Cook's Officers And Crew And Contemporaries

James Ward - able seaman on the Third Voyage

James Ward, who sailed on Cook's Third Voyage on the Resolution as an able seaman, has remained something of a shadowy individual. We only know a little about his time with Cook. He remained an able seaman until 1st November 1777 when he became a midshipman and stayed one until 2nd November 1779. For the last part of the voyage he reverted to being an able seaman. He emerged from obscurity during the voyage by being was the first to see the Hawaiian Islands when he sighted O'ahu on the morning of 18 January 1778.

A discovery in late 2005 has allowed us to piece together some background for Ward. His grave was located at St. Michael's Church, Berechurch on the southern edge of Colchester in Essex, UK. The inscription on the gravestone provided valuable further information: that he was the son of Ralph and Mary Ward and the grandson of Knox Ward. More research showed that there was a connection with other persons linked to James Cook.

Clifford Thornton has written about Ralph and George Jackson from Cleveland [see Cooks' Log, page 1357, vol. 20, no. 1 (1997)]. Ralph and George were the sons of George Jackson and his wife Hannah, who was herself the daughter of William and Mary Ward. William and Mary had at least twelve children, including, as well as Hannah, two sons, Joshua and John. Joshua (1686-1761) would become rich and notorious as an inventor and vendor of quack medicines. He invented the medicines known as Ward's Pill and Ward's Drop.

Ward's brother, John (1675-1755), would become a notorious businessman and politician and was even knighted. Sir John Ward was an M.P. and even Lord Mayor of London in 1718. In 1725, Ward was a defendant in an action brought by the widow of the first duke of Buckingham and Normanby, concerning alum works he had leased from the duke. It emerged that Ward had cheated the duke out of £70,000 and he was convicted of fraud and forgery.

Knox Ward was the son of Sir John and he was Clarenceux King of Arms from 1726 to 1741. In 1736, Knox Ward acquired the property of West Donyland outside Colchester. Knox Ward married Eliza Nettleton and together they had two sons and two daughters. At Knox's death in 1746, West Donyland passed to his son, Ralph Ward. The reason for Knox Ward moving to Essex may rest with one of his aunts. Margaret Ward, another of William and Mary's daughters, married David Gansell in 1714 and lived at the Gansell home, East Donyland, southeast of Colchester. It is probable that Knox Ward became aware of property near Colchester through his Aunt Margaret.

Ralph Ward, the elder son of Knox and Eliza, was a lawyer in London. He and his wife Ann had two daughters, Maria and Elizabeth and one son, James. It is this James Ward, born in 1761, who sailed with Cook.

James Ward's great great grandfather, William Ward of Cleveland, was also the grandfather of George Jackson, who from 1766 was Second Secretary to the Admiralty. Different strands of the family were in contact and it was probably on George Jackson's recommendation that the young James entered the Naval Academy at Portsmouth in 1772. He remained there until 1775 and during this time became a very close friend of James Trevenen. Ward and Trevenen, together with a third Portsmouth graduate, William Charlton joined Cook for the Third Voyage. Ward's appointment with Cook once again probably owed much to George Jackson. After sailing with Cook, Trevenen and Ward corresponded and stayed with each other.

James Ward became a lieutenant in August 1782 and saw service in the East Indies under James Burney from 1782 until 1786. His subsequent naval record is thin, though he is mentioned in May 1793 as being in charge of the Sandwich cutter at the Scilly Isles with two captured French privateers.

James Ward died on 28 September 1806 aged 45 and was buried at St. Michael's, Berechurch. There is no indication that he ever married or had children. His father, Ralph, outlived him and Ralph's will, written in 1795, mentions his son James but no wife. A codicil, dated August 1808, acknowledges James' death but mentions no dependents. Of James' sisters, Maria never married while Elizabeth married Nicholas Tomlinson (later a vice admiral) and they had two sons.

John Robson

 

Originally published in Cook's Log, page 24, volume 29, number 2 (2006).

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Lada Syrovatko
Very interesting letters from James Trevenen to James Ward have survived (about 20 of them, from 1783 to 1787). I'm writing a book about James Trevenen; It seems that these letters, before I received their scans, were only read by address and sender. From these letters, in particular, it is possible to determine the year of death of midshipman George Gilbert, the author of the diary about the third expedition of James Cook. Ward and Trevenen kept in touch with him, and the context suggests that in 1786 Ward informed Trevenen that Giobret was dying. From the context of the letter, it can be assumed that it was some kind of unusual illness, perhaps with a mental disorder, since Trevenen literally writes the following: "Helston, April 20th 1786. Your account of poor Gilbert has given my infinite pain and I am very anxcious. I hear the event of his disorder. It seems indeed to be very little doubtful, and I fancy I may safely conclude that he is at present in a much easier situation than he was at the time your letter was written. I entirely agree with you that in this base he is not to be so much regretted as his friends; for the dreadful Vale of Death once past the greatest Evil we fear is past, and whether it arrives 40 years sooner a later is a matter of very little consequence when a further eternal State is brough into the Consideration of the Subject. This life is sometimes a very pleasant kind of life; and worth enjoying, but at other it is no much the Reverse, and both weighed together, make but a very inferior kind of Existence, surely only a state of probation, anterior to one more perfut and compleat. And the fiery ordeal past the sooner determined the better. The Honest Fellow will certainly be very much wisped by his father, who, if I remembered, might had a greater esteem for him than for his brother, and of his sister the lop must be irreparable. What a Wretched disorder to die of; it seen no to the strange that I should never have known that he had not had of. When you mentioned his being in a bad way. I mostantly imagined a consumption for him, owing of his figure and manner." The same letter mentions the receipt of a detailed letter from Edward Riou from Paris. This trio - Trevenen, Ward and Riou - apparently were the strongest friends and until the last days there was active correspondence between them with the slightest details. Riou and Trevenen philosophize a lot; Riou is very serious - and Trevenen is serious with him. In his letters to Ward, he speaks of "Ned" with great tenderness. Riou such a moral compass for him.Trevenen and Ward discuss books, engravings, caricatures, music, and Trevenen often tells him “anecdotes from life.” Such a quirk of fate: the funeral service for Trevenen in Russia and Ward in England was performed by the same person - Reverend William Tooke. Ward's obituary was most likely written by Took's son. The obituary mentions that Ward's favorite stories were memories of Trevenen and Riou, and he could never keep from crying when talking about them.
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