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On This Day: Polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton dies while sailing to the Antarctic
The 47-year-old, who was planning to circumnavigate the icy continent, perished off the coast of South Georgia three months after setting sail aboard Quest from England
JANUARY 5, 1922: Legendary British polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton died on this day in 1922 - after suffering a heart attack on a ship headed to the Antarctic.
The 47-year-old, who was planning to circumnavigate the icy continent, perished off the coast of South Georgia three months after setting sail aboard Quest from England.
Shackleton, who is famed for cheating death in the most daring escape ever from Antarctica in 1915, refused to quit after suffering a suspected heart attack days earlier.
And, minutes before dying, he lambasted the expedition’s physician Alexander Macklin when he suggested that the seasoned explorer 'lead a more regular life'.
'You are always wanting me to give up things, what is it I ought to give up?' asked Shackleton, to which Dr Macklin replied: 'Chiefly alcohol, Boss.'
He was buried on South Georgia, the nearest inhabited island to Antarctica, after his wife Emily suggested it rather than bring him home.
Dr Macklin recorded in his diary: 'I think this is as the Boss would have had it himself, standing lonely in an island far from civilisation, surrounded by stormy tempestuous seas, and in the vicinity of one of his greatest exploits.'
A memorial service was later held at St Paul’s Cathedral in London.
It was attended by King George V, whose father knighted Shackleton in 1909 after he came within 100 miles of the South Pole – the closest anyone ever come at that time.
A silent British Pathé newsreel, titled 'Empire mourns loss of great Polar Explorer', showed Shackleton speaking to a camera just prior to his departure in September.
[On This Day: Captain Scott sets off on doomed Antarctic expedition]
This farewell address was, according to maker Harry Grindell Matthews, the first 'talking picture' ever made, although the sound recording has not survived.
Shackleton, who led the last mission of the so-called Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration that began in 1897, had many admirers.
The Irish-born and London-raised son of protestant Co Kildare landowners made his mark after joining Robert Falcon Scott’s first Discovery expedition in 1901.
But, while Scott died on his second visit in 1912 after a doomed race to the South Pole that was won by Norwegian Roald Amundsen, Shackleton made three trips.
And it was his third trip, or Endurance expedition, in which he tried and failed to cross the Antarctic by land, that really cemented his image as a public hero.
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After leaving Plymouth on August 8, 1914 –only days after the First World War had started – the ship became stuck in ice the following February.
The crew of 28 men camped in freezing conditions for more than a year hoping that ice floes would either take them to safety or the thaw.
It did not - and eventually Endurance began to sink with the men still stuck on the ice – so Shackleton decided to launch their three lifeboats.
In April 1916, they crammed into 22ft-long open vessels and spent seven days at sea in temperatures as low as –30C before reaching Elephant Island.
But the island, which lies 150 miles northeast of the Arctic Peninsula, was still extremely frigid, uninhabited, rarely visited by whalers who might help rescue them.
[Shackleton's epic voyage recreated by explorers]
So Shackleton and five other volunteered to take the James Caird lifeboat on an 800-mile trip to South Georgia, which remains a British territory.
They braved hurricane winds and took 16 days to get there – before spending a further 11 days trekking over the remote and mountainous island to get help on the other side.
Shackleton then sailed back round to where they had first landed to pick up his three sick crewmates before heading back to Elephant Island to rescue the other 22.
The explorers did not return to England until May 29, 1917 – and the explorer instantly volunteered for the Army.
In the midst of the war – and the more enduring myth of Scott’s heroism – Shackleton was largely forgotten.
But his image as a tenacious leader was renewed in the late 20th century when a number of historians began reappraising the polar explorers.
Many praised Shackleton as a 'model leader' while accusing his earlier master of being seriously 'flawed' and needlessly leading men to their deaths.
And, in a 2002 BBC poll to determine the '100 Greatest Britons', Shackleton was ranked eleventh while Scott was down in 54th place.
