James Cook

No, HMS Endeavour was a British Royal Navy research vessel, it was not a clipper, it was a 'Bark' (In the 18th centuary, the British Royal Navy used the term bark for a nondescript vessel that did not fit any of its usual categories).

A 'Clipper' was a very fast sailing ship of the 19th century that had three or more masts and a square rig - these ships were used as commercial, not military vessels.

Further information:

The Endeavour was HM Bark Endeavour.

There were two reasons by which a ship might be classified as a "bark":

1. A bark was any ship which did not match the usual classification of ship and if it was commanded by a Lieutenant. At this stage, Cook was still a Lieutenant, and had not yet been promoted to captain.

2. A bark could also refer to a ship with a flat bow and square stern.

The Endeavour was also an ex-collier, or coal-carrying ship - formerly the Whitby cat collier "Earl of Pembroke". It had been bought by the British navy and converted so it was suitable for exploration and scientific pursuits.

Initially, Cook and the others aboard the Endeavour were uncertain whether the point that Zachary Hicks saw, and which Cook named "Point Hicks" was part of another island like New Zealand, or a continent. At first they believed it to be Van Diemen's Land, which Abel tasman had discovered almost 130 years earlier.

When Cook actually had his first good look at the continent, on 20 April 1770, he wrote in his journal: the weather being clear gave us an opportunity to view the country which had a very agreeable and promising aspect. the land is of moderate height diversified with hills, ridges, plains and valleys with some few small lawns, but for the most part, the whole was covered with wood; the hills and ridgesrise with a gentle slope' they are not high, neither are there many of them."

James Cook landed in a number of places in Australia. The three most significant locations were:

• Botany Bay, which he originally named Stingray Harbour
• Endeavour River, near present-day Cooktown where his crew spent some five weeks repairing the Endeavour after it was wrecked on the Great Barrier Reef
• Possession Island, where he claimed the eastern half of Australia for England, naming it "New South Wales"

Captain Cook did not discover Australia. Notwithstanding the presence of Australian Aborigines, and the Asian sea-slug traders who visiter the continent's northern shores long before Eureopean settlement, Australia was "discovered" by Dutch explorers in the early 1600s.

The boat in which Captain Cook explored and charted the eastern coastline was the H.M.Bark Endeavour.

The HM Bark Endeavour was an ex-collier bought by the English navy and converted for use in exploration. Initially launched in 1764 as the Earl of Pembroke, it was bought by the Navy is 1768 specifically for the purpose of being used in a scientific mission to the Pacific Ocean (observing the transit of Venus from the best vantage point, which was Tahiti), and to explore for the Terra Australis Incognita or "unknown southern land."

The Endeavour, under Captain James Cook's command, was the first European vessel to reach Australia's eastern coast, where it was used to chart the unknown coastline. Cape Tribulation, in far North Queensland, was named by Captain Cook after the Endeavour struck the reef and nearly sank. The Endeavour managed to stay afloat for another week whilst the crew sought desperately for land, eventually sighting the harbour formed by the Endeavour River. The ship was landed on 10 June 1770, and Cook spent almost two months repairing it.

Following Cook's first voyage of exploration, the Endeavour was used for ferrying Navy supplies to the Falkland Islands. After being sold to a private enterprise in 1775, the Endeavour was purposely scuttled in a blockade of Narragansett Bay at Rhode Island in 1778, during the American Revolution. The precise whereabouts of the wreckage of the Endeavour are unknown, but several items were salvaged from the ship, and are on display in various maritime museums around the world. A replica of the Endeavour is displayed in the Australian National Maritime Museum at Sydney Harbour, Australia.