Captain James Cook was commissioned by the Council of the Royal Society of London to command an expedition to observe and record the six-hour transit of the planet Venus in 1769. His Majesty’s Bark Endeavour was used by Captain Cook to make this first voyage of discovery to the South Seas.
Captain James Cook and the Endeavour returned to England on 13 July 1771, having completed what would become the first of his three voyages to open up the mysterious Pacific Ocean and her islands to Europe.