Nicholas Young, a young orphan, sailed with James Cook in 1768 and died in Batavia over two years later. Or did he…?

Legacies explores the notion that ‘Young Nick’ did not perish from malaria, but survived to sail with Cook two more times before returning to England. A now dashing man-of-the-world, he falls in love but is compelled to leave London. He then winds up in Africa, Cape Town, where he builds a new life.

This new life includes a growing family which over fifty years extends to the Mediterranean, the Arctic, Britain and Canada. In the process, the Young family also mixes with numerous historical figures from Sir Joseph Banks and Mary Wollstonecraft to Sir John Franklin and Alexander von Humboldt.