Discovery

In an exhibition at the Discovery Center in Dundee, Scotland.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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In the exhibition at the Discovery Center in Dundee, Scotland, is a copy of Gulliver’s Travels given to Scott by Clements Markham. “C R Markham—this book went with me to the Arctic region. 1850. Presented to Robert F. Scott with all good wishes July 1901.” Likely to have been aboard Discovery, for Scott’s British Antarctic Expedition, 1901-1904.

Discovery press clippings

Probably compiled by Emily Scott, in a volume of mounted clippings [SPRI MSS 735/1] with one loose section of four pages at rear with NZ press coverage of “The Antarctic Expedition. The Arrival of the Discovery.” [off Lyttleton Heads, and Christchurch].
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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p. 1, col. 2: [no date] Our Wellington correspondent telegraphs that Sir James Hector of the Canadian Palliser expedition in 1857-1859, has sent to the Discovery a large number of scientific works bearing upon New Zealand. The books sent include a complete set (33 volumes) of the transactions of the New Zealand Institute. These books will greatly assist the members of the expedition in their observations and researches.

The Voyages of the ‘Morning’

Doorly, James G. S. Bluntisham, UK: Bluntisham Books, 1995. [First published London: Smith, Elder, 1916].
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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The Morning was a relief ship for Scott’s Discovery expedition. Notable for its piano, given by Clements Markham (the carpenter cut it in half to get it into the wardroom), for the song texts given in the book, apparently composed by Doorly, and the key role of the piano. Doorly was a close friend of Teddy Evans and it was Evans’s influence on Clements Markham that helped get him posted to the Morning and involved in freeing Discovery from the heavy ice of McMurdo sound. Doorly wrote a readable autobiography called In the Wake, which devotes a couple of chapters to his Discovery experience.

Journal of a Voyage to the Arctic 1901-02. S S Discovery.

Duncan, James. By J. Duncan. Typescript of Manuscript Journal. Dundee, Scotland: Dundee Art Galleries and Museums. Human History Section, 1973?.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Duncan was a civilian shipwright from Dundee who helped build the Discovery and joined the expedition as an able bodied seaman when the ship was completed. He served as carpenter and in other construction projects (e.g., the Wind Mill) and sometimes as cook, and returned with the Morning after one year. His spelling is phonetic at best (or was it the typist’s?) so that proper names become an interesting puzzle as presented in this transcript. When at sea the journal reads much like a deck log but there is some more substance in the entries made ashore. Here are a few examples of his journal style:

Diaries and Notebooks

Ferrar, Hartley. 10 vols. SPRI MS 1264.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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p 18: During the first six months, we find him poring over Drygalski, an author to whom he and several others frequently returned. In rapid succession we find him reading Ball’s The Cause of an Ice Age, Morley’s Challenger Notes, Judd’s Volcanoes, Gregory’s Great Rift Valley, Nansen’s First Crossing of Greenland, Scoresby’s Arctic Regions, Greely’s Handbook of Arctic Observation, Mill’s The Realm of Nature, Ross’s Voyage to the Southern Seas, and Howorth’s The Glacial Nightmare.

The Antarctic Manual for the Use of the Expedition of 1901.

Murray, George, editor. With a Preface by Sir Clements R. Markham…, Presented to the Expedition by the Royal Geographical Society. London: Royal Geographical Society, 1901.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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p. vii: Baron Nordenskiöld has told me that, during the voyage of the Vega, when the North-East Passage was discovered, the books most in request were the “blue book” and the “white book,” as they called the Arctic manuals.

Antarctic Obsession. A Personal Narrative of the Origins of the British National Antarctic Expedition 1901-1904.

Markham, Clements. Edited and introduced by Clive Holland. Bluntisham, UK: Erskine Press, 1986.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Markham was the President of the Royal Geographical Society, and this book is based on his manuscript journal in the SPRI collection where Holland was once Librarian. It is not only a personal narrative but a vituperative one; one wonders whether Markham ever intended publication. It’s a one-sided story in the first person singular describing the feud between the Royal Society and the Royal Geographical Society during the planning of the Discovery Expedition, a feud over who would control the expedition, whether Scott would be in complete control or whether he would turn command over to the scientists (represented by geologist John Walter Gregory) when ashore. Markham won the battle in backing his own choice (many would argue the wrong choice) in Robert Falcon Scott. There is another side of this story but it won’t be found here in this egocentric and self-justifying account by this authoritarian martinet.

Newspaper clipping

New Zealand Press. SPRI MS 7354/1 BPC leaf 13.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Clipping from this newspaper in SPRI speaking of the “pretentious library” aboard Discovery, and noting that Shackleton had organized it. Probably from the period when Discovery was in Lyttleton, NZ November 1901. See above under Discovery.

Books contained in a box labeled ‘Books used on board Discovery no. 1.

Royal Geographical Society.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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The vicomte de Bragelonne by A. Dumas Owd Bob by Alfred Ollivant Emerson’s Essays (Selections) The Newcomes by Thackeray Vixen by Miss Braddon The Poetical works of Robert Burns vol. III (entry on fly-leaf, The Discovery from H.R.M.) Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson (entry on fly-leaf R.F.S. 1901) The Primrose Path by Miss Oliphant (entry printed in pencil on fly-leaf: “This book was part of the library of the Terra Nova captain R. F. Scott) The Egoist by G. Meredith Diana of the Crossways by G. Meredith Round the World on a Wheel by J. Foster Fraser (These three books have on the fly-leaf, R. Scott Terra Nova 1910. not in Capt. Scott’s hand. Slip of paper, bookmark?, found in Diana of the Crossways with tiny drawings of a bird and some insects, with initials P.M.S. H.R.M. is Hugh Robert Mill, meteorologist & friend of W.S. Bruce. [courtesy Innes Kinreigh] [Read through leaf 455—may return to it, but not too promising for reading matter. DS]

The Voyage of the Discovery.

Scott, Robert Falcon. First published London: Smith Elder, 1905.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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[A new edition with introduction by E.C. Coleman was published in Stroud, Gloucestershire, in 2005.]

Shackleton Discovery Diaries. Vol. 1 Dec. 1901-1902.

Shackleton, Ernest. SPRI Ms 1537/3/4/1 and 2.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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p. 5, Thursday [Dec] 26th: One of the officers of the “Ringarooraa” sent me Swinburne’s “Songs before Sunrise” and two volumes of the Poems and Ballads, but I don’t think there will be much time to read these during the summer; during the long winter far away from the teeming life of the great world one may calmly criticize his rather erotic lines.

Notes from Discovery Journal & Sledging Diaries of R W Skelton

Skelton, Reginald W. Extracts concerning the reading of books. prepared by Judy Skelton, his grand-daughter.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Ms Skelton subsequently published her grandfather’s diaries as The Antarctic Journals of Reginald W. Skelton: “Another Job for the Tinker. (Cheltenham, UK: Reardon Publishing, 2004):

Diary of the Discovery Expedition to the Antarctic Regions 1901-1904.

Wilson, Edward. Edited from the Original Mss. in the Scott Polar Research Institute, by Ann Savours. London: Blandford Press, 1966.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Wilson was a prodigious reader. In addition to the citations below he speaks often of readings on medicine or surgery, presumably technical books he had with him on the expedition. He was also a devout Christian and would read his services when he couldn’t attend or in addition to attendance. Most notable was his reading of Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” during the fatal polar trip.

Towards the South Pole aboard the Français, the First French Expedition to the Antarctic 1903-1905.

Translated by A. W. Billinghurst, with an introduction by Maurice Raraty. Bluntisham, Hunts., UK, Bluntisham Books, 2004. [This work was first published in French in 1906 as Le “Français” au pole Sud. Paris: Flammarion, 1906. First English translation].
  • 1903-05 First French South Polar Expedition (Charcot).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
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Charcot was among the more erudite of the heroic age explorers, brought an extensive library of classical authors with him, and does more to describe his reading experience than most of his early 20th- century peers.