NEAREST THE SOUTH POLE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume V, Issue 371, 21 June 1911, Page 7

NEAREST THE SOUTH POLE.

Lieutenant Shackleton tells the story in the October number ol "Pearson's Magazine" of his finadash for the South Pole—the wonderful 800-mile sledge journey that iclipsed all previous records, Northern as well as Southern. Lieutenant Shackleton and his three companions left winter quarters on October 29, and travelled Southward all through November and December. By this time food supplies had fallen dangerously low, and" the strength of the men was naturally failing. Still, the goal was within measurable distance, and by reducing rations to the smallest possible limit, it seemed possible that the conquest of the Pole might fae achieved. But it was not to be. The weather grew stormy, and worse was to follow. Lieutenant Shackleton writes : "On January 6 we camped in a blizzard with high drift in latitude BSft. 7in. South. The wind rose during the night, and for the next sixty aours it was blowing with a force of seventy or eighty miles an hour, the temperature at times being as '.ow as 70 degrees of frost. The situation was serious, for not only was our advance being stopped and our preoious food disappearing, but there was doubt as to whether the sledge tracks and flags would remain to guide us back to the depot on which our lives depended. During the sixty Hours we had many times to restore the circulation of one another's feet, for the temperature inside the torn and worn tent, which had now to contain the whole party, was just about the same as in the open air, and the snow drifted in all the time. As those dark hours went on, we prayed for a cessation of the blizzard and at 1 a.m. on Janaary 9 it began to break. *' The blizzard had done its work, however, and we ! recognised that we h*id just about reached our limit. Wo got up at 2 a.m., and at 4 a.m. were away on a final march south, taUing with us nothing but food, instruments, and the Queen's flag with a bamboo rod for a staff. '\Half running, half walking, we made that, last march, and at 9 a.m. in latitude 88ft. 23in. South, we hoisted the Union Jack. We could do no more, for to go further meant to abandon all hope of getting back to our depots.

"The Pole, though only 97 geographical miles away was impossible for us to attain. Before us stretched the same white plain over which we had travelled for many days ; oui powerful Goertz glasses showed no signs of land, and we could safely assume that the geographical South Pole was situated on this immense plateau, between 10,000 feet and 11,000 feet above sea level, and certainly the coldest and one of the most stormy parts of the world. We took a photograph of the party, with the Queen's flag blowing out in the icy wind that cut us to the bone, took possession of the plateau on behalf of His Majesty, and immediately began the march back to our camp, our faces once more turned north."