Dampier, William (1651 - 1715)

Summary

William Dampier led a chequered career which included periods as a buccaneer, West Indian planter, and Royal Navy officer. He was the first Englishman to publish reports of what is now Australia, and the first to circumnavigate the world three times. His initial visit to Australia was to the west coast as navigator on board Cygnet. The ship anchored near King George Sound between January and March 1688, before making an extended visit to southeast Asian countries. Dampier's account of this voyage included the earliest notes on the flora, fauna and indigenous people of Australia, and highly-regarded observations on the currents and winds in the Pacific region. As captain of the Royal Navy ship Roebuck Dampier was again off the coast of Western Australia, in the region of Shark Bay (which he named) in August to September 1699. From here he sailed north into New Guinean waters, despite the parlous condition of his ship, and discovered New Britain. One outcome of this voyage was his court-martial as unfit to command any Navy ship. Dampier's publications describing his voyages were exceptionally popular and ran to multiple editions. The endemic Australian plant genus Dampiera (Goodeniaceae) was named in his honour, as were a number of geographic features including the town of Dampier and the Dampier Archipelago, Western Australia.

Details

Chronology

c. 1670 - c. 1672

Career position - Able Seaman, Dutch East India Company

1672 - c. 1674

Military service - Served with the Royal Navy, Britian

1672 - 1674

Military service - Fought in the Third Dutch War

1674

Life event - Travelled to Jamaica on the ship Content

c. 1674 - 1679

Life event - Planter in the West Indies, and buccaneer raiding the Spanish Caribbean colonies

1679 - 1683

Career event - Served with Bartholomew Sharp in Central and South American waters

1683 - 1686

Career event - Served with buccaneers John Cooke and Edward Davis in South American and Pacific waters

c. 1686 - c. 1691

Career position - Crew member in Cygnet

March 1686 - 1691

Career position - Navigator on board Cygnet, exploring South East Asia, Asia and Australasia including the northern coast of Australia, China, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Nicobar Islands, and Islands of the Eastern Archipelago

1691

Life event - Returned to England

1697

Career event - Published A new voyage round the world

c. 1698

Career event - Provided navigation advice, Council of Trade in England

1699 - 1701

Career position - Captain, H.M.S. Roebuck, exploring the South Seas reaching Timor and New Guinea

1702

Career event - Deemed unfit to command His Majesty's Ships

1703

Career position - Privateer in St George, on expedition to the South Seas

1703

Career event - Published A voyage to New Holland, volume 3

1708 - 1711

Career position - Privateer Pilot in Duke, exploring the Pacific Ocean

1709

Career event - Published A continuation of a voyage to New Holland

Archival resources

Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science

• Australian Botanists - Biographies, MS 064; Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science. Details

Published resources

Books

• Dampier, William, A new voyage round the world: describing particularly the isthmus of America, several coasts and islands in the West Indies, the Isles of Cape Verd, the passage by Terra del Fuego, the south sea coasts of Chile, Peru, and Mexico, the Isle of Guam, one of the Ladrones, Mindanao and other Philippine and East India islands near Cambodia, China, Formosa, Luconia, Celebes, &c., New Holland, Sumatra, Nicobar Isles, the Cape of Good Hope, and Santa Hellena: their soil, rivers, harbours, plants, fruits, animals, and inhabitants: their customs, religion, government, trade (London: Printed for James Knapton, 1697), 550 pp. Details
• Dampier, william, A voyage to New Holland, &c. in the year, 1699: wherein are described, the Canary-Islands, the isles of Mayo and St. Jago: the Bay of All Saints, with the forts and town of Bahia in Brasil: Cape Salvadore: the winds on the Brasilian coast: Abrohlo-Shoals: a table of all the variations observ'd in this voyage: occurrences near the Cape of Good Hope: the course to New Holland: Shark's Bay: the isles and coast, &c. of New Holland: their inhabitants, manners, customs, trade, &c., their harbours, soil, beasts, birds, fish, &c., trees,plants, fruits, &c. Illustrated with several maps and draughts: also divers birds, fishes, and plants, not found in this part of the world...: vol. III (London: Printed for James Knapton, 1703), [24], 162 pp. Details
• Dampier, William, A continuation of a voyage to New-Holland, &c. in the year 1699: wherein are described, the islands Timor, Rotee and Anabao: a passage between the islands Timor and Anabao, Copang and Laphao Bays: the islands Omba, Fetter, Bande and Bird: a description of the coast of New-Guinea [etc] (London: Printed by W. Botham; for James Knapton, 1709), [16], 198, [10] pp. Details
• Dampier, William, A Continuation Of A Voyage To New Holland (James and John Knapton, 1729). http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks/e00047.html. Details
• Dampier, William, A Voyage to New Holland Etc In the Year 1699 (St. Pauls Churchyard, England: James and John Knapton, 1729), http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks/e00046.html. Details
• Dampier, William, A New Voyage Round the World: the Journal of an English Buccaneer (London: Hummingbird Press, 1998), 284 pp. http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0500461h.html. Details
• George, Alex S., William Dampier in New Holland: Australia's First Natural Historian (Hawthorn, Victoria: Blooming Books, 1999), 191 pp. Details
• Marchant, Leslie R., An island unto itself: William Dampier and New Holland (Victoria Park, W.A.: Hesperian Press, 1988), 208 pp. Details
• Mitchell, Adrian, Dampier's monkey: the South Seas Voyages of William Dampier (Kent Town, S.A.: Wakefield Press, 2011), 545 pp. Details
• Pinkerton, John, Early Australian Voyages: Pelsart, Tasman, Dampier (London, England: Cassell & Co, 1886). Details
• Williams, Glyn, Naturalists at Sea: Scientific Travellers from Dampier to Darwin (New Haven, Connecticut/London: Yale University Press, 2013), 309 pp. Details

Book Sections

• Bach, J., 'Dampier, William (1651-1715)' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 1: 1788 - 1850 A-H, Douglas Pike, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1966), pp. 277-278. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A010265b.htm. Details
• Baer, Joel H., 'William Dampier, 1651-1715' in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). Details
• Dear, I.C.B.; and Kemp, Peter, 'Dampier, William' in The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea (Oxford University Press, 2006), https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199205684.001.0001/acref-9780199205684-e-745. Details

Conference Papers

• Williams, Gary C., 'William Dampier: Pre-Linnean Explorer, Naturalist, Buccaneer', in Impact of Travels on Scientific Knowledge edited by Michael T. Ghiselin and Alan E. Leviton (San Francisco: California Academy of Sciences, 2004), pp. 146-166.. Details

Edited Books

• Howse, Derek ed., Background to Discovery: Pacific Exploration from Dampier to Cook (Berkley: University of California Press, 1990), 226 pp. Details
• Norris, Gerlad ed., William Dampier, buccaneer explorer (London: Folio Society, 1994), 268 pp. Details

Journal Articles

• George, A. S., 'The plants seen and collected in north-western Australia by William Dampier', Western Australian Naturalist, 11 (1971), 173-8. Details
• George, Alex, 'William Dampier as a natural historian', The Great Circle: Journal of the Australian Association for Maritime History, 37 (1) (2015), 36-52. Details
• Gillbank, Linden, 'Of Victorian specimens and species: the naming of Dampiera galbraithiana in honour of Jean Galbraith', The Victorian naturalist, 143 (3) (2017), 76-80. Details
• Kemp, John, 'William Dampier: Navigator Extraordinary', Journal of Navigation, 67 (4) (2014), 545-67. Details
• Konishi, Shino, 'The "brilliant shells" of Shark Bay: the emotions of shell-collecting', Studies in Western Australian history, 35 (2020), 21-36. Details
• Marner, Serena K., 'Investigating the history of the botanical collections made by William Dampier in 1699 from "New Holland"', Studies in Western Australian history, 35 (5-20) (2020). Details
• McCarthy, M., 'A brief Dampier chronology', The Great Circle: Journal of the Australian Association for Maritime History, 37 (1) (2015), i-xii. Details
• Williams, Gary C., 'William Dampier: Science, Exploration and Literary Influence, including his Hydrographic Treatise of 1699', Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, Series 4, 59 (14) (2008), 533-663. Details
• Williams, Gary C., 'The historical context and influence of William Dampier's hydrographic science', The Great Circle: Journal of the Australian Association for Maritime History, 37 (1) (2015), 53-81. Details

Resources

• VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/12377608. Details
• Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q221125. Details
• 'Dampier, William (1652-1715)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-1228973. Details

See also

• Serle, Percival, Dictionary of Australian biography (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1949). Details