Forby SutherlandPrint Page

The monument commemorates Scottish seaman Forby Sutherland.

During the Endeavour’s brief stay in 1770, a Scottish seamen named Forbus (Forby) Sutherland died from tuberculosis. He was buried on May 1 on the beach at Kurnell, just above highwater mark. The approximate site of the grave was located in 1923 by the Royal Australian Historical Society, and marked. Recording Sutherland’s death in the ship’s log, Cook noted that he had named the northwest point ‘Point Sutherland’ in his memory.

Eighteen years before the First Fleet arrived at Sydney a British citizen had found his last resting-place in Australia. He was Forby Sutherland, an able-bodied seaman of H.M.S. Endeavour, who died of consumption at Botany Bay and was buried, by Captain Cook's orders, at a spot on the southern headland of the bay. On Saturday, almost exactly 163 years after his death, a memorial stone will be unveiled at the place where Sutherland is believed to have been buried. Little is known of Forbes Sutherland, or "Forby" Sutherland, as he is called in the log of the Endeavour. He was a Scot. It is believed that he was employed as a farm hand, and that he won the favour of his employer, who sent him to a school for seamen, whence he found his way into the crew of the Endeavour.

Throughout the voyage Sutherland had suffered from consumption. The Endeavour had been anchored in Botany Bay for several days when he died. The following day Cook made the following entry in his private log: "Last night departed this life Forby Sutherland, seaman, who died of consumption, and in the A.M. his body was entard(sic) ashore at the watering place. The circumstance occasioned my calling the south point of this bay Sutherland's Point." Cook marked the point, which is west of Cape Solander, on his chart of the bay. Thus the name of this obscure British seaman became perpetuated.
The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW),  28 April 1933.

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