TheRoss expedition was a voyage of scientificexploration of theAntarctic in 1839 to 1843, led byJames Clark Ross, with two unusually strong warships,HMSErebus andHMSTerror. It explored what is now called theRoss Sea and discovered theRoss Ice Shelf. On the expedition, Ross discovered theTransantarctic Mountains and the volcanoesMount Erebus andMount Terror, named after each ship. The young botanistJoseph Dalton Hooker made his name on the expedition.
The expedition confirmed the existence of the continent of Antarctica, inferred the position of theSouth Magnetic Pole and made substantial observations of thezoology andbotany of the region, resulting in a monograph on the zoology and a series of four detailed monographs by Hooker on the botany, collectively calledFlora Antarctica, published in parts between 1843 and 1859. Among the expedition's biological discoveries was theRoss seal, a species confined to thepack ice of Antarctica. The expedition was also the last major voyage of exploration made wholly undersail.
In 1838, theBritish Association for the Advancement of Science (BA) proposed an expedition to carry outmagnetic measurements in the Antarctic.[1] SirJames Clark Ross was chosen to lead the expedition after previous experience working on the British Magnetic Survey from 1834 onwards, working with prominent physicists and geologists such asHumphrey Lloyd,Sir Edward Sabine,John Phillips andRobert Were Fox.[2] Ross had made many previous expeditions to the Arctic, including experience as captain.[3]
Ross, a captain of theRoyal Navy, commandedHMSErebus. Its sister ship,HMSTerror, was commanded by Ross' close friend, CaptainFrancis Crozier.[4]
The botanistJoseph Dalton Hooker, then aged 23 and the youngest person on the expedition, was assistant-surgeon toRobert McCormick, and responsible for collectingzoological andgeological specimens.[5][6] Hooker later became one of England's greatest botanists; he was a close friend ofCharles Darwin and became director of theRoyal Botanical Gardens, Kew for twenty years.[7][8] McCormick had been ship's surgeon for thesecond voyage of HMSBeagle under CaptainRobert FitzRoy, along with Darwin as gentleman naturalist.[9]
The second master onTerror wasJohn E. Davis who was responsible for much of the surveying and chart production, as well as producing many illustrations of the voyage. He had been on theBeagle surveying the coasts of Bolivia, Peru and Chile.[10] Another Arctic veteran wasThomas Abernethy, another friend of Ross, who joined the new expedition as agunner.
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HMSErebus and HMSTerror, the ships servicing the Ross expedition, were two unusually strong warships.[11] Both werebomb ships, named and equipped to fire heavymortar bombs at a high angle over defences, and were accordingly heavily built to withstand the substantial recoil of these three-ton weapons.[11] Their solid construction ideally suited them for use in dangerous sea ice that might crush other ships. The 372-tonErebus had been armed with two mortars – one 13 in (330 mm) and one 10 in (250 mm) – and ten guns.[12]
In September 1839,Erebus andTerror departedChatham in Kent, arriving atTasmania (then known asVan Diemen's Land) in August 1840. On 21 November 1840 they departed for Antarctica. In January 1841, the ships landed onVictoria Land and proceeded to name areas of the landscape afterBritish politicians, scientists and acquaintances.Mount Erebus, onRoss Island, was named after one ship andMount Terror after the other.[13] McMurdo Bay (now known asMcMurdo Sound) was named afterArchibald McMurdo, senior lieutenant ofTerror.[14]
Reaching latitude 76° south on 28 January 1841, the explorers spied
...a low white line extending from its eastern extreme point as far as the eye could discern... It presented an extraordinary appearance, gradually increasing in height, as we got nearer to it, and proving at length to be a perpendicular cliff of ice, between one hundred and fifty and two hundred feet above the level of the sea, perfectly flat and level at the top, and without any fissures or promontories on its even seaward face.[15]
Ross called this the "Great Ice Barrier", now known as theRoss Ice Shelf, which they were unable to penetrate, although they followed it eastward until the lateness of the season compelled them to return to Tasmania. The following summer, 1841–42, Ross continued to follow the ice shelf eastward. Both ships stayed atPort Louis in theFalkland Islands for the winter, returning in September 1842 to explore theAntarctic Peninsula, where they conducted studies in magnetism, and gatheredoceanographic data and collections ofbotanical andornithological specimens.[13]
The expedition arrived back in England on 4 September 1843, having confirmed the existence of the southern continent and charted a large part of its coastline.[16] It was the last major voyage of exploration made wholly undersail.[17]
Ross discovered the "enormous" Ross Ice Shelf, correctly observing that it was the source of thetabular icebergs seen in theSouthern Ocean, and helping to found the science ofglaciology.[19] He identified theTransantarctic Mountains and the volcanoes Erebus and Terror, named after his ships.[20][21]
The main purpose of the Ross expedition was to find the position of theSouth Magnetic Pole, by making observations of the Earth's magnetism in theSouthern Hemisphere.[22] Ross did not reach the Pole, but did infer its position.[23] The expedition made the first "definitive" charts ofmagnetic declination,magnetic dip and magnetic intensity, in place of the less accurate charts made by the earlier expeditions ofCharles Wilkes andDumont d'Urville.[19]
The expedition's zoological discoveries included a collection of birds. They were described and illustrated byGeorge Robert Gray andRichard Bowdler Sharpe inThe Zoology of the Voyage of HMS Erebus & HMS Terror.[5][24][25]
The expedition was the first to describe theRoss seal, which it found in thepack ice, to which the species is confined.[19]
The expedition's botanical discoveries were documented in Joseph Dalton Hooker's four-partFlora Antarctica (1843–1859). It totalled six volumes (parts III and IV each being in two volumes), covered about 3000 species, and contained 530 plates figuring in all 1095 of the species described. It was throughout "splendidly"[26] illustrated byWalter Hood Fitch.[26] The parts were:
Hooker gave Charles Darwin a copy of the first part of theFlora; Darwin thanked him, and agreed in November 1845 that thegeographical distribution of organisms would be "the key which will unlock the mystery of species".[27]
In 1912, the Norwegian explorerRoald Amundsen wrote of the Ross expedition that "Few people of the present day are capable of rightly appreciating this heroic deed, this brilliant proof of human courage and energy. With two ponderous craft – regular "tubs" according to our ideas – these men sailed right into the heart of the pack [ice], which all previous explorers had regarded as certain death ... These men were heroes – heroes in the highest sense of the word."[28]
Hooker'sFlora Antarctica remains important; in 2013 W. H. Walton in hisAntarctica: Global Science from a Frozen Continent describes it as "a major reference to this day", encompassing as it does "all the plants he found both in the Antarctic and on the sub-Antarctic islands", surviving better than Ross's deep-sea soundings which were made with "inadequate equipment".[19]
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