Captain Cook Encyclopaedia

Publisher: Chatham Publishing & Stackpole Books £30.00
Publication Date: 2004

John Robson, who was born in Stockton-on-Tees, has had a lifelong interest in Captain Cook about whom he has written previous books. He is now the Map Librarian at the University of Waikato in New Zealand. After a brief biography the book becomes an encyclopaedia listing alphabetically every person, ship, place and event associated with Captain Cook. Contemporary history, the eighteenth century Royal Navy, and even wallpaper and stained glass windows depicting him are included. At the end all publications dealing with him, museums with Cook memorabilia, the names of all who sailed with him, places named after him and his associates and the ships in which he sailed are listed. There is a good bibliography. After two and a half centuries it is unlikely that any more will be learned of him so this may be his definitive history, of interest to both the serious student and more casual reader. A gentleman named William Wales, no less, sailed as an astronomer on the Second Voyage during which an albatross was shot. He later taught Samuel Taylor Coleridge mathematics at Christ’s Hospital School. This may have given rise to ‘The Rime [Sic] of the Ancient Mariner’. – JLC