Amberley’s new series of Eyewitness Accounts bring history, warfare, disaster, travel and exploration to life, written by the people who could say, ‘I was there!’
The definitive collection of Frank Hurley's amazing photos from Shackleton's Antarctic expedition is the first book to reproduce all the surviving expedition photos, some of which have never been published. Over 450 photos.
On August 1, 1914, on the eve of World War I, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his hand-picked crew embarked in HMS Endurance from London's West India Dock, for an expedition to the Antarctic. It was to turn into one of the most breathtaking survival stories of all time. Even as they coasted down the channel, Shackleton wired back to London to offer his ship to the war effort. The reply came from the First Lord of the Admiralty, one Winston Churchill: "Proceed." And proceed they did. When the Endurance was trapped and finally crushed to splinters by pack ice in late 1915, they drifted on an ice floe for five months, before getting to open sea and launching three tiny boats as far as the inhospitable, storm-lashed Elephant Island. They drank seal oil and ate baby albatross (delicious, apparently). From there Shackelton himself and seven others - the author among them - went on, in a 22-foot open boat, for an unbelievable 800 miles, through the Antarctic seas in winter, to South Georgia and rescue. It is an extraordinary story of courage and even good-humour among men who must have felt certain, secretly, that they were going to die. Worsley's account, first published in 1940, captures that bulldog spirit exactly: uncomplaining, tough, competent, modest and deeply loyal. It's gripping, and strangely moving.
The story of the expedition across Antarctica led by Ernest Shackleton, illustrated by the photographs taken by Frank Hurley. The text covers the crushing of their ship Endurance by ice, their two-year struggle to stay alive and their eventual rescue.
A thrilling reading experience! One of the greatest adventure stories of our times' - New York Times Book Review. In 1914 Ernest Shackleton and a crew of 27 men, sailed for the South Atlantic on the 'Endurance' with the object of crossing the Antarctic over land. In October 1915, still half a continent away from their intended base, the ship was trapped, then crushed in ice. For five months Shackleton and his men, drifting on ice packs, were castaways in one of the world's most savage regions. This gripping book based on firsthand accounts of crew members, describes how the men survived, living together in camps on the ice for 17 months, how they were attacked by sea leopards, had to kill their beloved dogs whom they could no longer feed, and suffered disease with no medicines (an operation to amputate the foot of one member of the crew was carried out on the ice). Their extraordinary indefatigability and their lasting civility towards one another in the most adverse conditions shines through.
Frank A. Worsley was the Captain of the H. M. S. Endurance, the ship used by the legendary explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton in his 1914-16 expedition to the Antarctic. On its way to the Antarctic continent the Endurance became trapped and then crushed by ice, and the ship's party of twenty-eight drifted in an ice floe for five months. Finally reaching an uninhabited island, Shackleton, Worsley and four others sailed eight hundred miles in a small boat to the island of South Georgia, an astounding feat of navigation and courage. All hands survived this ill-fated expedition; as Worsley writes, 'By self-sacrifice and throwing his own life into the balance, (Shackleton) saved every one of his men. . . although at times it looked unlikely that one could be saved. ' 'A remarkable book. . . Worsley writes without heroics. . . but makes us feel to the marrow the conditions that the party endured before all hands were rescued. ' New Yorker.
Frank Hurley is best known for his stunning Antarctic photographs. Here, Helen Ennis discusses some of his most famous images and the conditions in which they were taken. Uniquely, Hurley's own words are sprinkled throughout as facsimiles from his diaries written during both the Mawson and Shackleton expeditions. For Hurley, image-making and exploration went hand in hand and he sought out exalted experiences, through physical struggle, through relationships with the natural world and through story telling. This book brings to life his passion for photography and for making art, and his own spirit of survival.
The Quest for Frank Wild tells the gripping story of one woman's determination to unravel the truth of the final years of Frank Wild, one of the greatest British Edwardian Polar explorers of all time. Frank Wild, Sir Ernest Shackleton's closest friend and right hand man was the only explorer to serve on five expeditions to the Antarctic during the Heroic Age. The last sixteen years of his life were spent in South Africa, supposedly in penury, unable to come to terms with Ernest Shackleton's death and forgotten by his fellowmen. He died suddenly in the small mining town of Klerksdorp near Johannesburg. The little that was known of his later life in South Africa has been maligned by hearsay and sensational journalism and most tragically of all, no-one knew where he was buried. An outstanding man lost in life and in death. Angie Butler's seven year journey finally uncovers an extraordinary untold story and by doing so fulfils Wild's wish to have his memoirs published. The memoirs stand alone as a unique account of Edwardian Polar exploration"--page [4] of cover.
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