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The polar ship Quest

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

Angus B. Erskine  and
Kjell-G. Kjaer
Angus B. Erskine
Affiliation:
16 Braid Farm Road, EdinburghEH10 6LF
Kjell-G. Kjaer
Affiliation:
Daerlengengt 16B, 0567 Oslo, Norway
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Abstract

Sir Ernest Shackleton bought the Norwegian sealer Foca 7 in 1921 for his third Antarctic expedition and renamed it Quest. He died aboard the ship in South Georgia in January 1922, but Frank Wild took over the leadership and completed the expedition after the delayed start. The vessel returned to Norwegian ownership in 1923 but kept the name Quest. In the 1920s and 1930s, in-between sealing voyages, she was chartered out for various scientific or hunting expeditions, mostly to S valbard or the east coast of Greenland, during which many well-known explorers trod her decks, including Gunnar Isachsen, Gino Watkins, Augustine Courtauld, John Rymill, Count Eigil Knuth, Lawrence Wager, H.W. Ahlmann, Gaston Micard, Paul-Emile Victor, and John Giaever. Vital assistance was given in rescuing the survivors of the Italian airship Italia in 1928, of the Danish ship Teddy in 1924, and of several sealers at different times. Many sailors owed their lives to this little ship, which was owned by the Schjelderup family and for most years captained by Ludolf Schjelderup, who gained international fame as an expert ice pilot. On one occasion, 1936–37, the vessel overwintered at Loch Fyne in northeast Greenland. In April 1940, when the Germans invaded Norway, Quest was sealing off Newfoundland. Allied naval forces took possession of her and she was used in various capacities in Canada, Bermuda, and UK coastal waters for the rest of the war. After the war, she once again returned to the sealing business under Norwegian ownership until finally coming to grief in the ice just north of Newfoundland and sinking on 5 May 1962.

Type
Articles
Information
Polar Record , Volume 34 , Issue 189 , April 1998 , pp. 129 - 142
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1998

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