Shackleton and the end of the Heroic Age
Shackleton and the end of the Heroic Age is a element of the Exploration of the Antarctic: Part 8. Highlights of this era are:
- Douglas Mawson, a member of the team, returned at the head of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition (1911-14) explored regions of the Antarctic coast, west of the Ross Sea.
- the Second German Antarctic Expedition (1911-13).
- A Japanese Antarctic expedition (1910-12) had modest success moving south from the Ross Ice Sheet.
The Endurance trapped in ice. Photo by Frank Hurley, courtesy of the Macklin Collection. (Source: NSIDC) Details of the Shackleton expedition
Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (1914-16) was a total disaster in terms of its goal of crossing the entire Antarctic continent from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea. It did provide, however, an adventure story with a happy ending to counterbalance the tragedy of Scott's expedition.
Shackleton’s ship, the Endurance, became trapped in the ice of the Weddell Sea on January 18, 1915. For several months, the ship drifted with the ice until it was finally crushed, forcing the crew to abandoned the ship. With the help of dogs, they began walking across the ice. They pulled three lifeboats until they found it too difficult and built a small camp. The dogs were killed for food and the expedition waited for the drift of the ice to carry them northward.
The Endurance wrecked and crushed by the ice. Photo by Frank Hurley, courtesy of the Macklin Collection. (Source: NSIDC) On April 9, 1916, after 164 days of drifting, the ice floe they were camped on finally reached the ice edge and began to break up. They boarded their three small lifeboats and sailed through rough seas, with little food or water, for seven days. Eventually, they reached small, uninhabited Elephant Island near the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. For the first time in 497 days, the men stood on real ground. However, the island was small, unsheltered, and far from any sailing routes. The chance of being rescued by a passing ship was minimal. No one knew where they were, or even that they were in trouble.
Shackleton decided that the only hope of saving his crew was for a small group to attempt to sail to South Georgia Island, which had a whaling station and likely had a ship that could come back and rescue the rest of the crew on Elephant Island. South Georgia Island is 1,287 kilometers (800 miles) to the east of Elephant Island, across some of the roughest seas in the world. Shackleton hoped to do it with rudimentary navigational equipment in the largest (6.7 meter or 22 foot) of the lifeboats. After 14 days of sailing, the crew ran out of fresh water. Fortunately, on the verge of dehydration, they reached South Georgia Island two days later. After a 36-hour hike across a steep and snowy mountain range, they reached the whaling station; their first encounter with civilization in 531 days.
Shackleton could not rest long at the whaling station. He needed to return to Elephant Island and save the rest of his crew. Even though he left immediately, it took three attempts and more than three months to rescue the crew because sea ice prevented the ships from reaching the island. Finally, on August 30, 1916, the rescue ship made it to Elephant Island. Amazingly, after 143 days on Elephant Island, 307 days since abandoning the Endurance, and almost two years after the beginning of the expedition, not a single person in the expedition perished.
A little-known part of this story involves the Aurora, that sailed to the other side of the Antarctic continent to haul supplies for Shackleton’s planned trek across the continent. The Aurora crew also encountered harsh conditions, and three crew members were killed when they left the ship. They unwisely ventured onto unstable sea ice. A blizzard appeared, and they were never heard from again.
Shackleton was returning to Antarctica in early 1922 to undertake another expedition, this time to circumnavigate the continent, when he died. However, the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration had passed already when the catastrophe of the First World War (1914-1918) diverted the enthusiasm and resources needed for major expeditions.
Further reading
- Antarctica: Exploring the Extreme: 400 Years of Adventureby Marilyn J. Landis, Chicago Review Press, 2001
- South Pole: A Narrative History of the Exploration of Antarctica by Anthony Brandt, NG Adventure Classics, 2004
- Index to Antarctic Expeditions, Scott Polar Research Institute, retrieved November 1, 2008
- The Antarctic Circle
- Exploring Polar Frontiers: An Historical Encyclopedia, William James Mills, ABC-CLIO, 2003
- Antarctic History, 70 South, retrieved November 1, 2008
- The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition, Caroline Alexander, Knopf, 1998
- South: The Endurance Exbidition
