or 4000 ft. high, which he named Adélie Land and took possession
of by landing on a rocky islet off the icebound coast. Ten
days later in 64° 30′ S. D’Urville cruised westward along a high
ice-barrier, which he believed to be connected with land, from
longitude 131° E. and he named it the Clarie Coast. A few days
later he left the Antarctic regions for the Pacific.
As early as 1836 the United States Congress had authorized an American Exploring Expedition in the programme of which Antarctic exploration had a leading place. Lieut. Charles Wilkes was appointed to command the expedition of five vessels in Wilkes.August 1838, and his instructions, dated in that month, required him amongst other things (1) to follow Weddell’s route as far as possible, (2) to visit the most southerly point reached by Cook in the Antarctic, and (3) to make an “attempt to penetrate within the Antarctic region, south of Van Diemen’s Land, and as far west as longitude 45° E., or to Enderby Land” The ships were in bad repair and ill-adapted for navigation in the ice, and many of the officers were not devoted to their chief; but in spite of great difficulties Wilkes fulfilled his programme. In following Weddell’s route Wilkes in March 1839 fared no better than D’Urville in the previous year, but the “Flying Fish” of 96 tons under Lieutenant Walker reached 70° S. in 105° W., thus nearly reaching Cook’s position of 1774. The third item of the Antarctic programme was made the subject of the most strenuous endeavour. Wilkes sailed from Sydney in the “Vincennes” on the 26th of December 1839, accompanied by the “Peacock” under Lieut. William L. Hudson, the “Porpoise” under Lieut. Cadwaladar Ringgold, and the “Flying Fish” under Lieut. Pinkney. They went south to the west of the Balleny Islands, which they did not see, and cruised westward along the ice-barrier or as near it as the ice-pack allowed towards Enderby Land nearly on the Antarctic Circle. The weather was bad with fogs, snowstorms and frequent gales, and although land was reported (by each of the vessels) at several points along the route, it was rarely seen distinctly and the officers were not agreed amongst themselves in some cases. Unfortunate controversies have arisen at intervals during sixty years as to the reality of Wilkes’s discoveries of land, and as to the justice of the claim he made to the discovery of the Antarctic continent. Some of the land claimed at the eastern end of his route has been shown by later expeditions not to exist; but there can be no doubt that Wilkes saw land along the line where Adélie Land, Kemp Land and Enderby Land are known to exist, even if the positions he assigns are not quite accurate. No one, however, could establish a claim to the discovery of a continent from sighting a discontinuous chain of high land along its coast, without making a landing. It seems no more than due to a gallant and much-persecuted officer, who did his best in most difficult circumstances, to leave the name of Wilkes Land on the map of the region he explored.
Unlike the other two expeditions, that equipped by the British government in 1839 was intended solely for Antarctic exploration and primarily for magnetic surveys in the south polar seas. There were two ships, the “Erebus” of 370 tons, and the Ross.“Terror” of 340, stoutly built craft specially strengthened for navigation in the ice. Captain James Clark Ross, R.N., was in command of the “Erebus” and of the expedition, Commander Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier of the “Terror.” A young surgeon, Joseph Dalton Hooker, joined the Royal Navy in order to go on the expedition, and he lived to take a keen interest in every subsequent Antarctic expedition down to that of Captain Scott in 1910. Ross had intended to make straight for the meridian of the Magnetic Pole, but, finding that D’Urville and Wilkes had already entered on those seas he determined to try to make a high latitude farther east, and leaving Hobart Town on the 12th of November 1840 he crossed the Antarctic Circle on the 1st of January 1841 and entered the pack ice on the 5th in 174° E. Instead of proving an impenetrable obstacle, the pack let the two ships work through in five days, and they emerged into open sea. Sailing towards the Magnetic Pole they found a chain of great mountains rising from a coast which ran due south from a prominent cape (Cape Adare) in 71° S. The continent was taken formal possession of for Queen Victoria by landing on Possession Island, the mainland being inaccessible, and the ships continued southward in sight of the coast of Victoria Land, where the loftiest mountain was named Mt Melbourne after the Prime Minister, until the twin volcanoes named Erebus and Terror were sighted in 78° S. on the 28th of January. From Cape Crozier, at the base of the mountains, a line of lofty cliffs of ice ran eastwards, the great ice-barrier, unlike any object in nature ever seen before, rising perpendicularly from the water to the height of 200 or 300 ft. and continuing unbroken for 250 m. Along the barrier the highest latitude of 78° 4′ S. was attained, and the farthest point to the east was 167° W., whence Ross turned to look for a winter harbour in Victoria Land. Being desirous to winter near the South Magnetic Pole, Ross did not explore McMurdo Bay between Mt Erebus and the north-running coast, where, as we now know, a harbour could have been found, and as he could not reach the land elsewhere on account of ice extending out from it for 15 or 16 m., after sighting the Balleny Islands at a great distance, on the 2nd of March the ships returned to Hobart. This was the most remarkable Antarctic voyage for striking discoveries ever made.
In November 1841 the “Erebus” and “Terror” returned to Antarctic waters, steering south-east from New Zealand and entering the ice-pack in about 60° S. and 146° W., the idea being to approach the great barrier from the eastward, but by the end of the year they had just struggled as far as the Antarctic Circle and they, together with the pack, were several times driven fat to the northward by heavy gales in which the ships were at the mercy of the floating ice. During a storm of terrible severity on the 18th of January the rudders of» both ships were smashed, and not until the 1st of February did they break out of the pack in 67° 29′ S., 159° W. The barrier was sighted on the 22nd and the ships reached 78° 10′ S. in 161° 27′ W., the highest latitude attained for 60 years. To the eastward the barrier surface rose to a mountainous height, but although Ross believed it to be land, he would only treat it officially as “an appearance of land,” leaving the confirmation of its discovery as King Edward Land to the next century. No more work was done in this quarter; the “Erebus” and “Terror” turned the edge of the pack to the northward and on getting into clear water sailed eastward to Cape Horn, meeting the greatest danger of the whole cruise on the way by colliding with each other at night while passing between two icebergs in a gale.
After wintering in the Falkland Islands and making good the damage received, Ross made his third and last attack on the southern ice, and for six weeks he cruised amongst the pack off Joinville Island and Louis Philippe Land trying in vain to reach the Antarctic Circle. Failing in this attempt he turned to follow Weddell’s route and skirted the pack eastward in 65° S., crossing Weddell’s track on the 14th of February 1843, more than a degree farther south than D’Urville in his attempt four years before, but on the edge of an equally impenetrable pack. Coasting it eastward to 12° W. the “Erebus” and “Terror” at last rounded the pack and found the way open to the south, crossing the circle on the 1st of March. Four days later the pack was met with again and the ships were forced into it for 27 miles to latitude 71° 30′ S in 14° 51′ W., nineteen degrees east of Weddell’s farthest south. No sign of land was seen, a deep-sea sounding showed 4000 fathoms with no bottom, and although this was a mistake, for the real depth was later proved by Dr Bruce to be only 2660 fathoms, it showed at least that there was no land in the immediate neighbourhood.
This was Ross’s last piece of Antarctic work, but the magnetic observations of his expedition were continued by Lieut. T. E. L. Moore, R.N., in the hired barque “Pagoda,” which left Simon’s Bay in January 1845 and proceeded south-east, crossing the Antarctic Circle in 30° 45′ E. and reaching a farthest south of 67° 50′, nine degrees farther east. An attempt to reach Enderby Land was frustrated by the weather, and Moore continued his
