Of course as nothing had been heard of the expedition for a considerable time, a certain amount of anxiety was felt, which at length found vent in paragraphs in the public press, and on 11th January 1780 the London Gazette contained the following:

“Captain Clerke of His Majesty’s Sloop the Resolution, in a letter to Mr. Stephens, dated the 8th of June 1779, in the harbour of St. Peter and St. Paul, Kampschatka, which was received yesterday, gives the melancholy account of the celebrated Captain Cook, late Commander of that Sloop, with four of his private Marines having been killed on the 14th of February last at the island of Owhyhe, one of a Group of new-discovered Islands in the 22nd degree of North Latitude, in an affray with a numerous and tumultuous Body of the Natives.”

“Captain Clerke adds, that he received every friendly supply from the Russian Government; and that as the Companies of the Resolution and her Consort, the Discovery, were in perfect Health, and the two Sloops had twelve months Stores and Provisions on board, he was preparing to make another Attempt to explore a Northern Passage to Europe.”

The Empress of Russia.

The London Gazette of 8th February says:

“The Empress of Russia expressed a most deep concern at the Loss of Captain Cook. She was the more sensibly affected from her very partial regard to his merits; and when she was informed of the hospitality shown by the Russian Government at Kamschatka to Captain Clerke, she said no Subject in her Dominions could show too much Friendship to the Survivors of Captain Cook.”

The letter written by Clerke was sent by express through Petersburg; that is to say, it was written in the extreme east of Asia in June, and was sent overland across Siberia to Petersburg, and thence via Berlin to London, and was there published in under the six months. A wonderful journey when the difficulties of transit are taken into consideration.

In the numerous appreciative notices that appeared in the press relating to Cook and his work, the Morning Chronicle alone strikes a jarring string, which is at once met by a reply; and a day or two after the same paper publishes a long letter signed Colombus (the style suggests the pen of Sir Joseph Banks) in which the character and methods of Cook are most strenuously defended, the writer claiming to have obtained his knowledge of the man “through long intercourse with him.”

The Gazetter of 24th January says:

“His Majesty, who had always the highest opinion of Captain Cook, shed tears when Lord Sandwich informed him of his death, and immediately ordered a pension of 300 pounds a year for his widow.”

The amount really granted to Mrs. Cook was 200 pounds per annum, and the Admiralty in addition gave her half the proceeds of the Journal of the Third Voyage, a share in the Journal of the Second Voyage, and a share of the plates used in illustrating the two publications: a very considerable addition to her income. A Coat of Arms was also granted to the family by order of the King, and Sir W. Besant records his belief that it was the last one ever granted as a direct “recognition of Service.” His description of it is:

“Azure, between the two polar stars Or, a sphere on the plane of the meridian, showing the Pacific Ocean, his track thereon marked by red lines. And for a crest, on a wreath of the colours, is an arm bowed, in the uniform of a Captain of the Royal Navy. In the hand is the Union Jack on a staff proper. The arm is encircled by a wreath of palm and laurel. A very noble shield indeed.”

The notes of appreciation of his talents and services came from all parts of the world, and none more kindly than from the series of brilliant Frenchmen who followed in his footsteps. De Crozet did not hesitate to throw away his own charts when he recognised the superiority of Cook’s; and Dumont d’Urville calls him “the most illustrious navigator of both the past and future ages whose name will for ever remain at the head of the list of sailors of all nations.”

Mrs. Cook’s letter.

The Royal Society was naturally amongst the first to recognise the great worth of its late Fellow, and the loss the Society had suffered from his death. It had already granted him one of its highest honours in the form of the Copley Gold Medal for his successful contest with the scurvy, and it now decided to mark its appreciation by striking a special gold medal in his honour. This was forwarded by Sir Joseph Banks, President of the Royal Society, to Mrs. Cook, and acknowledged by her in the following touching letter:

Mile End,

16th August 1784.

Sir,

I received your exceeding kind letter of the 12th instant, and want words to express in any adequate degree my feelings on the very singular honour which you, Sir, and the honourable and learned Society over which you so worthily preside, have been pleased to confer on my late husband, and through him on me and his children who are left to lament the loss of him, and to be the receivers of those most noble marks of approbations which, if Providence had been pleased to permit him to receive, would have rendered me very happy indeed.

Be assured, Sir, that however unequal I may be to the task of expressing it, I feel as I ought the high honour which the Royal Society has been pleased to do me. My greatest pleasure now remaining is in my sons, who, I hope, will ever strive to copy after so good an example, and, animated by the honours bestowed on their Father’s memory, be ambitious of attaining by their own merits your notice and approbation. Let me entreat you to add to the many acts of friendship which I have already received at your hands, that of expressing my gratitude and thanks to that learned body in such a manner as may be acceptable to them.

I am, Sir, etc., etc.,

Elizabeth Cook.

The medal actually presented to Mrs. Cook is now in the British Museum.

Deaths of the sons.

It is greatly to be regretted that so little can be ascertained about Cook’s private life that would be of service in forming an intimate knowledge of his character, but this is accounted for by the fact that after he had joined the Navy his time was so fully occupied by that service that he had but little opportunity to form private friendships such as fall to the lot of most men. The intimacies that he did form were mostly connected very closely with his naval duties, and his opportunities of correspondence were necessarily limited by absence from all ordinary means of communication. For a man of his marked celebrity it is very curious that there should be such a dearth of anecdote that it is difficult to find anything that is unconnected with his profession. Of his own family relations there is also little known, as Mrs. Cook, probably esteeming the few letters she had from him as too sacred to be seen by any other eye than her own, as the late Canon Bennett suggests, destroyed them before her death. Still some idea of their life together, short as it really was, notwithstanding it lasted, in name, for over sixteen years, may be gained from the manner in which his widow always spoke of him after his death. She always wore a ring containing a lock of his hair, and measured everything by his standard of morality and honour. The greatest disapprobation she could express was “Mr. Cook would never have done so.” He was always Mr. Cook to her. She kept four days each year as solemn fasts, remaining in her own room. The days were those on which she lost her husband and three sons, passing them in reading her husband’s Bible, prayer and meditation, and during bad weather she could not sleep for thinking of those at sea. For her husband’s sake she befriended her nephews and nieces whom she never saw. Of her three sons, two entered the Navy. One, Nathaniel, was lost with his ship, the Thunderer, in a hurricane off Jamaica in 1780. The eldest, James, rose to the rank of Commander, and in January 1794 was appointed to H.M. sloop Spitfire. He was at Poole when he received his orders to join his ship at Portsmouth without delay. Finding an open boat with sailors returning from leave about to start, he joined them. It was blowing rather hard, and nothing was ever heard of the passengers or crew, except that the broken boat and the dead body of the unfortunate young officer, stripped of all money and valuables, with a wound in the head, was found ashore on the Isle of Wight. The third son, Hugh, was entered at Christ’s College, Cambridge, in 1793, but contracting scarlet fever he died on 21st December of that year, and was buried in the church of St. Andrew the Great, being joined by his brother James a few weeks afterwards, when the mother was left indeed alone. She survived her husband for the long period of fifty-six years, living at Clapham with her cousin, Admiral Isaac Smith, and at length joined her two sons at Cambridge at the advanced age of ninety-three.

Cook’s character as given by those with whom he worked, men who day after day were by his side, was a fine one. His greatest fault seems to have been his hasty temper, which he admitted himself, often most regretfully; but Captain King says it was “disarmed by a disposition the most benevolent and humane,” and it never was displayed in such a manner as to cause the loss of respect and affection of his people. He was healthy and vigorous in mind and body, clear-headed and cool in times of danger, broad minded and temperate, and plain and unaffected in manner. His powers of observation were of the first rank, his knowledge of Naval mathematics far surpassed the ordinary level and amounted to genius, but, above all, his devotion to duty was the commanding feature of his character. Nothing was allowed to interfere when he saw his course before him; personal convenience was not allowed to weigh for one moment, but at the same time he never lost sight of the interests of those under him and spared them when possible. He was somewhat silent and reserved in manner, but when questioned on any subject on which he felt he was an authority, his answers were clearly and distinctly given, and his reasons disclosed his powers of observation to the full. He was kindly, generous, and hospitable, and by no means the stern character that has been painted, for even in such a matter-of-fact document as his official Journal, a spirit of fun occasionally gleams out.

Such was the man whose name will ever stand in the very first ranks of the British Empire Builders; honest, kindly, generous, a faithful servant and a noble leader.