Balfour correspondence

This material is held atScott Polar Research Institute Archives, University of Cambridge

  • Reference
    • GB 15 Arthur Balfour/Correspondence
  • Dates of Creation
    • 9 April 1914
  • Name of Creator
  • Physical Description
    • Letter

Scope and Content

  • MS 1537/2/30/11;D Letter to Ernest Shackleton, 9 April 1914 [Declining to subscribe to Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, 1914-1916]

Administrative / Biographical History

The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, [Weddell Sea Party] 1914-1916 (leader Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton) set out to cross the Antarctic continent. When Endurance was beset this goal was abandoned. The ship drifted for ten months before being crushed in the pack ice of the Weddell Sea and sinking in 1915. The entire company spent five months on the ice before escaping in the three lifeboats to Elephant Island, South Shetland Islands. Two of the life boats were made into a shelter for the company while Shackleton, Thomas Crean, Frank Worlsey, Timothy McCarthy, Harold McNish and John Vincent sailed 1450Km to South Georgia in the James Caird. Arriving at South Georgia Shackleton, Crean and Worlsey made the first major trek across the island to the whaling station at Stromness. The steam tug Yelcho rescued the men on Elephant island in August 1916.

Arrangement

Chronological.

Related Material

The Institute holds over a forty archival collections containing material relating to this expedition see SPRI collection GB 015 Imperial trans-Antarctic Expedition, [Weddell Sea Party] 1914-1916, and Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, [Ross Sea Party] 1914-1917 for more information.