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Australia Releases Report Confirming Finding Cook’s HMB Endeavour Wreck

historic shipwreck
Australian National Maritime Museum issued report confirming the shipwreck in Newport Harbor, RI is HM Bark Endeavour (ANMM)

Published Jun 7, 2025 5:08 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

The Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) released its final report detailing its conclusion that a wreck lying on the seabed in Newport Harbor, Rhode Island, is the famed HM Bark Endeavour, which carried Capt. James Cook and his crew on their voyage of exploration to Australia and New Zealand.

ANMM published its final report on the location of Endeavour, detailing a site known as RI 2394 in Newport Harbor indicating that it stands with its 2022 conclusion on the identity of the vessel at the wreck site. In the report, ANMM concludes that based on a “preponderance of evidence,” the wreck is that of Endeavour.

ANMM is hoping that the report, which is a culmination of a 26-year archival and archaeological research, will bring to rest the controversy that has continued to surround the identification of the sailing vessel that is of significant importance to Australia’s maritime history.

In 2022 when ANMM first announced the identification, archeologists at the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP) termed the announcement as “premature,” going on to add that Australia was being driven by emotions or politics. RIMAP, which was partnering with ANMM to locate the wreck, is yet to comment on the final report.

 

 

In its detailed 129-page report, ANMM contends that after Cook’s Pacific voyage on the Endeavour that began in 1768 and saw him reach the New South Wales coast in 1770, the vessel returned to England a year later. For about seven years, the vessel was of public view, being used as a naval transport before being sold to private owners, who renamed her Lord Sandwich. She was used to transport troops to the American colonies in support of British campaigns.

In 1778, the vessel was in poor condition and relegated to holding American prisoners of war in Newport Harbor. When American and French forces besieged the British-held town, Lord Sandwich was one of 13 vessels that were deliberately sunk to act as a submerged blockade. The ship was never salvaged.

For decades, historians and archeologists have been undertaking extensive research on the vessel. Part of the research was able to confirm the names and the details of five vessels scuttled by the British in August 1778 within a section of Newport Harbor that would later be identified as the Limited Study Area (LSA). One of these vessels was the 368-tonne Lord Sandwich.

In 2019, ANMM and RIMAP signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly identify the wreck and went ahead to establish a 10-point criteria necessary for the Lord Sandwich (ex-HMB Endeavour) shipwreck site to be identified with a reasonable degree of certainty. The teams carried out diving expeditions, surveying a large area of Newport Harbor with the hope of locating the vessel. Apart from the history of the ship, factors like the ship's hull and keel, timber used to construct the ship, and repairs that had been carried out made the team conclude the wreck on the RI 2394 site was indeed that of Lord Sandwich.

ANMM highlights that in 1999 and again in 2019, an agreement had been reached with RIMAP on a set of criteria that, if satisfied, would permit the identification of RI 2394 as Lord Sandwich. “Based on the agreed preponderance of evidence approach, enough of these criteria have now been met for the ANMM to positively identify RI 2394 as the remnants of Lord Sandwich, formerly James Cook’s HM Bark Endeavour,” states ANMM in its final report.

Endeavour remains an important vessel in Australian maritime history and one that elicits mixed opinions. For some, the Pacific voyage embodies the spirit of Europe’s Age of Enlightenment, while for others it symbolizes the onset of colonization and the subjugation of First Nations Peoples.