The Third Reich in Antarctica: The German Antarctic Expedition 1938-39.

Lüdecke, Cornelia and Colin Summerhayes. Bluntisham, Hunts. UK. Bluntisham Books, 2012.
  • 1938-39 German Antarctic Expedition (aboard Schwabenland).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Ignoring the potential onset of war, this German exploration involved study of whaling possibilities, the study of the usual scientific subjects, the search for raw materials and strategic military advantages, and land claims over what Norwegians had already claimed as Dronning Maud Land. It was a short trip during the Antarctic summer, and plans for subsequent expeditions were abandoned when WWII began. Its ship was the Schwabenland with Alfred Ritscher as leader of the expedition and Alfred Kottas as Captain of the ship. The book examines the accomplishments of the trip and debunks the various myths that had grown around this German initiative (secret bases, submarines, and UFOs) and dismisses them as fantasy.

The Content of the Kettles.

[Dickens] Stone, Ian. Dickensian 83 (1987) 7-16.
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

An even-handed account of Dickens’ attack in Household Words on John Rae’s reports of cannibalism among the Franklin party, reporting Rae’s eventual vindication.

Antarctica Unveiled: Scott’s First Expedition and the Quest for the Unknown Continent.

Yelverton, David E. Boulder, CO: University Press of Colorado, 2000.
  • 1901-04 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott aboard Discovery).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A fairly thorough study of the Discovery expedition (1901-04), very sympathetic to Scott, managing to skewer Huntford’s speculations against Scott in a gentle way in footnote after footnote. His maps of the period are more confusing than helpful, but it is a sound study and a fairly good read. It does seem to me that his attempt to create the sense of a race between the German expedition of Drygalski and the Gauss with Scott’s ventures is purely hypothetical. And he does have a penchant for determinist chapter headings; Preordained Strategies; To the Threshold of Destiny; The Best-Laid Schemes…; Hostages in a Frozen Trap; Slings and Arrows of Misfortune; and The Expeditions Fateful Legacy.

Voyages of Discovery in the Arctic and Antarctic Seas, and Round the World: Being Personal Narratives of Attempts to Reach the North and South Poles; and of an Open-boat Expedition up the Wellington Channel in Search of Sir John Franklin and Her Majesty’s ships “Erebus” and “Terror,” in Her Majesty’s Boat “Forlorn Hope,” under the Command of the Author. To which are added an Autobiography….

McCormick, Robert. In Two Volumes. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1884.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

These volumes cover three separate expeditions with an autobiography, and can be found on the Hathi Trust. McCormick was the surgeon on Ross’s Erebus (1839-1843), also something of a zoologist who also was involved in the Franklin Search in the 1850s.

Voyages of Discovery in the Arctic and Antarctic Seas, and Round the World: being personal narratives of attempts to reach the North and South Poles; and of an open-boat expedition up the Wellington Channel in search of Sir John Franklin and Her Majesty’s ships “Erebus” and “Terror,” in Her Majesty’s boat “Forlorn Hope,” under the command of the author. To which are added an Autobiography….

M’Cormick, Robert. In Two Volumes. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1884.
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions

The Polar Regions.

Richardson, Sir John. Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1861.
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

Richardson worked with Franklin in two overland expeditions much as Edward Wilson worked with Robert Falcon Scott on two Antarctic journeys, the last one fatal to both explorers. Naturalist, surgeon, explorer, and eventually librarian of Haslar Hospital. In this general overview of the [chiefly northern ] Polar Regions, Richardson shows his erudition while summing up his wide experience of the North.

Matthew Flinders Private Journal, from 17 December 1803 at Isle of France to 10 July 1814 at London.

Flinders, Matthew. Edited and with an Introduction by Anthony J. Brown and Gillian Dooley. Adelaide, NSW, Australia: Friends of the State Library of South Australia, 2005.
  • 1801-03 British Exploring Expedition to Terra Australis (Captain Matthew Flinders aboard Investigator).
  • Global Circumnavigations and Cape Horn Transits.
  • Maritime Reading
 Preview 

Captain Matthew Flinders RN (16 March 1774 - 19 July 1814) was an English navigator and cartographer, who was the leader of the first circumnavigation of Australia and identified it as a continent. Flinders made three voyages to the southern ocean between 1791 and 1810. In the second voyage, George Bass and Flinders confirmed that Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania) was an island. In the third voyage, Flinders circumnavigated the mainland of what was to be called Australia, accompanied by an Aboriginal man, Bungaree. (From ABEBooks description, retrieved 5/14/17, of another Flinders work.

Captain Nathaniel Brown Palmer: An Old-Time Sailor of the Sea

Spears, John R. Stonington, CT: Stonington Historical Society, 1996 [First published 1922].
  • 1820-21 American Sealing Voyage to South Shetlands and Antarctic Peninsula aboard Hero and Express (commanded by George Pendleton with Nathaniel Palmer).
  • “Discovery” of Antarctica.
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

This is a thoroughly hagiographic and somewhat jingoistic account of the American sealer and whaler many have considered the discoverer of the Antarctic continent. There is little about any extracurricular reading on Palmer’s voyage, but there is an emphasis on journals and log books, navigational manuals, and hydrographic charts.

Barrow’s Boys

Fleming, Fergus. . (London, Granta Books, 1998).
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

p. 37, concerning the Parry and Ross Northwest Passage expedition on Isabella and Alexander, 1818: The officers, meanwhile, were supplied with a twenty-five-volume library of Arctic reference books, to which the Naval and Military Bible Society added ninety uplifting tracts to be shared between both ships.

Deadly Winter: The Life of Sir John Franklin.

Beardsley, Martyn. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2002.
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

A facile and not very original biography of Franklin, sloppily edited and proofread, but a decent enough overview.