History of Endurance

Admin   12 Aug 2024  

In late 1914 the world was threatened by war. Shackleton volunteered to cancel his plans for an expedition and placed his ship at the disposal of the UK Government. The First Sea Lord, Winston Churchill, instructed him, however, to proceed. Shackleton accordingly headed south, but chose to avoid the Falkland Islands, which he reckoned might be attacked by the Imperial German Navy, and to approach Antarctica from the relative safety of South Georgia. And indeed, it was as Endurance entered the Weddell Sea that the British and German fleets engaged in the Battle of the Falklands.

Shackleton’s aim for his Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (the “Endurance Expedition”) was to achieve the first crossing of the White Continent from the Weddell Sea via the South Pole to the Ross Sea.

While Shackleton would lead a party that would set off for the Pole from the Weddell Sea, a separate party was to be landed on the shores of the Ross Sea with the objective of placing supplies from the Pole to the Ross Sea that would support Shackleton’s party on the second part of their crossing of Antarctica. Despite many difficulties, the members of the Ross Sea party succeeded in placing the supplies as planned. Tragically three members of the expedition died before the party was picked up from their base on the Ross Sea.

Endurance too encountered difficulties, becoming stuck in the dense pack ice in early 1915 and the crew had no choice but to abandon ship and set up a makeshift camp on the ice, as the sea ice overwhelmed the ship. On that day, 21st November 1915, Captain Frank Worsley wrote the coordinates of the location in which the ship sank in his diary: 68°39’ 30”S, 52°26’30”W. One of the objectives of the Endurance22 expedition is to use that information to help locate the lost vessel.

The band of 28 crew would have had to draw upon every ounce of strength, tenacity and courage that they possessed in order to survive the failed expedition, which is now remembered in history as one of the most epic feats of endurance in the heroic age of Antarctic exploration.

They trekked to the edge of the sea ice, then sailed in the salvaged ship’s lifeboats to Elephant Island where there were seals and penguins to eat and a sheltered bay in which to camp under the upturned lifeboats.

However, knowing that it was unlikely that anyone would come to Elephant Island to rescue them because it was so remote, Shackleton and Worsley led a small party in one of the open boats to South Georgia, where there was a whaling station. Worsley navigated with just a sextant over the wild seas of the Southern Ocean. Landing on the south side of the island, Sir Ernest then had to traverse the hitherto uncharted and uncrossed mountains and glaciers to reach the Norwegian whalers. Rescue missions to reach the stranded expedition members at Elephant island were thwarted by the thick sea ice. Finally, on 30 August 1916, the fourth attempt was a success, and the expedition party on Elephant Island was taken to safety in Punta Arenas by the Chilean tug ‘Yelcho’.