George Bass was born in Aswarby, Lincolnshire in England in1771. As a British Explorer and a Naval Surgeon he proved the existence of the sea passage between Australia and Tasmania in 1798. In 1789 Bass joined the Company of Surgeons, and in 1795, he travelled to Port Jackson in Sydney Harbour, Australia on a vessel called the Reliance. He travelled with Matthew Flinders, an explorer who also served on the Reliance. He and Bass with the help of Bass's servant William Martin, explored Botany Bay near Sydney and Georges river nearby. In 1796, they stumbled into a site which is now called Port Hacking.
In 1797, upon a whaleboat, Bass Sailed to Cape Howe, the farthest point of south-eastern Australia. From here he voyaged to Bass Strait, over the length of the southern coast as far as near present day Melbourne. Although he was not sure that the strait connected with the Pacific and Indian oceans, his belief that a strait separated Tasmania was backed up by the noticing of the rapid tide and the long south-western swell at Wilson's Promontory. In 1798, the theory was made fact when Bass and Flinders, in the sailing boat Norfolk, sailed around Tasmania. Bass later disappeared at sea in 1803.
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