Part I: Seals teeth and whales ears - Scott Polar Research Institute ...

Islands and the Debenham Islands (in Marguerite Bay), in successive seasons.
Extensive scientific programmes were conducted in meteorology, geology, glaciology
and biology. The expedition took a small aircraft, useful for reconnaissance and
during dog sledge journeys and flights the west coast, and off lying islands of the
Antarctic Peninsula were surveyed as far south as southern Alexander Island.
Sledging parties discovered King George VI Sound and travelled as far south as 72° S
and across the Antarctic Peninsula to the east. They established that it was indeed a
peninsula, not an island. Penola spent the 1936 winter at the Falkland Islands and
South Georgia where Brian Roberts made important ornithological investigations.
The efficient methods of travel and field research and results of studies on birds and
seals (my main interest), by Brian Roberts and Colin Bertram, set a new standard.
The expedition also developed new techniques of polar travel and design of polar
clothing. A second expedition planned for 1939-40 was abandoned after the outbreak
of World War II.
Operation Tabarin
In January l943, during World War II the War Cabinet approved an expedition
to the Falkland Islands Dependencies. The objectives were to strengthen the British
claim to sovereignty in the face of claims by Argentina and Chile; and to deny the use
of harbours and oil fuel stocks to enemy shipping. The operation was put under
Admiralty control and was to be secret – code-named ‘Operation Tabarin’ after a
famous Paris nightclub. News of the expedition was not released until April 1944.
The expedition was planned by a committee of representatives from
government departments, including the Admiralty, Foreign Office and Colonial
Office. It was an informal committee comprising people with polar expertise -
mainly from Discovery Investigations and British Grahamland Expedition (BGLE) -
and it provided advice on scientific possibilities and logistics. The Governor of the
Falkland Islands, representing the Colonial Office, was to be in overall control of the
expedition, once it was in the field, and Cdr J W S Marr, RNVR, was appointed
Expedition Leader. Marr had Antarctic experience from service on Shackleton’s last
expedition, attached as a Boy Scout (l921-22) and with Discovery Investigations from
l927-30.
In the l943/44 season bases were established at Port Lockroy (Base A) and
Deception Island (B), by HMS William Scoresby and SS Fitzroy, the cargo/passenger
ship owned by the Falkland Islands Company. A [Naval Meteorological Service] and
Post Offices were set up. The following season the SS Eagle from Newfoundland was
chartered for the relief of the bases and in that season the main base was established
as planned at Hope Bay (D) and a base hut erected at Sandefjord Bay (B), Coronation
Island, South Orkney Islands.
Marr was replaced as expedition leader by Captain A Taylor, Royal Canadian
Engineers, in February 1945 and in July ‘Operation Tabarin’ was renamed the
Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey (FIDS) and the Colonial Office took over full
responsibility. Funding and logistics continued to be the responsibility of the
Admiralty. The informal Advisory Committee was serviced by Dr B B Roberts,
Colonial Office Research Department. Arrangements were made to store data,
records and specimens from ‘Operation Tabarin’ and FIDS in the Discovery
Committee accommodation in the British Museum (Natural History).
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