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Death of Captain Cook

Maker

(artist)
1755-1834

Title

Date of Production

(circa) 1789

Medium

pen and grey-brown ink, grey-brown wash, with details added in graphite and white bodycolour on wove paper (whole sheet is now discoloured brown, the pictorial area even more so)

Dimensions

Height: 23 cm
Width: 16.6 cm

Accession Number

D.1952.RW.768

Mode of Acquisition

Robert Clermont Witt, bequest, 1952

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords

shipmasters

Label Text

This tiny yet meticulously detailed drawing is one of a set of designs for engravings that illustrated the 1789 edition of Cook’s Voyages. Captain James Cook (1728-1779) was a British naval officer, cartographer and explorer whose fame rests on the three voyages he made to the Pacific between 1768 and 1779. Cook is depicted here as the innocent victim of a group of indigenous Hawaiians, but the reality was more complicated. Cook and his men had steadily antagonised the Hawaiians since their arrival in the islands, culminating with their attempt to kidnap and ransom the king, Kalaniʻōpuʻu; Cook was killed as the people tried to rescue their king.

Provenance

Spencer (London); purchased there by Sir Robert Witt, London (1872-1952), n.d.; Witt Bequest 1952

Literature

Blunt, Anthony, Hand-list of the drawings in the Witt Collection, London, 1956
p. 48

Inscriptions

Watermark: Watermark: none.

Inscription: Recto: within drawing, lower centre, brown ink: “T. Stothard.”; lower centre edge, graphite: “As he was siting [sic], & before he could recover his feet, another Indian / stabbed him in the back of the neck / vol II Cooks Voyages”.

Collector's mark: none.

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