The Erebus and Terror in the Antarctic

James Clark Ross · 1839 CE – 1843 CE · Earth

Find the South Magnetic Pole and build a worldwide record of magnetic observations.

Historical context

At its Newcastle meeting of 1838 the British Association, prompted by Edward Sabine, asked the government for an Antarctic voyage and for fixed magnetic observatories, part of a worldwide system of simultaneous readings. Ross, who had reached the North Magnetic Pole in 1831, was given two bomb vessels fortified for the ice and orders to find the southern pole, and even to reach it if possible. French and American expeditions went south in the same seasons, in ships that, as Ross saw it, were not built for the pack.

The voyage, step by step

1. Erebus and Terror sail

   September 1839

   In September 1839 two bomb vessels, rebuilt for ice, leave the Thames for four years in the Southern Ocean.

2. Sixty-eight days at Kerguelen

   May 1840

   From May 1840 the ships lie at Christmas Harbour taking hourly magnetic readings through almost continuous gales.

3. Franklin’s welcome

   August 1840

   At Hobart in August 1840 the lieutenant-governor, the Arctic explorer John Franklin, has an observatory built for Ross in nine days.

4. Into the pack

   5 January 1841

   On 5 January 1841 Ross drives his ships straight into the ice, and four days later comes out into an open sea.

5. Victoria Land

   11 January 1841

   On 11 January a range of snow mountains rises ahead of the ships; the next day boats land on an offshore island to claim the coast.

6. A volcano in the ice

   28 January 1841

   On 28 January the ships find a smoking mountain 3,800 metres high at 77° south, and name it for the Erebus.

7. The Great Ice Barrier

   1841 CE

   East of the volcano the ships meet a vertical cliff of ice 50 metres high and follow it 450 kilometres without finding an opening.

8. Collision among the bergs

   13 March 1842

   On the night of 12 to 13 March 1842, in a gale among icebergs, the two ships collide and hang together, rigging in rigging.

Outcome

Broke through the pack into a new sea, discovered Victoria Land, Mount Erebus and the Great Ice Barrier, and reached 78°10′ south in 1842, but could not reach the South Magnetic Pole, which lay inland.

James Clark Ross

British polar navigator who reached the North Magnetic Pole and then broke into the Ross Sea, sighting Mount Erebus and the Great Ice Barrier.

Read on Wikipedia

Sources

• James Clark Ross — Wikipedia
• A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions, during the Years 1839–43, vol. 1James Clark Ross · John Murray · 1847

Continue exploring

• Voyage to the South Pole and OceaniaJules Dumont d’Urville · 1837 CE – 1840 CE
• Lost Arctic expeditionJohn Franklin · 1845 CE – 1848 CE
• The circumnavigation of AustraliaMatthew Flinders · 1801 CE – 1803 CE
• Survey of the Pacific NorthwestGeorge Vancouver · 1791 CE – 1795 CE