quarters, lay out depots during the autumn and the following spring, and as early as possible in 1915 set out on the journey."The Transcontinental party will be led by Sir Ernest Shackleton, and will consist of six men. It will take 100 dogs with sledges, and two motor-sledges with aerial propellers. The equipment will embody everything that the experience of the leader and his expert advisers can suggest. When this party has reached the area of the Pole, after covering 800 miles of unknown ground, it will strike
due north towards the head of the Beardmore Glacier, and there it is hoped to meet the outcoming party from the Ross Sea. Both will join up and make for the Ross Sea base, where the previous Expedition had its winter quarters.
"In all, fourteen men will be landed by the Endurance on the Weddell Sea. Six will set out on the Transcontinental journey, three will go westward, three eastward, and two remain at the base carrying on the work already outlined.
"The Aurora will land six men at the Ross Sea base. They will lay down depots on the route of the Transcontinental party, and make a march south to assist that party, and to make geological and other observations as already described.
"Should the Transcontinental party succeed, as is hoped, in crossing during the first season, its return to civilization may be expected about April 1915. The other sections in April 1916.
"The Ships of the Expedition.
"The two ships for the Expedition have now been selected.
"The Endurance, the ship which will take the Transcontinental party to the Weddell Sea, and will afterwards explore along an unknown coast-line, is a new vessel, specially constructed for Polar work under the supervision of a committee of Polar explorers. She was built by Christensen, the famous Norwegian constructor of sealing vessels, at Sandefjord. She is barquentine rigged, and has triple-expansion engines giving her a speed under steam of nine to ten knots. To enable her to stay longer at sea, she will carry oil
fuel as well as coal. She is of about 350 tons, and built of selected pine, oak, and greenheart. This fine vessel, equipped, has cost the
Expedition PS14,000.
"The Aurora, the ship which will take out the Ross Sea party, has been bought from Dr. Mawson. She is similar in all respects to the Terra Nova, of Captain Scott's last Expedition. She had extensive alterations made by the Government authorities in Australia to fit her for Dr. Mawson's Expedition, and is now at Hobart, Tasmania, where the Ross Sea party will join her in October next."
I started the preparations in the middle of 1913, but no public announcement was made until January 13, 1914. For the last six months of 1913 I was engaged in the necessary preliminaries, solid mule work, showing nothing particular to interest the public, but essential for an Expedition that had to have a ship on each side of the Continent, with a land journey of eighteen hundred miles to be made, the first nine hundred miles to be across an absolutely unknown land mass.
On January 1, 1914, having received a promised financial support sufficient to warrant the announcement of the Expedition, I made
it public.
The first result of this was a flood of applications from all classes of the community to join the adventure. I received nearly five thousand applications, and out of these were picked fifty-six men.
In March, to my great disappointment and anxiety, the promised financial help did not materialize, and I was now faced with the fact
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that I had contracted for a ship and stores, and had engaged the staff, and I was not in possession of funds to meet these liabilities. I immediately set about appealing for help, and met with generous response from all sides. I cannot here give the names of all who supported my application, but whilst taking this opportunity of thanking every one for their support, which came from parts as far apart as the interior of China, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia, I must particularly refer to the munificent donation of PS24,000 from the late Sir James Caird, and to one of PS10,000 from the British Government. I must also thank Mr. Dudley Docker, who enabled me to complete the purchase of the Endurance, and Miss Elizabeth Dawson Lambton, who since 1901 has always been a firm friend to Antarctic exploration, and who again, on this occasion, assisted largely. The Royal Geographical Society made a grant of PS1000; and last, but by no means least, I take this opportunity of tendering my grateful thanks to Dame Janet Stancomb Wills, whose generosity enabled me to equip the Endurance efficiently, especially as regards boats (which boats were the means of our
ultimate safety), and who not only, at the inception of the Expedition, gave financial help, but also continued it through the dark days
when we were overdue, and funds were required to meet the need of the dependents of the Expedition.
The only return and privilege an explorer has in the way of acknowledgment for the help accorded him is to record on the discovered lands the names of those to whom the Expedition owes its being.
Owing to the exigencies of the war the publication of this book has been long delayed, and the detailed maps must come with the scientific monographs. I have the honour to place on the new land the names of the above and other generous donors to the Expedition. The two hundred miles of new coast-line I have called Caird Coast. Also, as a more personal note, I named the three ship's boats, in which we ultimately escaped from the grip of the ice, after the three principal donors to the Expedition--the James Caird, the Stancomb Wills and the Dudley Docker. The two last-named are still on the desolate sandy spit of Elephant Island, where under their shelter twenty-two of my comrades eked out a bare existence for four and a half months.
The James Caird is now in Liverpool, having been brought home from South Georgia after her adventurous voyage across the sub-Antarctic ocean.
Most of the Public Schools of England and Scotland helped the Expedition to purchase the dog teams, and I named a dog after each school that helped. But apart from these particular donations I again thank the many people who assisted us.
So the equipment and organization went on. I purchased the Aurora from Sir Douglas Mawson, and arranged for Mackintosh to go to Australia and take charge of her, there sending sledges, equipment and most of the stores from this side, but depending somewhat on the sympathy and help of Australia and New Zealand for coal and certain other necessities, knowing that previously these two countries had always generously supported the exploration of what one might call their hinterland.
Towards the end of July all was ready, when suddenly the war clouds darkened over Europe.
It had been arranged for the Endurance to proceed to Cowes, to be inspected by His Majesty on the Monday of Cowes week. But
on Friday I received a message to say that the King would not be able to go to Cowes. My readers will remember how suddenly came the menace of war. Naturally, both my comrades and I were greatly exercised as to the probable outcome of the danger threatening the peace of the world.
We sailed from London on Friday, August 1, 1914, and anchored off Southend all Saturday. On Sunday afternoon I took the ship off
Margate, growing hourly more anxious as the ever-increasing rumours spread; and on Monday morning I went ashore and read in
the morning paper the order for general mobilization.
I immediately went on board and mustered all hands and told them that I proposed to send a telegram to the Admiralty offering the ships, stores, and, if they agreed, our own services to the country in the event of war breaking out. All hands immediately agreed, and I sent off a telegram in which everything was placed at the disposal
