The Backbone of Success: The Crew of Captain Cook's Third Voyage of Discovery

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Reparing the Ships

The voyage took the Resolution and Discovery to areas of the world far from safe harbors where repairs would have been facilitated by cranes, dry docks and all the tools and hands that could be procured. Being isolated from such “modern commodities” the crews of the voyage were forced to make due with what they had and either repair the ships and continue, sink and die or be stranded. Geoffrey Badger explained the difficulty of keeping ships bound on long distance voyages in good repair. He wrote, “the fact that a wooden sailing ship was a steadily deterioration fabric which became more and more difficult to handle on a protracted voyage and could actually break up under the stresses of wind and sea.”85 Both the Resolution and Discovery stood as testimonies of the battering ships takes from the ocean.

Keep in mind that the Resolution had already made a three-year expedition on Cook’s second voyage, which was also Cook’s longest voyage as far as ocean miles covered. Near the end of his second voyage Cook wrote, “we were not in a condition to support, our sails and rigging were so much worn that some thing was giving way every hour and we had nothing left either to repair or replace them.”86 After returning to England the Resolution was quickly refitted for the third voyage. However, the Resolution was not properly refitted. Philip Edwards explained the refitting as being, “very badly carried out, as the recurring serious problems with the masts and with leaks were to show.”87 J. C. Beaglehole further explained the horrible condition of the Resolution, even on the first leg of the voyage. “Badly caulked at the dockyard, her seams opened so much that in a few days hardly a man could lie dry in his bed, while the sails in the sail-room suffered great damage.”88 At harbor in England, the one place where the Resolution could have been made as good as new, the ship was poorly refitted and as a result was in almost constant need of repair while on the third voyage. The work of the crew to keep the Resolution sail-worthy stands as a testament of their ability to repair the Resolutions vast array of defects and damages under a variety of trying circumstances. They kept it afloat and in good enough condition to remain sailing and able to continue throughout the voyage.

For three years the Resolution and Discovery and their crews were much like the Apollo lunar landing expeditions, far from any modern help or assistance. Their own knowledge and skills were the only things that could help them when dangers or damages occurred. John Ledyard wrote about the dangerous situation the ships were in, north of the Bearing Strait in September 1778. “We had blowing weather, which rendered our situation among the ice dangerous. The ships too were in bad condition, the winter approaching, and the distance from any known place of refreshment very great.”89 John Rickman further explained their situation due to being in an uncharted area, “We were now so far advanced to the northward and eastward as to be far beyond the limits of European Geography, and to have reached that void space in our maps.”90 After leaving the Cape of Good Hope in December 1776, the ships did not reach a “modern” port, according to the European standards, until December 1779 at Macao on the south coast of China, which was under Portuguese possession at the time. Thus, for three full years all repairs had to be performed without the assistance of a real harbor. This was no small feat, because the ships were in constant threat from the dangers of nature and often showed the signs of such battering.

The ships were often damaged by savage storms that violently tossed the ships, ripped the sails, broke masts, shattered rigging and filled the ships with water. Shoals and ice fields could strip the bottom and sides of the hull. Snow and ice could weigh down the sails and deck to make the ship top heavy putting it in danger of capsizing. An image by John Webber demonstrates the grave danger of the ships while surveying north of the Bearing Strait. Such a place was very precarious even in good weather, but in a storm or thick fog, both of which occurred often the situation became even more grave (Figure 10).91

Before 12 at night the wind veered from N.N.W. and E.SE. and was succeeded by a sudden and impetuous gale of wind that threw us into the utmost confusion from its unexpected approach and our unprepared situation to receive it. This gale continued with very little intermission until the 1st of May. This gale was very severe, and was the means of opening a defective place in the Resolution’s bottom, which was of an alarming nature. (Ledyard 1963, 77-78)

In similar manner after leaving Kealakekua Bay at Hawaii, Ledyard described the storm that forced the ships back to the same bay for repairs. Having already outstayed their welcome at Kealakekua, the return of ships led to the skirmish that took the lives of Cook and five other crewmembers.92

On the 8th the gale became not only more violent but more irregular and embarrassing, and before night was improved into a mere hurricane; we wrenched the head of our foremast and sprung it about 9 feet below the hounds, and also made a great deal of water. The excessive mutability of the wind, and the irregular sea, was such as demanded our best skill and unremitted attention to keep the ship under any kind of command. (Ledyard 1963, 140)

These two descriptions of severe storms explain the kind of trials that the crew had to withstand to keep the ships from sinking, but also demonstrate the destruction that came to the ships in such situations. Even with lost anchors, broken hulls, masts, rigging and sails the crews were able to retrieve or repair these items to keep the ships sailing and progressing on their voyage.