Frank Worsley
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Navigation is an art, of which Worsley had shown himself a master on the voyage from Patience Camp to Elephant Island
- Roland Huntford, Shackleton
You could argue that all the men on the famous
escape
from Antarctic Endurance expedition (1914-16) were heroes.
Few would disagree but a hero towering
about other heroes (with the exception
of the leader Shackleton)
was the Captain, Frank Worsley. For without his
extraordinary navigational skills with the most
rudimentary on instruments in the epic open-boat
voyage of the James Caird from Elephant Island
to South Georgia then the members of the expedition would surely have perished. Such a feat of navigation has long since passed into the seaman's folklore.
Worsley was from New Zealand and became
an apprentice in the merchant navy at the age
of 15 serving on both sailing and steam ships.
In 1914 he joined the above mentioned
epic Endurance expedition (more details). His captaincy of men could be all over the place
but as, basically, a second-in-command to Shackleton he more than held his own.
After the expedition, he commanded Q boats
in the First World War - anti-submarine boats
disguised as merchant shipping. He was twice decorated for
anti-submarine action, once with the D.S.O.
In late October 1918, Worsley became part of the
North Russia Expeditionary Force
at the request of Shackleton.
He again won the D.S.O. for leading a
daring land raid against the Bolsheviks.
After the war, he was involved in Shackleton's last
expedition to the Antarctic on the Quest,
cut short by Shackleton's death on South Georgia.
The voyage continued without their leader, with
Frank Wild
in charge, and they returned to Elephant Island,
the home of 22 of the men for four months during Endurance.
Worsley then spent several years earning
money by giving lectures about the Endurance
expedition. He commentated on Shackleton's
film South released in 1919.
He was joint leader of an Arctic expedition to
Franz Josef Land in 1925; in 1935 he was
part of a treasure hunting expedition in the Cocos Islands.
Despite retiring from the sea in 1939, he remained a Royal naval reserve officer and continued to instruct at the Royal Naval College in Greenwich until his death in February 1943. He died of lung cancer.
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