Antarctic exploration yesterday and today

Extract

On 1 January 19081 left New Zealand for Antarctica with Ernest Shackleton, in a 220-ton barquentine with auxiliary engines of 40 horse-power. Two years later, on a 750 ton barque—the Terra Nova—I left again with Scott on his famous but ill-fated journey during which the South Pole was actually reached. Half a century later I journeyed south again—in just as good company but under vastly different conditions—first in the Royal Yacht Britannia with H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh and then as the guest of the Americans on their great expedition, Operation “Deep Freeze IV”. I am the last survivor of Scott's Northern Party and first I want to give some idea of adventures at that time, for they were both varied and typical of those days, if somewhat extreme, and point well the contrast between then and now.