Mountbatten Medallic History of Great Britain and the Sea Medal: Captian Scott, Antarctic Exped…

Images(2)

Mountbatten Medallic History of Great Britain and the Sea Medal: Captian Scott, Antarctic Expeditions

AssociatedAssociated with Lord Mountbatten of Burma (Frogmore House, Windsor, England, 1900 - 1979)

Medallist John Pinches, Medallists

DateMay 2004

Object NameMedal

MediumSterling Silver

ClassificationsMedals

LocationView by Appointment - Aberdeen Treasure Hub

Object numberABDMS072500.76

Keywords

Commemorative

About MeAfter the discovery of the North Pole by the American Robert Peary in 1909, a race for the South Pole was inevitable, but it was not this which first drew Captain Robert Falcon Scott to the Antarctic. In 1901 he went as leader of an expedition to find out what lay south of the Ross Barner, which had been discovered half a century earlier.

Scott sailed in the Discovery (700 tons), which remains a monument to his memory moored off the Embankment in London. With him was Ernest Shackleton, who was to make, his own reputation, and Dr. Edmund Wilson, who became Scott's closest friend and whose, body lay beside his at the end. This scientific expedition found the great mountain range which encircles the plateau on which the South Pole is situated. Its members reached 82° 15" S, 2~ miles beyond the previous record.

Scott's last expedition left England in the Terra Nova (764 tons) in August 1910. A Melbourne they learned that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen (who had in 1904 been the first to negotiate the North-West Passage) was on his way to the Bay of Whales with the intention of teaching the South Pole first. He was using Nansen's ship, the Fram, in which the drift of the Arctic Ocean had been surveyed.

Amundsen was an experienced explorer, having learned the practice of dog-sledging from the Eskimos, whereas Scott preferred to use ponies because he disliked killing and eating dogs. Scott may not have been as good a planner, nor did he enjoy his rival's luck with the weather. However, Apsley Cherry-Garrard (his companion who wrote the best book about the tragic journey) found him an outstanding leader - 'the strongest combination of a strong mind in, strong body that I have ever known.'

Bad luck dogged the group-Scott himself, Dr. Wilson, Captain Gates, Petty Officer Evans, Lieutenant Bowers - from the start. Progress was delayed by accidents and bad weather so that by the date op which Scott reached the Pole -17th January, 1912 - he found that Amundsen (who had started on 19th October, 1911) had already planted the Norwegian flag there on 14th December.

The 800-mile journey back was appalling. Two of Scott's companions died. The last entry in his diary, for 29th March, reads: 'Outside the tent it remains a whirling drift. We are getting weaker and the end cannot be far. It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more. For God's sake, look after our people.' The following November his tent, with three bodies inside, was finally discovered by a rescue party.

If Amundsen achieved more, Scott's was the greater glory. The story of his tragic end has become a famous episode in the epic of national heroes.

The Mountbatten Medallic History of Great Britain and the Sea, John Pinches Medallists Ltd.