Captain Cook Memorial Museum him on as apprentice seaman for a three-year term. Cook served Walker first as apprentice, then as seaman and lastly as master’s mate until he joined the Royal Navy in 1755. He spent most of his time at sea on Walker’s colliers, mainly in the coal trade between the Tyne and London but including voyages to the Baltic and Dublin. The Whitby historian George Young, ‘Life of Cook’ 1836, stated that during Cook’s apprenticeship Walker retained Cook in Whitby on occasion and lodged him in the attic of the house in Grape Lane. There should be no difficulty in accepting
British soldiers in the eighteenth century to captain and six years before becoming a major, improving the quality of the officers through the experience gained. During the 18th century the weapon of choice was the Brown Bess musket which had been used by the army since the 1730s. The pike had been replaced by the use of the musket in the early 18th century. There were many different patterns of musket fired during the 18th century, but the weapon normally favoured a flintlock mechanism which was more reliable than the preceding matchlock system used during the English Civil War in the 17th century. Bayonets were used