10. Criminal sentencing helped to expand the Empire into Australia in the late 1700s.
Following the loss of the thirteen American colonies, the courts of Great Britain no longer had the option of sentencing felons to transportation to America (which was one of the grievances mentioned in the American Declaration of Independence). James Cook had explored the East Coast of Australia in 1770 and claimed the continent for Great Britain. The Dutch had discovered the West Coast in 1606, named it New Holland, but otherwise left it alone. Cook named the areas he claimed New South Wales, and his botanist on the voyage charted Botany Bay, presenting it to Parliament as an alternative to North America for the transportation of convicts.