William Neale collection

The collection comprises of material relating to the British Exploring Expedition, 1881-1882 (leader Benjamin Leigh Smith) to the Russian Arctic (Zemlya Frantsa-Iosifa) and correspondence by Neale with the polar explorers William Speirs Bruce, Benjamin Leigh Smith and Allan Young

In 1880, William Henry Neale served as surgeon in Eira on the British Exploring Expedition (leader Benjamin Leigh Smith), a private venture to Svalbard and Russian Arctic waters, exploring 176 km of new coast in Zemlya Frantsa-Iosifa. He returned as surgeon in Eira on the British Exploring Expedition, 1881-1882 (leader Benjamin Leigh Smith), a private expedition to extend the exploration of Zemlya Frantsa-Iosifa. After Eira was nipped in the ice and sank off Mys Flora in August 1881, the crew lived in a makeshift hut for ten months, setting out in the ship's four boats in June 1882 and reaching Novaya Zemlya, where they met Hope commanded by Allen Young. The expedition sailed back to Aberdeen in August 1882. The following year, Neale was elected a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. He practised medicine in St. John's Wood and South Hampstead, London, for nearly fifty years. He died in 1939.

The collection is split into two sub-fonds comprising of expedition material and correspondence respectively

By appointment.

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The term holograph is used when the item is wholly in the handwriting of the author. The term autograph is used when the author has signed the item.

Descriptions compiled by N. Boneham, Assistant Archivist with assistance from R. Stancombe and reference to Arctic, exploration and development c500 BC to 1915, an encyclopaedia by Clive Holland, Garland Publishing, London (1994) and Exploring Polar Frontiers, a historical encyclopaedia by William Mills, San Diego and Oxford, 2003 and 'William Henry Neale' by Brian Roberts in The Geographical Journal volume 94 number 3 July to December 1939 p260-261

Clive Holland Manuscripts in the Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, England - a catalogue, Garland Publishing New York and London (1982) ISBN 0824093941.

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