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SIR JAMES WEDDELL, DISCOVERER OF THE WEDDELL SEA
An extensive and valuable article (amongst many on Antarctica) about James Weddell (1787-1834), the British navigator who discovered the Weddell Sea in which Endurance became trapped in 1915, can be found at the Wikipedia site.
Visit the page outlining the life and achievements of James Weddell
It was while crossing the Weddell Sea that Shackleton's ship Endurance became beset and trapped in the ice (18 January 1915). She was abandoned at 5 p.m. on October 17 1915 and sank on 20 November.
It is a remarkable coincidence that Weddell died at exactly the same age as Ernest Shackleton: he was just 47. In addition to the sea, Weddell Island in the Falklands is named after him. Weddell Island is the third largest of the Falkland Islands, with an area of 98 square miles (254 km²). Until the late 19th century it was known as Swan Island. Its is now named after James Weddell, the doughty English navigator and explorer who visited the Falklands in the early 1800s. The small population of the island lives in Weddell Settlement on the east coastthe rest is farmed. Like many of the Falkland Islands, Weddell Island is known for its wildlife, including penguins, sea lions and dolphins. Exotic wildlife, including skunks, rheas, parrots and guanacos were introduced in the 1930s, along with Patagonian foxes and sea beavers, which can still be found. The island is known as Isla San José in Spanish.
The Weddell Sea is defined as 'A sea of the southern Atlantic Ocean, bounded on the west by the Antarctic Peninsula of West Antarctica, on the east by Coats Land of East Antarctica, and on the extreme south by frontal barriers of the Filchner and Ronne ice shelves east of the Antarctic Peninsula'.
Centring at about 73° S, 45° W, the Weddell Sea has an area of about 1,080,000 square miles. At its widest the sea is around 2,000 km across.
On the map the Weddell Sea is to the top left of the picture. It can be seen that it a substantial bight out of the South American side of the continent, just as the Ross Sea, situated roughly opposite, is a similar substantial bight out of the New Zealand side.
Read a list of historic publications and scholarly references relating to the Weddell Sea
The Weddell Sea is the main source of information about the deepest water of the world's oceans. Therefore, changes in Weddell Sea water mass characteristics may affect interpretations that reach far beyond its immediate geographical area.
Read more about William Speirs Bruce
Read all about Bruce's career, including the early years
The navigation of the coastland abutting the Weddell Sea owes much to the energies and precise records of William Speirs Bruce (1867-1921), the successful Scottish Polar explorer with whom Shackleton became familiar while serving as Secretary to the Scottish Geographical Society in Edinburgh, prior to mouinting his own Nimrod Expedition. Bruce's father was Scottish and his mother, Welsh; his paternal grandfather hailed from Glasgow and his grandmother, Charity Isbister, came from the Orkneys (where Isbister is a common patronymic). LBruce's father had a very successful medical practice in London (much as Shackleton's had in South London) - and as with Dr. Shackleton, this was necessary in order to support William Bruce's seven brother and sisters, not to mention servants, nursemaids and coachmen.
See a splendid series of almost 150 photos relating to W.S.Bruce and the 'Scotia' at Glasgow Digital Library website
Bruce had sailed south on the Scotia a few years after his first meeting with Shackleton, in 1902, and thus his principal expedition coincided, albeit on the opposite of Antarctica, with that of Scott's Discovery expedition, which was Shackleton's first journey to the white continent/.
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