Southern Cross Expedition - Voyage - Ross Sea Exploration

Ross Sea Exploration

Southern Cross returned to Cape Adare from Australia on 28 January 1900. Borchgrevink began dismantling the camp and taking its remaining supplies on board, but soon abandoned this; on 2 February he took the ship south into the Ross Sea. Evidence of a hasty and disorderly departure from Cape Adare was noted two years later, when the site was visited by members of the Discovery Expedition, after which Edward Wilson wrote; "... heaps of refuse all around, and a mountain of provision boxes, dead birds, seals, dogs, sledging gear ... and heaven knows what else".

The first port of call in the Ross Sea was Possession Island, where the tin box left by Borchgrevink and Bull in 1895 was recovered. They then proceeded southwards, following the Victoria Land coast and discovering further islands, one of which Borchgrevink named after Sir Clements Markham, whose hostility towards the expedition was evidently unchanged by this honour. Southern Cross then sailed on to Ross Island, observed the volcano Mount Erebus, and attempted a landing at Cape Crozier, at the foot of Mount Terror. Here, Borchgrevink and Captain Jensen were almost drowned by a large wave caused by a calving or breakaway of ice from the adjacent Great Ice Barrier. Following the path of James Clark Ross sixty years previously, they proceeded eastwards along the Barrier edge, to find the inlet where, in 1843, Ross had reached his farthest south. Observations indicated that the Barrier edge had moved some 30 statute miles (50 km) south since Ross's time, which meant that the ship were already south of Ross's record. However, Borchgrevink wished to make a landing on the Barrier itself. In the vicinity of Ross's inlet he found a spot where the ice sloped sufficiently to suggest that a landing was possible. On 16 February he, Colbeck and Savio landed with dogs and a sledge, ascended to the Barrier surface, and then journeyed a few miles south to a point which they calculated as 78°50′S, a new Farthest South record. They were the first persons to travel on the Barrier surface, earning Amundsen's approbation: "We must acknowledge that, by ascending the Barrier, Borchgrevink opened the way to the south, and threw aside the greatest obstacle to the expeditions that followed". Close to the same spot ten years later, Amundsen would establish his base camp "Framheim", prior to his successful South Pole journey.

On the passage northward, Southern Cross halted at Franklin Island, off the Victoria Land coast, and made a series of magnetic calculations. These indicated that the location of the South Magnetic Pole was, as expected, within Victoria Land, but further north and further west than had previously been assumed. The party then sailed for home, crossing the Antarctic Circle on 28 February. On 1 April, news of their safe return was sent by telegram from Bluff, New Zealand.