Shackleton-Rowett Expedition
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Shackleton-Rowett Expedition (1921 – 1922) Ernest Shackleton's last Antarctic adventure ended in his death by natural causes.
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[edit] 1921
In 1921, Shackleton sailed once more for Antarctica on the ship Quest. The man who had never tasted victory but had achieved glory in defeat was now forty-seven years old.
[edit] 1922
After a rough passage, the Quest arrived at Grytviken on January 4, 1922. All that day Shackleton stood on the bridge, gazing through his binoculars toward the familiar coast where he and two companions had crossed the mountains with almost superhuman strength. As the shore passed before his eyes, gusts of wind carried the stale odour of dead whale.
Then, just after 2:00 hours, terrible, vice-like chest pains gripped Shackleton and surged up his neck and across his shoulders. Gasping, he blew the small whistle beside his bed for Dr. Macklin. When the physician rushed into the room, Shackleton asked for pain pills, but it was too late. He died of a massive heart attack in the helpless arms of his friend.
[edit] Burial
When Lady Shackleton received word that her husband had died, she requested that his body be buried on South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. It was here that he and his two companions "had reached the naked soul of man" during their arduous crossing of the island in May 1916. The grey stone is a slab of rough-cut granite that suits the man who never forgot his men or his humanity. Inscribed on the back of the granite marker is a line form Robert Browning's The Statue and the Bust:
- "A man should strive to the uttermost for his life's set prize."
