Likely to be overlooked in a double whammy of political correctness and the corona virus, next Wednesday will mark 250 years since Captain Cook landed at Botany Bay.

As Michael Crowley writes, Cook was one of the great figures in European history in terms of his advancement of knowledge.

The three voyages of James Cook, between 1768 and 1780, substantially increased humanity’s knowledge of the globe.

Prior to his odysseys, the Earth was divided into two separated hemispheres: the northern, which was largely but not entirely charted; and the southern, which was largely uncharted, and yet to be fully discovered by the more technologically developed world north of the equator. Cook’s voyages, his achievements in seamanship, in navigation and cartography, his relentless will to explore both hemispheres, opened the way for contact between different regions and different peoples of the world, which had hitherto been impossible.

Cook’s achievements ought to speak for themselves. He mapped more of the globe and sailed further south than anyone before him. When other mariners perished in the abyss of oceans, Cook could pinpoint his location to within a mile. He even pioneered a cure for scurvy that saved countless lives and increased the longevity of voyages.

He was also one of the very few men from the lower classes to rise to senior rank in the Royal Navy. Men followed Cook to the ends of the Earth and beyond, and his attitude to the indigenous peoples he encountered was enlightened and compassionate.

This month marks the 250th anniversary of Cook charting the east coast of Australia, then referred to as Terra Australis Incognita – the unknown land of the south. He accomplished it during the three-year voyage of the Endeavour, the first of his three great voyages that marked him out as the mariner of the Enlightenment, if not all time.

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