Following the success of the first edition hardback of The Quest Chronicle the book is now available in hardback and paperback. This edition is essentially the same as the first edition, with 410 pages containing many rarely seen images, insightful footnotes, a bibliography, reference section and an extensive index. The following preface is included summarising the amendments and new content:
PREFACE
The second edition of The Quest Chronicle is for the most part identical to the limited first edition hardback published in 2022. A few typographic and formatting errors have been corrected and two footnotes have been added.
For the record, the corrections of historical fact are as follows:
- Alexander Kerr’s age, at the time he joined the expedition, was 28, not 38 and Leonard Hussey was 30, not 27.
- George Vibert Douglas had met Shackleton in February 1921 in Montreal, not Toronto.
- Although the crew generally referred to Quest’s power unit as “the engines” there was in fact a single engine, and the text has been amended accordingly.
- George Vibert Douglas was not present at the dinner in Rio on 7 December 1921, as he was in South Georgia.
- The supplies of smoking tobacco for Quest’s excursion to the ice fields of Antarctica, packed by Macklin and mentioned in the entry for 9 January 1922, included 35 lbs per man, not 35 lbs total.
- Mount Rowett was given its name and the rock samples collected there on 1 June 1922, not 29 May.
- Allie Vibert Douglas was a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE), not an Officer (OBE).
- Emily Shackleton’s spelling of “granary” in her letter to H R Mill of 7 August 1922 was in fact “granery”, hence the [sic].
- Reginald James has been added to the Endurance crewmembers listed in Table 1.
Footnotes are added for James Hamilton and Dorothy Russell Grigg (later Dorothy Irving-Bell).
Jan Chojecki
February 2024