MORE ADO ABOUT THE ENDEAVOUR

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 264, 5 August 1939, Page 10

MORE ADO ABOUT THE ENDEAVOUR

Captain Cook's Ship

A QUESTION OF MIZZEN

TOPSAILS

Landlubbers may deem the question of whether Captain Cook’s vessel the Endeavour carried mizzen topsails a trilling matter, of concern only to historians. Many men in Wellington, however, have debated the matter in recent days, and libraries have been ransacked for information, for ou the answer depends to some extent the accuracy of the Centennial penny stamp, depicting the Endeavour so equipped. Seafaring men in particular are concerned with tlie question. Further criticism of the stamp has now been voiced by the mercantile community. The following letter has been written to the Postinaster-General by Captain F. A. Mclndoe, secretary of the New Zealand Merchant Service Guild :• —

“I have been directed to draw your attention to what we seamen consider an error, in the hope that it. may be rectified before it is too late.

"In the proposed New Zealand one penny stamp to mark the centenary of New Zealand, there is depicted a sailing vessel, and above is ‘H.M. Bark Endeavour.’ This no doubt is to represent Captain Cook’s vessel. Ihe only point we wish to make is that this vessel is a full-rigged ship, whereas Captain Cook’s vessel was a bark. The difference between a bark and a full-rigged ship is that a ship has yards ou the three masts, whereas a bark has yards only ou two masts, the fore and main, and none on the mizzen mast. The mizzen is fore and aft rig or in other words a spanker and a gaff topsail. “We can readily understand how a mistake can bo made like this and trust you will accept these remarks in tlie same good spirit in which they are forwarded to you.” Word Should Bo Omitted. Captain S. Holm, president of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, said yesterday that in his opinion the word “bark” should be omitted from the stamp. The question was simply that the stamp showed a full-rigged ship, with yards on the mizzen mast, and above it was described as a bark. He personally doubted if Cook’s ship

carried yards on the mizzen mast; Captain Cook was a merchant seaman before he entered the navy, and he was a man who knew ships. He was not likely to term his ship a bark if she was actually a full-rigged, ship. However, even if it could be shown that the Endeavour carried mizzen topsail yards, it did not affect the issue, which was that in present-day speech a bark or barque was taken to mean a particular type of rig, and a different one from that shown on the stamp. He thought it would look very foolish to publish to the world what everybody who knew ships would take for a full-rigged ship, and to label it on the stamp as a bark. It would be taken for ignorance. The Artist’s Design.

The artist who designed the stamp, Mr. J. Berry, of “The Dominion” staff, said that in his original sketch submitted to the authorities he had drawn the Endeavour as an orthodox barque, with fore-and-aft rig only on the mizzen mast; The alteration bad, he understood, been made hi England after reference to the proper authorities. A picture of the Endeavour, then still named Earl of Pembroke, leaving Deptford after her purchase by the Admiralty, was painted by a contemporary artist, believed to be Thomas Luny; and this shows her carrying topsail yards on the mizzen. So does the model of the ship in the Science Museum at South Kensington. So does the Admiralty sail plan still in existence. So do the sketches of the artist Parkinson, who sailed in her. All agree in portraying her as having a very small mizzen, comprising only two parts, lower mast and. topmast, as is common in barques, instead of the three sections normal to a fullrigged ship of that time. And in spite of her mizzen yards, she was certainly listed in the Admiralty records in the style of “The Endeavour Bark.”