thoughts about the future were soon turning away from being a merchant and towards adventure at sea: seafaring was, for him, far more appealing than the world of commerce where he would be doing little more than selling uninspiring essentials of everyday life.
Legend has it that the tipping point came when a well-weathered sailor strolled into the store and used a one-shilling piece minted to Britain’s South American trading organisation, the South Sea Company, to pay for his purchase. Young James is said to have looked at the coin as if it were an omen guiding him to his future: as though it held magical powers – conjuring up a thousand stories of distant lands.
Within eighteen months of arriving in Staithes, Cook had, with the full support of his employer, decided to move on from working the shop floor to walking the deck. So the tall young Yorkshireman packed his bags, bade Mr Sanderson farewell, and travelled 10 miles south to another seaport, Whitby, on the River Esk.
A clue to Whitby’s place in English history is seen atop one of the high hills surrounding the town, where the ruins of Whitby Abbey, founded by St Hilda in 658 AD, stand in defiance of time. In 1746, the town was about to add to its impressive history: it was from here that the remarkable seafaring life of Captain James Cook, the great master mariner, navigator, explorer and cartographer, evolved.
With a population of more than 10,000, Whitby was considerably larger than Staithes, and far more active as a seaport. Around 250 ships, the majority owned by local businessmen, sailed out of the Esk each year and traded with ports across the known world. Cook’s new hometown was 25 miles directly east of his birthplace, Marton-in-Cleveland, yet the two were like comparing wheat and weeds with kippers and kelp.
Cook was born on 27 October 1728, the second child of 34-year-old Scotsman James Cook, and his wife, Grace (née Pace), in a humble and extremely small mud-walled cottage, known locally as a ‘biggin’. It would have comprised
two rooms, at most, and is thought to have had a dirt floor and thatched roof. There were no more than three tiny windows, bringing a minimal amount of light into the dim interior.
The family home would have been a damp, dank and bleak introduction to the world for baby James. The roof and walls of such a basic abode almost always leaked, causing the floor to be constantly wet. There was no sanitation and, with soap a highly priced luxury, personal hygiene was almost nonexistent for most families of this low social strata. To counter the inevitable pungent smells that were part of such a clammy circumstance, and to make the house more habitable, fragrant herbs – more than likely meadowsweet – as well as straw, were strewn throughout the cottage. Meadowsweet was the preferred choice of all classes of the Georgian era, having been the favourite strewing herb of Queen Elizabeth I more than a century before.
On 3 November 1728, an entry in the register at the village church, St Cuthbert’s, told of the newborn’s baptism: ‘James, the son of a day labourer’. He had a brother, John, who was one year older, and by the time James was seventeen, five sisters and another brother had been born. Sadly, four of those siblings did not live beyond four years, while John passed away aged twenty-two. Only his sisters, Christiana and Margaret, enjoyed longevity, both living beyond sixty.
James Cook senior was recognised locally as a diligent farm worker who demonstrated an intelligent approach to his tasks. He was employed by an estate owner, George Mewburn, until 1736, when he accepted the full-time position as foreman, a ‘hind’, on the stately and historic Aireyholme Farm, near Great Ayton, 6 miles to the south of Marton-in-Cleveland. The property, which has its origins dating back more than 1000 years to the time of the Saxons, and remains a fully operational farm to this day, is located on the lower slopes of Roseberry Topping – an impressive, Matterhorn-like peak standing 1049 feet above sea level. When James Cook senior took up his employment, the farm was owned by Thomas Skottowe, Lord of the Manor of Great Ayton.
James junior, then eight years old, is believed to have attended the local school, which had been established by a farm owner in the district, Michael Postgate. It has been suggested that Skottowe paid for James’s schooling as part of an incentive for James senior to remain in his employ, and because he was impressed by the young lad’s dedication to learning. As many as thirty children attended the school, the curriculum of which comprised four main subjects: reading, arithmetic, writing and religion. Cook remained there until just before he took up his apprenticeship in Staithes, by which point his academic achievements had led to the Lord of the Manor eagerly recommending him to his friend William Sanderson.
Similarly impressed with the teenager’s intelligence and work ethic, it was Sanderson who now provided Cook with an introduction to Whitby-based shipowners John and Henry Walker. The Walker brothers had a fleet of commercial vessels operating primarily in the coal trade, working the lucrative passage that took coal from Newcastle-on-Tyne, north of Whitby, down south to London. Other ships in their fleet made cargo runs to ports around the North Sea and in the Baltic.
Before taking up his position with the Walkers, Cook was obliged to sign a 478-word indenture Agreement which outlined his obligations to his ‘master’, whom he was required to ‘faithfully serve’ throughout the three-year apprenticeship. Among many conditions, the document stipulated that the apprentice ‘shall not commit fornication, or contract matrimony within the said term’, nor would he ‘haunt taverns or playhouses’.
In return, the master was obliged to teach him ‘the trade, mystery and occupation of the mariner’ and provide him with ‘meat and drink, washing and lodging’. The latter point meant that Cook, along with up to fifteen other apprentice sailors, was accommodated in the fourth-level attic of John Walker’s riverfront home in Grape Lane, near the centre of town. In keeping with their life at sea, these apprentices slept in hammocks suspended from the rafters. When it came to work, they didn’t have far to go to board their ships – Walker had the vessels that were in port docked at his residence.
The Walkers were highly respected in Whitby. They were Quakers, a religion based on high morals, integrity and a solid work ethic. John Walker, who had been impressed by Cook’s approach to work right from the outset, would go on to become the young lad’s lifetime friend and mentor.
While visions of the South Seas and dreams of ocean adventures propelled Cook’s life on its new journey like a warm trade wind filling a ship’s sails, there was nothing glamorous or romantic about this initiation. His ship, Freelove – a name meaning ‘divine grace’ – was a solidly built 341-ton three-masted collier (often referred to as a bark or a cat), about 100 feet in overall length and with a broad beam. Having been purpose-designed to carry coal, internal volume was of great importance. This meant she was relatively slab-sided and flat-bottomed. The latter feature brought a number of advantages: Freelove was shallow draft, so she could navigate river entrances and waterways where there was little depth of water. It also allowed her to ‘take the ground’ – that is, sit safely on a mudflat or sandbank when the tide had ebbed. These far-from-pretty ships were functional but not fast; however, they could handle the heavy weather that the North Sea delivered all too often.
Having served out a suitable period of training, Cook first sailed aboard Freelove in the depth of winter in February 1747. Now aged eighteen, he was posted as a ‘servant’: a junior position where he would ‘learn the ropes’ when it came to actually sailing the vessel, and assist with loading and unloading the coal. He and other young apprentices, usually fifteen in the crew of twenty-five, would scurry aloft to set, reef or furl sails as dictated by the wind and demanded by the master. In reality, though, this role was hardly different from a young lad starting work in a coal pit, except that Cook was aboard a lumbering collier where, in good times, he could enjoy the open sea and wide horizons. At other times, his lot was similar to that of the young mine-worker: it was a dirty, grubby, grimy and laborious existence, one in which it often seemed there was more coal dust on the decks than sea mist in the air. Each round voyage from Whitby to Newcastle, then London and back to Whitby, was about 600 nautical miles. Some 400 vessels plied this route annually, the majority completing at least six voyages in that time.
The 50-nautical-mile passage from Whitby to Newcastle would have taken around ten hours to complete. Once Freelove entered Newcastle’s Tyne River, the hard yards began. The crew, assisted by local keelmen (waterfront coal loaders) used buckets, skips and slings to first unload the ballast the ship had carried to provide stability when under sail, then load the coal into the empty hold – usually between 300 and 400 tons of it, depending on the size of the vessel. This procedure was then reversed in London: the coal would be discharged at docks on the north bank of the River Thames, about a mile downstream from London Bridge, which at the time was the only structure spanning the river.
Every round trip aboard Freelove took about four weeks to complete, depending on the weather. One can only imagine the physical appearance of Cook and his crewmates after being exposed to so much coal dust during that time. Yet none of this toil deterred Cook from holding course when it came to his career path. Most importantly, he was gaining experience under sail on the notorious North Sea, which, because it was so shallow and strewn with sandbanks, could be one of the roughest and toughest expanses of ocean known to man. In many places in the south, where the water was less than 20 fathoms, wicked storms, accompanied by huge breaking waves, were commonplace. Little wonder these waters were the graveyard for countless ships and men over the centuries.
Each time Cook returned to Whitby, he would apply himself to his studies, all of which were aimed at qualifying him for a future as a seafarer, and hopefully, one day, as the master of his own vessel. This dedication would lead to him being self-taught in the important areas of algebra, trigonometry, geometry, astronomy and navigation, the latter being a subject urged upon him by John Walker.
After completing three coal runs aboard
Freelove, Cook was brought ashore temporarily to work on the rigging and fitting-out of the Walkers’ newest ship, Three Brothers. The maintenance, repairing and re-rigging of vessels were familiar tasks for Cook and his fellow apprentices, particularly during wintertime, when most of the ships remained in port. Once Cook had finished his three-year apprenticeship, the Walkers transferred him to Three Brothers, and he remained part of her crew until 1752. He was then promoted to the position of mate aboard another new vessel in the fleet, Friendship.
It is interesting to note that 1752 was the year of calendar reform in England – when the Calendar Act of 1751 took effect. This was ‘an Act for regulating the commencement of the year; and for correcting the calendar now in use’. The legislation was enacted to coincide with Britain changing from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar in September that year. Simply put, it meant that eleven days were removed from the month of September, so the day after 2 September 1752 became 14 September 1752. Also, until this change, each year was deemed to start on 25 March, but the legislation decreed that in future it would begin on 1 January. The consequence of this has led to considerable confusion on many occasions over actual dates relating to this period, and debates that continue to this day. For example, when Cook was born on 27 October 1728, England was using the Julian calendar, but after 1752, when the Gregorian calendar was introduced, his birth date, strictly speaking, would be 7 November.
As the years progressed, so Cook’s horizons expanded. At one stage he joined the crew of Mary, another in the Walkers’ fleet, and sailed to the Baltic and St Petersburg. He also crewed on a ship transporting troops to Ireland. On each voyage he applied himself assiduously to developing his sailing and navigation skills under the guidance of the master.