Shackleton's Journey: 1

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He was honoured by the Royal Geographical Society, who awarded him a gold medal; a proposal that the medal be smaller than that earlier awarded to Captain Scott was not acted on.

In tribute to their achievement, he wrote: "I do not know how they did it, except that they had to—three men of the heroic age of Antarctic exploration with 50feet of rope between them—and a carpenter's adze". Following the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899, Shackleton transferred to the troopship Tintagel Castle where, in March 1900, he met an army lieutenant, Cedric Longstaff, whose father Llewellyn W. A photograph of the departure of the James Caird in April was doctored by photographer Frank Hurley to create this image.Back in Britain, Shackleton spent some time as a journalist and was then elected secretary of the Scottish Royal Geographical Society. Shackleton reluctantly agreed to look for winter quarters at either the Barrier Inlet—which Discovery had briefly visited in 1902—or King Edward VII Land. Shackleton was then briefly involved in a mission to Spitzbergen to establish a British presence there under guise of a mining operation. With his death, Wild took the ship to Antarctica; but it proved unequal to the task, and after a month spent futilely attempting to penetrate the pack, he set a course for Elephant Island.

When spring arrived in September, the breaking of the ice and its later movements put extreme pressures on the ship's hull. Unqualified as a diplomat, he was unsuccessful in persuading Argentina and Chile to enter the war on the Allied side. Nevertheless, in February 1907, Shackleton presented to the Royal Geographical Society his plans for an Antarctic expedition, the details of which, under the name British Antarctic Expedition, were published in the Royal Geographical Society's newsletter, Geographical Journal.Two years later, he had obtained his first mate's ticket, and in 1898, he was certified as a master mariner, qualifying him to command a British ship anywhere in the world. Besides the official honours, Shackleton's Antarctic feats were greeted in Britain with great enthusiasm.