Borchgrevink, Carsten Egeberg (1864 - 1934)

Summary

Carl Borchgrevink was an Antarctic explorer who, as leader of the British Antarctic Expedition (the Southern Cross expedition) of 1898 to 1900, led the first party to overwinter on the continental mainland in Antarctica. He studied natural science at the Royal College in Tharandt, Saxony, before migrating to Australia in 1888. Between 1892 and 1894 he worked on survey teams in New South Wales and Queensland, later teaching languages and natural science at the Cooerwull Academy in Bowenfels, New South Wales. His first Antarctic experience was as a deck hand, with permission to carry out some scientific work, on the whaler Antarctica. The Expedition left London in 1898 and reached Cape Adare, Antarctica, in February 1899. Over the next 14 months the party undertook a program of meteorological and magnetic observations and collected geological and biological specimens. They also reached further south than any previous expedition. Although was not a properly trained scientist, Borchgrevink's pioneering work in the Antarctic was valuable to later, more elaborate, scientific expeditions. His later career included a scientific expedition for the National Geographic Society to the West Indies in 1902 to study the effects of recent volcanic eruptions.

Details

Chronology

1888

Life event - Migrated to Australia

1892 - 1894

Career event - Member of survey teams in Queensland and New South Wales

1894 - 1895

Career position - Crew member on whaling ship Antarctica

August 1898 - April 1900

Career position - Leader, British Antarctic Expedition [II]

1900 - 1934

Award - Fellow, Royal Geographical Society

1904

Award - Silver medal, Royal Scottish Geographical Society

1930

Award - Patron's Medal, Royal Geographical Society

Related entries

Published resources

Books

• Baughman, T.H., Before the Heroes Came: Antarctica in the 1890s (Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1994), 171 pp. Details
• Borchgrevink, C. E., First on the Antarctic Continent, being an account of the British Anratctic Expedition, 1898 - 1900 (London: Georges Newnes Ltd, 1901), 333 pp. Details
• Mawer, Granville Allen, South by Northwest: the Magnetic Crusade and the Contest for Antarctica (Kent Town: Wakefield Press, 2006), 319 pp. Details
• McConville, Andrew, In search of the last continent: Australia and early Antarctic exploration (Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2022), 227 pp. Details

Book Sections

• Swan, R. A., 'Borchgrevink, Carsten Egeberg (1864-1934), Antarctic explorer' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 7: 1891 - 1939 A-Ch, Bede Nairn and Geoffrey Serle, eds (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1979), p. 348. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A070353b.htm. Details

Journal Articles

• Borchgrevink, C. E., 'The Southern Cross Expedition to the Antarctic 1899 - 1900', Geographical journal, 16 (4) (1900), 381-414. Details
• Branagan, D. F., 'Carsten Egeberg Borchgrevink (1864-1934): the Man Who Claimed to be the First to Set Foot on Antarctica', Earth Sciences History, 33 (1) (2014), 67-121. Details
• Evans, H. B.; and Jones, A. G. E., 'A forgotten explorer: Carsten Egeberg Borchgrevink', Polar record, 17 (108) (1974), 221-35. Details
• Faithfull, J. W. and Durant, G. P., 'Antarctica rediscovered: Borchgrevink rock specimens rediscovered in the Hunterian Museum.', Scottish naturalist, 113 (2001), 127-39. Details

Resources

• Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q350366. Details
• VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/3613461. Details
• 'Borchgrevink, C E (1864-1934)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-794561. Details

See also

• Chester, Jonathan, Going to extremes: Project Blizzard and Australia's Antarctic heritage (Sydney: Auckland: Doubleday Australia, 1986), 308 pp. Details
• Crawford, Janet, That First Antarctic Winter: the Story of the Southern Cross Expedition of 1898-1900 as Told in the Diaries of Louis Charles Bernacchi (Christchurch, NZ: Southern Latitude Research in association with Peter J. Skellerup, 1998), 270 pp. Details
• Harrowfield, D. L. and Mabin, M. C. G., 'The Possession Islands Ross Sea Antarctica: a history of exploration and scientific endeavour at a Ross Sea archipelago since the first landing in 1841', Polar Record, 59 (e3) (2023), 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0032247422000390. Details