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Turtle Isle
Cook's Fiji Encounter
On 2 July 1774, HMS Resolution, heading west from the Friendly Islands (Tonga) toward the New Hebrides, sighted a solitary island on the horizon. Over the following day and a half, Cook circled it, sent his Master ashore, and named it. The encounter lasted fewer than 36 hours.
What Cook did not know — what no European yet knew — was that just to the north, invisible beyond the horizon, lay the main Fijian archipelago: an estimated 100,000 people, some 300 islands, one of the most complex societies in the Pacific. Cook wrote four lines about this area. Then he sailed away.
The island he named Turtle Isle is today called Vatoa, a limestone outcrop of about 4.45 km² in the southern Lau Group of Fiji. It is, to this day, the only island in present-day Fiji ever visited by James Cook.
The Navigation: How Cook Circled the Island
The journal entry for 1–3 July 1774 gives enough compass bearings and distance estimates to reconstruct Cook's track around Vatoa with reasonable precision. The island has two notable elevated sections visible from sea — the "two high peaks" referenced in the published account.
Google Earth View — Vatoa & the Missing Fiji Group
Above: Vatoa (Turtle Isle), Lau Group, Fiji — 19°48′S, 178°02′W. The main Fijian group lies approximately 170km to the north-northwest, beyond the horizon from Cook's position.
How to embed Google Earth in Squarespace
Google Earth Web supports direct iframe embedding. Use these two URLs — one for the close island view, one for the regional context. Paste one into an HTML Code Block in Squarespace, or alternate between them with a toggle button.
Close view — Vatoa island (shows reef outline and dual elevation):
https://earth.google.com/web/@-19.82,178.24,10a,15000d,35y,0h,0t,0r
Regional view — showing distance to main Fiji group to the north:
https://earth.google.com/web/@-18.5,178.5,0a,220000d,35y,0h,0t,0r
Squarespace Code Block (paste into Pages → Code Block → HTML):
<iframe src="https://earth.google.com/web/@-19.82,178.24,10a,15000d,35y,0h,0t,0r" width="100%" height="450" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Note: Google Earth Web embeds require the user's browser to support WebGL. For a static fallback, a Google Maps satellite embed of the same coordinates will work on all browsers. Cook's track (reconstructed from bearing and distance notes in the journal) can be added as a KML overlay in Google Earth if you build the route in Google My Maps first and export it.
Cook's Reconstructed Track, 1–3 July 1774
AM Land sighted bearing W ½ N. Course altered toward it. As the ship draws closer: an island of "good extent," its high points becoming distinct. Cook identifies two elevated sections — a doubled profile visible from seaward.
PM Resolution ranges the western and southern coasts at close distance. Cook notes the reef extending two miles from shore in places. He observes turtle near the reef — the name suggests itself.
AM Sunday. The Master takes a boat to the eastern shore and attempts to speak with islanders (approximately 20, armed with clubs and spears). They retire to the woods the moment he steps ashore. He leaves medals, nails, and a knife on the rocks. Observers notice islanders return to collect the gifts after the boat departs.
PM Resolution departs S.S.W., noting breakers on a coral bank approximately 5–6 miles from the island. Cook sends two boats to check for turtle on the bank. None found. Course set for the New Hebrides.
The Complete Journal Entry
The text below is the complete Turtle Island passage from A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Vol. II (London: Strahan & Cadell, 1777) — Cook's own published account of the Second Voyage, written and edited by himself. This is Chapter III of Book III. Footnote markers [¹] through [⁴] have been added; all other text is Cook's own.
Let us now return to Anamocka, as it is called by the natives. It is situated in the latitude of 20° 15′ S.; longitude 174° 31′ W., and was first discovered by Tasman, and by him named Rotterdam [¹].
[…]
These, together with Middleburg or Eaoowee, and Pylstart, make a group, containing about three degrees of latitude and two of longitude, which I have named the Friendly Isles or Archipelago, as a firm alliance and friendship seems to subsist among their inhabitants, and their courteous behaviour to strangers entitles them to that appellation; under which we might, perhaps, extend their group much farther, even down to Boscawen and Keppell's Isles discovered by Captain Wallis [²], and lying nearly under the same meridian, and in the latitude of 15° 53′; for, from the little account I have had of the people of these two isles they seem to have the same sort of friendly disposition we observed in our Archipelago.
[The ship departs Anamocka westward, passing through the channel between the two high volcanic islands of Amattafoa and Oghao.]
On the 2d of July, at day-break, land was discovered to the W. ½ N., which, at nine o'clock, we found to be an island of good extent; its N.W. and S.E. ends appearing high, and the middle low. We stood for it; and as we drew nearer, found the shore every where bounded by a reef of coral rocks, which, in some places, extended two miles from the land. Its N.W. end we passed at about two miles distance; and having ranged the S.W. and S. sides, we came round to the S.E., and brought the ship to in twenty fathoms water, a sandy bottom, with the S.E. point bearing N. ½ E., distant half a mile, and the N.W. point W. ½ N., distant about three miles.
In the morning, being Sunday the 3d of July, I sent the master with two boats to the shore, in order to look for water and to have some intercourse with the inhabitants; for we could see some people on the beach. He rowed in for the shore at the S.E. end of the island, where the reef seemed to be broken; but it was not, and therefore he could not land. He then rowed round to the N.E. side, where he found a break in the reef, and a canoe landing-place. Entering by it, he rowed in for the shore, thinking to speak with the people, not more than twenty in number, who were armed with clubs and spears; but the moment he set his foot on shore, they retired to the woods. He left on the rocks some medals, nails, and a knife; which they, no doubt, found, as some were seen near the place afterwards.
This island is not quite a league in length, in the direction of N.E. and S.W., and not half that in breadth. It is covered with wood, and surrounded by a reef of coral rocks, which, in some places, extend two miles from the shore. It seems to be too small to contain many inhabitants; and probably the few whom we saw may have come from some isle in the neighbourhood to fish for turtle; as many were seen near this reef, and occasioned that name to be given to the island, which is situated in latitude 19° 48′ S., longitude 178° 2′ W.
Seeing breakers to the S.S.W., which I was desirous of knowing the extent of before night, I left Turtle Isle, and stood for them. At two o'clock we found they were occasioned by a coral bank of about four or five leagues in circuit. By the bearing we had taken, we knew these to be the same breakers we had seen the preceding evening. Hardly any part of this bank or reef is above water at the reflux of the waves. The heads of some rocks are to be seen near the edge of the reef, where it is the shoalest; for in the middle is deep water. In short, this bank wants only a few little islets to make it exactly like one of the half-drowned isles so often mentioned. It lies S.W. from Turtle island, about five or six miles; and the channel between it and the reef of that isle is three miles over. Seeing no more shoals or islands, and thinking there might be turtle on this bank, two boats were properly equipped and sent thither; but returned without having seen one.
It is not improbable but that this island may be the same as that said to have been discovered by Tasman in 1643, and which, on the chart of that navigator, as published by M. Dalrymple [³], is laid down in or about the latitude of 17° S., which is not far from the truth; but the longitude is very erroneous. In looking over M. Dalrymple's chart, to see how the discoveries of former navigators agreed with mine, I find that the Cocos and Traitors Isles, discovered by Le Maire and Schouten in 1616 [⁴], and laid down in that chart in latitude 15° 54′, longitude 174°, are no other than Boscawen and Keppell's Isles already mentioned; and if so, these two navigators had got the latitude well enough, but the longitude is widely different.
The restraint of that sentence is characteristic of Cook at his best. No complaint. No judgment on the islanders. No claim of ownership. Just the bare record of a non-encounter. The gifts left on the rocks — the medal, nails, a knife — are the extent of European contact with what is now Fiji for this voyage.
Annotations & Historical Notes
Tasman and "Rotterdam"
Abel Janszoon Tasman (c.1603–1659), the Dutch navigator employed by the VOC (Dutch East India Company), made two major Pacific voyages in 1642–43 and 1644. On the first of these, returning northward after circling much of the Southern Ocean, he encountered the Tongan island group in January 1643. The island he named Rotterdam is Anamocka (modern Nomuka) in the Ha'apai group of Tonga — the same island Cook had just left when writing this passage. Tasman named it after the Dutch city, as was common VOC practice; he had already named a neighbouring island Amsterdam (modern Tongatapu). Cook's usage of "Rotterdam" here is a cross-reference to Tasman's own chart, acknowledging the prior European record.
When Cook writes of the island "first discovered by Tasman, and by him named Rotterdam," he is doing something characteristic: scrupulously crediting previous navigators even when he has improved on their work. Tasman's longitude for this island was considerably in error — something Cook notes elsewhere. Cook's own longitude, derived using the Kendall K1 chronometer (a copy of Harrison's H4), was far more accurate and represented a step-change in Pacific cartography.
Wallis and the Boscawen & Keppel Islands
Captain Samuel Wallis (1728–1795) commanded HMS Dolphin on the voyage of 1766–68 — the voyage that discovered Tahiti (June 1767), just months before Cook's first voyage was commissioned. On the same passage through the Pacific, Wallis encountered two islands in the north Tongan group, which he named Boscawen's Island and Keppel's Island, after two Royal Navy admirals he had served under: Admiral Edward Boscawen and Admiral Augustus Keppel.
These islands are today known by their Tongan names: Tafahi (Boscawen's Island) and Niuatoputapu (Keppel's Island). They lie in the far north of the Tongan archipelago, approximately 15°51′S, 173°43′W — very close to Cook's stated latitude of 15°53′. They are small, volcanic, and today have tiny resident populations.
Cook's reference here is geographically precise: he is noting that these two islands Wallis named lie roughly on the same meridian as his own "Friendly Islands" group and appear to share similar cultural characteristics — enough, he suggests, to perhaps be considered part of the same extended archipelago. He is doing active comparative geography in real time, stitching together the records of different voyages into a coherent picture.
Mr Dalrymple's Chart — What Was It, and Was It On Board?
Alexander Dalrymple (1737–1808) was a Scottish geographer, hydrographer, and passionate advocate for the existence of a great undiscovered Southern Continent — Terra Australis Incognita. He was the Royal Society's first choice to lead the 1768 transit of Venus expedition; when the Admiralty refused to give command of a naval vessel to a civilian, Cook was appointed instead. Dalrymple never forgave this, and later became one of Cook's most vocal critics.
Despite this personal rivalry, Dalrymple's scholarly publications were genuinely valuable reference works. He published An Historical Collection of the Several Voyages and Discoveries in the South Pacific Ocean in two volumes (1770–71), which included translated accounts of Dutch and Spanish voyages, accompanied by charts reconstructed from those accounts. The chart Cook refers to here — placing what may be Vatoa (or a nearby island) at approximately 17°S — is almost certainly from this collection, which incorporated Tasman's data.
Was this chart physically on board the Resolution? Almost certainly yes. Before the Second Voyage departed in 1772, Dalrymple gave Banks a copy of his book for the First Voyage; it is highly probable that Cook carried the relevant Dalrymple charts on the Second. Cook explicitly references "M. Dalrymple's chart" throughout the second voyage journal, treating it as a standard navigational reference — even while frequently noting its errors. The relationship between Cook and Dalrymple's work is one of productive correction: Cook used Dalrymple's compilation of earlier voyages as a framework, then systematically tested and corrected it against his own observations.
Cook's comment here — that the longitude on Dalrymple's chart for this island is "very erroneous" — is both a navigational note and a characteristic quiet jab. He is, in effect, demonstrating once more that the Kendall chronometer and proper longitude observation has superseded Dalrymple's reconstructions. The difference in longitude he found was considerable.
Le Maire, Schouten, and the Cocos & Traitors Isles (1616)
Jacob Le Maire (1585–1616) and Willem Cornelisz Schouten (c.1580–1625) led the first expedition to sail around Cape Horn and cross the Pacific from east to west, in the ship Eendracht (Unity), 1615–16. Their voyage is notable in maritime history as the proof that Tierra del Fuego was not a peninsula of a vast southern continent — they found open sea to the south of it, and named the southernmost cape after Schouten's home town: Hoorn, from which we get Cape Horn.
Continuing westward across the Pacific, they encountered two islands in July 1616 which they named from their experiences there. The first, a high volcanic cone rich with coconut palms, they called Cocos Eylant (Coconut Island) after the abundance of palms and the peaceful welcome from islanders who came out in canoes to trade. The second, nearby and larger, gave them a more hostile reception: islanders boarded the ship and attacked with clubs; when they discovered what muskets could do, an uneasy truce enabled limited trading. This island they named Verraders Eylant — Traitors' Island.
These are today called Tafahi (Cocos Eylant) and Niuatoputapu (Traitors' Island), in the north of Tonga — the same islands Wallis renamed Boscawen and Keppel in 1767.
Cook's point is that Dalrymple's chart, which reproduces the Le Maire/Schouten positions, places these islands at longitude 174° — whereas Cook, observing them directly with his chronometer in 1773–74, found them considerably further east. The latitude (15°54′ in Le Maire; 15°53′ in Cook) is close; the longitude is the problem. This was a standard difficulty with all pre-chronometer charts: latitude could be determined reliably by celestial observation, but longitude required dead reckoning or lunar distance calculations, both of which accumulate error over long passages.
The Larger Silence
What Cook's journal does not contain is as significant as what it does. After leaving Turtle Isle on the afternoon of 3 July, the Resolution sailed west-northwest toward the New Hebrides. The main Fijian archipelago — Viti Levu, Vanua Levu, the Koro Sea, perhaps 300 inhabited islands — lay roughly 170 kilometres to the north. Cook did not know it was there. It does not appear in his journal because it never appeared on his horizon.
Dalrymple's chart, which Cook was consulting, showed the area as essentially blank — ocean. No earlier European had charted the main group. Tasman had skirted its southern edge in 1643 without landing. The Dutch East India Company had no commercial interest in pushing further into this part of the Pacific. So the main Fiji group remained, in 1774, entirely unknown to European cartography — and entirely unnecessary to its approximately 100,000 inhabitants.
Cook would hear about Fiji on his Third Voyage, in Tonga in 1777, through his linguistic specialist William Anderson's notes on Tongan conversations. But he still did not go. The main group would not receive a sustained European presence until the sandalwood traders of the early 1800s, followed by missionaries in the 1830s, followed by the formal British annexation of 1874.
The next Europeans to enter Fijian waters came fifteen years later, and did not choose to. In May 1789, William Bligh — Cook's former sailing master on the Third Voyage, now captain of HMS Bounty — was cast adrift in an open longboat by Fletcher Christian's mutineers off Tonga. Rowing west for Timor, Bligh threaded his 23-foot boat between Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, the two main islands, under pursuit from Fijian war canoes. He did not land; he was running for his life. His charts of the passage became the first accurate European record of the main Fijian group — which is why the strait between the two islands is still called Bligh Water today. Bligh returned on a naval vessel in 1792 and made a more deliberate survey. But even then, no European stepped ashore on the main islands. That distinction belongs to the first sandalwood traders, around 1800–01, when the brig Argo was wrecked in the Lau group and surviving crew were taken in by Fijian chiefs — becoming the first Europeans to live among Fijians and setting in motion a contact history that would, within seventy years, end in British annexation.
Four lines in the journal. An island the size of a large farm. A few men who walked back into the trees.
Everything that followed came later.