Remember what happened after the 'Pilgrim Fathers'. Nearly 150 years later it was a Plymouth expedition that opened up Australasia to the English settlers. In 1768 Captain Cook left Plymouth in the ship 'Endeavour', and explored the shores of New Zealand and New South Wales. This voyage was followed by another in 1772, when Cook, in the two warships 'Resolution' and 'Discovery', again weighed anchor in Plymouth Sound and sailed to Australian waters, on further explorations. These two voyages revealed something of the potentialities buried in the then almost unknown continent, and the British Parliament, having no place of banishment for criminals since the loss of the American colonies, determined' in 1786, to found a penal colony in Botany Bay, and early in 1787 the first party of 800 convicts left England for Australia. (Another picture to follow)


