Capt Cook Claims Australia for Britain [15min]

Explorers in the second half of the 1700s were going south to the mystery continent we call Australia. The continent was unexplored but its existence was known and, by the time the British arrived, the Dutch had long called it New Holland. But the coast was virtually uncharted. "This Sceptred Isle: Empire" is a narrative history of the British Empire from Ireland in the 12th century to the independence of India in the 20th, told in 90 programmes written by historian Christopher Lee and narrated by actor Juliet Stevenson. (You may listen again online to up to five most recent episodes of "Empire".)

In 1768 James Cook was given command of the Endeavour to sail with members of the Royal Society to the Pacific -- officially to observe the planet Venus. He had secret orders to look for the southern continent, Australia. The voyage was gale ridden in the Pacific; in Tahiti, many in his ship suffered from venereal disease, a few junior officers tried to desert.

Eventually, on 7 October, 1769, the Endeavour sighted the eastern seaboard of New Zealand. They spent six months surveying the coast and then headed east, mainly because Endeavour was in no state to tackle Cape Horn. This is how, on All Fools Day 1770 ,they sighted what we call New South Wales. Cook at first called the landing place Stingray Bay, after the marine life. But when he was told about the abundant flora, he re-named it Botany Bay.

The Endeavour returned to England in 1771 with 38 fewer hands than the 94 she'd sailed with. Cook's second voyage, in Resolution, took him further south into the Antarctic than any navigator had gone, another three-year voyage. His third voyage, in Discovery, with William Bligh as his sailing master, was to be his last. He died in the Pacific Islands, at the hands of islanders.