Botany Bay, New South Wales
Initially the name Stingray Bay was used by Cook and other journal keepers on his expedition, for the stingrays they caught. That name was recorded on an Admiralty chart too. Cook's log for 6th May 1770 records "the great quantity of these sort of fish found in this place occasioned my giving it the name of Stingrays Harbour". But in his journal (prepared later from his log) he changed to "The great quantity of plants Mr. Banks and Dr. Solander found in this place occasioned my giving it the Name of Botany Bay".
Cook's Landing Place
In 1770, Lieutenant James Cook landed at Botany Bay's Inscription Point on the Kurnell Peninsula headland. He and his Endeavour crew stayed in the area for eight days and had a dramatic impact on Australian history. Located near Silver Beach, Cook's landing place is a popular Sydney attraction. Now heritage-listed, this reserve interprets the story of the meeting of European and Aboriginal cultures.
James Cook memorial, Kurnell
Cook's Landing Place has memorials to Cook and his fellow travellers, naturalists Joseph Banks and Carl Solander, a marker and plaque identifying the exact spot where they came ashore.
Memorial to Sir Joseph Banks
Botany Bay is the resting place the first two Europeans to have been buried in marked graves on Australian soil. Near Cook's Landing Place is the grave of Scottish Seaman Forbus (Forby) Sutherland, of James Cook's Endeavour who died of tuberculosis on 30th April, 1770, the day after the vessel was brought to anchor in Botany Bay. His body was brought ashore and buried the following day near a watering place used by Cook (the small creek still flows today) who named the nearby headland Point Sutherland in his memory. The location is marked by a cairn.
The grave of Scottish Seaman Forbus (Forby) Sutherland
On the northern shore, at La Perouse, is another grave, that of French Franciscan friar Claude-Francois Joseph (Pere) Receveur, who came to Australia on La Boussole in January 1788 at the time of the arrival of the first fleet. L'Astrolabe and La Boussole, commanded by La Compt de La Perouse, were on an expedition of discovery and exploration into the Pacific.
Memorial to Sir Joseph Banks
Cape Solander
Cape Solander is undoubtedly one of Sydney's best whale watching spots - June/July is the best time to see humpback whales as they migrate to warmer waters. If you're lucky you won't even need to look far - whales have been known to swim as close as 200m from the coast. Named after botanist Daniel Solander, Cape Solander features a lookout with a viewing platform - the perfect vantage point - along with information on whales seen in Sydney waters. Friendly volunteers are there to provide information throughout the season.Banks-Solander Track is an easy walk in Kamay Botany Bay National Park. Many of Australia s plants were first collected and described in the area by Cook's botanists, Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander, in 1770. The track features informative panels showcasing numerous plant types that fascinated Banks and Solander more than 240 years ago.
Bare Island
The small island just inside the heads was described by Captain James Cook as 'a small bare island'. It was never given a name, and so the notation on Cook's charts stayed as the means of identifaction of this small island at the head of Botany Bay.Bare Island was part of the traditional land of the Gweagal and Kameygal Aboriginal tribes. The island was fortified in 1885, according to a design by colonial architect, James Barnet (1827 1904), and fitted with heavy guns. In 1912 Bare Island became a retirement home for war veterans, which continued to operate until 1963 when it was handed over to the New South Wales Parks and Wildlife Service for use as a museum and tourist attraction. Bare Island is connected by a footbridge to the suburb of La Perouse. The historic military fort and tunnels can only be visited by guided tour. The waters around the island are popular with scuba divers.
La Perouse
The La Perouse peninsula is the northern headland of Botany Bay. A large area of La Perouse is open space, where one can find the old military outpost at Bare Island and the northern section of Botany Bay National Park. Congwong Bay Beach, Little Congwong Beach, and the beach at Frenchmans Bay provide protected swimming areas in Botany Bay. =Kurnell is located opposite, on the southern headland of Botany Bay. These features and the picturesque beaches attract large numbers of visitors to the suburb.
A stone obelisk with a globe on top which commemorates the visit to Botany Bay in January 1788 of French explorer La Perouse and his two ships L'Astrolabe and La Boussole. The two ships stayed at Botany Bay for six weeks before setting sail never to be seen again. More than a century later they later discovered wrecked on reefs at Vantikoro off the Solomon Islands. The monument was designed by Colonial Architect George Cockney to the instructions of the Governor, Sir Thomas Brisbane, and officially commemorated by Captain B.H. Bougainville. Erected in 1825, it is believed to be the oldest monument in Sydney and perhaps the whole of Australia. Several plaques have since been added which commemorate other French citizens in Australia.
Grave of Claude-Francois Joseph (Pere) Receveur
On the shores of Frenchmans Bay is the grave of French Franciscan friar Claude-Francois Joseph (Pére) Receveur, who came to Australia on La Boussole in January 1788 at the time of the arrival of the first fleet. L'Astrolabe and La Boussole, commanded by La Compt de La Perouse, were on an expedition of discovery and exploration into the Pacific. They landed on 6th December 1787 at Maouna, in the Navigator Islands in the Samoan Group, where an exploring party was attacked by natives, 12 being killed and others wounded. Among the latter was Receveur, who was a chaplain, botanist and shoemaker. He succumbed to his wounds after landing on Australian shores.
The tomb we see today was erected by Baron de Bougainville in 1825 near the grave site. The Baron commissioned and paid for the present tombstone and the monument to Laperouse, after consultation with Governor Thomas Brisbane. Both were designed and costed by the Government Architect George Cookney. The epitaph appears to have been based on the texts recorded by the First Fleet officers in early 1788, but with some change in the Latin grammar. Although commemorative Catholic Masses at the gravesite were reported as early as 1879, in 1933, 5,000 people attended the first mass 'pilgrimage' to Pére Receveur's grave.
Receveur's burial, on 17th February 1788 on the La Perouse headland, was the third recorded death and burial of an European on Australian soil. Forby Sutherland, a member of James Cook's expedition, died a few kilometres to the south of La Perouse in April 1770; William Dampier's cook, John Goodman, died in August 1699 whilst in Shark Bay; a Dutch sailor of the Duyfken is known to have died and been buried near Cape Keerweer on the Gulf of Carpentaria in March 1606, though his name was not recorded.
Receveur's grave was originally marked with a painted epitaph fixed to a tree trunk. Laperouse departed Botany Bay on 10 March 1788. Soon after, the grave marker was found to have been torn down. Governor Phillip ordered a replacement to be engraved on copper. Several officers in the First Fleet recorded the epitaph with varying degrees of consistency. When Louis Isidore Duperrey's expedition arrived in New South Wales on the Coquille in 1824, a number of the officers went in search of Laperouse's campsite and Receveur's grave on Botany Bay. One of them, Ensign Victor-Charles Lottin, recorded that after they found it.
They carved the trunk of an enormous eucalyptus which shaded the site, with the words: Prés de cet arbre reposent les cendres du pére Receveur, visité en mars 1824 [Near this tree lie the remains of Father Receveur, visited in March 1824]. The tree was later used as a windbreak for a fire, but the carved inscription was saved thanks to the efforts of Simeon Pearce, later the first mayor of Randwick. It was then exhibited at the Exposition Universelle, in Paris in 1854. Soon after, it became part of the collection of the Louvre and thence the nascent Musée de la Marine in Paris.
The First Fleet - 1788
In 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip led the First Fleet into the bay on 19th January 1788 to found a penal colony there. Finding that the sandy infertile soil of the site in fact rendered it most unsuitable for settlement, Phillip decided instead to move to the excellent natural harbor of Port Jackson to the north. On 26th January, while still anchored in the bay, the British encountered the French exploratory expedition of Jean-Francois de La Perouse. Panicked by the thought that the French might beat them to it, the colonists sailed that afternoon to found a settlement at Sydney Cove.Despite the move, for many years afterward, the Australian penal colony would be referred to as "Botany Bay" in England - and in convict ballads such as Ireland's "The Fields of Athenry". The good supply of fresh water in the area led to the expansion of its population in the 19th century. The land around Botany Bay became part of the Sydney metropolitan area with suburban expension in the early part of the 20th century. Port Botany was built in 1930 and is now a container terminal.
Frenchmans Bay
Frenchmans Bay recalls the nationality of a pair of ships that arrived in Botany Bay just va few days after the First Fleet had arrived and dropped anchor there. The expedition was led by French explorer Francois de Galaup, Comte de La Perouse who rested his crew rested here in January/February 1788. It is also the burial place of Pere Louis Receveur, a Franciscan friar who came to Australia as a scientist on L'Astrolabe with La Perouse. He died here on 17th February 1788 from an injury received during an attack by natives in Samoa two months earlier.
Molineaux Point
Molineaux Point was named by Lieut. James Cook during his visit to Botany Bay in April 1770 after Robert Molyneux, master of HMS Endeavour. Molineaux Point is not the only name to be found on the northern shores to recall the early days of European exploration and settlement. The road to the point - Phillip Bay, now known as Yarra Bay, honours the first Governor of New South Wales, Arthur Phillip who brought the first fleet safely to Botany Bay. Ironically he rejected the bay and locality now named in his honour as the site for the convict settlement of New South Wales he was commissioned to establish, preferring Sydney Cove on Port Jackson, to the north.
Cruwee Cove
Cruwee Cove, to the east of La Perouse on the shores of Little Bay towards Cape Banks, was named after an Aboriginal who, during early colonial times, claimed to have sighted James Cook's arrival at Botany Bay in 1770. He is reported to have lived to the mid 1850s. Legend has it that he watched from the bay as HM barque Endeavour enter Botany Bay when he was a young boy.
Prince Of Wales Drive recalls one of the ships of the First Fleet. It arrived in Botany Bay on 19th January 1788 carrying a cargo of convicts. Penrhyn Estuary recalls another First Fleet convict transport vessel, the Lady Penrhyn, the journey to Botany Bay being her maiden voyage. Lady Penrhyn sailed with 101 female convicts. The crew strength is believed to have been 32. Also on board were around 11 marines and officials, including a stowaway.