Third voyage of James Cook

James Cook's third and final voyage (12 July 1776 – 4 October 1780) was a British attempt to discover the fabled Northwest Passage between the Atlantic ocean and the Pacific coast of North America.

After exploring and charting the northwest coast of the continent, they passed through the Bering Strait into the Arctic Ocean where they were eventually blocked by pack ice.

At Kealakekua Bay, off the island of Hawaii, a number of quarrels broke out between the Europeans and Hawaiians culminating in Cook's death in a violent exchange on 14 February 1779.

[1] Initially the Admiralty had wanted Charles Clerke to lead the expedition, with Cook, who was in retirement following his exploits in the Pacific, acting as a consultant.

[2] However, Cook had researched Bering's expeditions, and the Admiralty ultimately placed their faith in the veteran explorer to lead with Clerke accompanying him.

The arrangement was to make a two-pronged attack, Cook moving from the Bering Strait in the north Pacific with Richard Pickersgill in the frigate Lyon taking the Atlantic approach.

In August 1773, Omai, a young Ra'iatean man, embarked from Huahine, travelling to Europe on Adventure, commanded by Tobias Furneaux who had touched at Tahiti as part of James Cook's second voyage of discovery in the Pacific.

Resolution began her career as the 462 ton North Sea collier Marquis of Granby, launched at Whitby in 1770, and purchased by the Royal Navy in 1771 for £4,151 and converted at a cost of £6,565.

"[4] Captain Charles Clerke commanded HMS Discovery,[5] which was a Whitby-built collier of 299 tons, originally named Diligence when she was built in 1774 by G. & N. Langborn for Mr. William Herbert from whom she was bought by the Admiralty.

Driven by strong westerly winds, they reached Van Diemen's Land on 26 January 1777, where they took on water and wood and became cursorily acquainted with the aborigines living there.

Here the Māori were apprehensive because they believed that Cook would take revenge for the deaths in December 1773 of ten men from the Adventure, commanded by Furneaux, on his second voyage.

In order to re-provision, the ships went with the westerly winds to the Friendly Isles (now known as Tonga), stopping en route at Palmerston Island.

After returning Omai, Cook delayed his onward journey until 7 December, when he travelled north and on 18 January 1778 became the first European to visit the Hawaiian Islands.

In passing and after initial landfall at Waimea harbour, Kauai, Cook named the archipelago the "Sandwich Islands" after the fourth Earl of Sandwich—the acting First Lord of the Admiralty.

It has been said that, in a single visit, Cook charted the majority of the North American northwest coastline on world maps for the first time, determined the extent of Alaska, and closed the gap between the Russian (from the west) and Spanish (from the south) exploratory probes of the northern limits of the Pacific.

[17] He became increasingly frustrated on this voyage, and perhaps began to suffer from a stomach ailment; it has been speculated that this led to irrational behaviour towards his crew, such as forcing them to eat walrus meat, which they found inedible.

[18] From the Bering Strait the crews went south to Unalaska in the Aleutians where Cook put in on 2 October to again re-caulk the ship's leaking timbers.

As Cook turned his back to help launch the boats, he was struck on the head by the villagers and then stabbed to death as he fell on his face in the surf.

Following the practice of the time, Cook's body underwent funerary rituals similar to those reserved for the chiefs and highest elders of the society.

The body was disembowelled and baked to facilitate removal of the flesh, and the bones were carefully cleaned for preservation as religious icons in a fashion somewhat reminiscent of the treatment of European saints in the Middle Ages.

Some of Cook's remains, disclosing some corroborating evidence to this effect, were eventually returned to the British for a formal burial at sea following an appeal by the crew.

[29] Clerke, who was dying of tuberculosis, took over the expedition and sailing north, landed on the Kamchatka Peninsula where the Russians helped him with supplies and to make repairs to the ships.

[31] After passing down the coast of Japan they reached Macau, in China in the first week of December and from there followed the East India trade route via Sunda Strait to Cape Town.

[33] The task of editing the account of the voyage was entrusted by the Admiralty to Dr John Douglas, Canon of St Paul's, who had the journals in his possession by November 1780.