However, on January 5, 1922, he suffered a heart attack on his ship and died. Shackleton returned to South Georgia in late 1921, again en route to Antarctica where he aimed to circumnavigate the continent. Not a single life was lost during this extraordinary journey. It took many months and four attempts by a determined Shackleton to finally rescue the men on Elephant Island at the end of August 1916. From there, Shackleton, Worsley and Crean made the difficult and treacherous journey on foot over the glaciated mountains covering 40 miles in 36 hours to reach Stromness Whaling Station. The men survived the 800 mile journey across one of the roughest sea passages in the world, landing on the deserted southern shores of South Georgia. On 24th April 1916 Shackleton and five men set sail in the 23ft James Caird for South Georgia. In March 2016 they saw land for the first time and in April they finally made it ashore with the lifeboats landing on Elephant Island, north of the Antarctic Peninsula. The men tried to walk, dragging life boats and provisions with them, but it was too difficult so they set up Ocean Camp on an ice floe and drifted with the ice. In October 1915 the ship was crushed by the ice and the men had to abandon ship and live on the drifting ice. The expedition never reached the starting point for the Antarctic crossing and they became frozen into pack ice at the southern edge of the Weddell Sea. The story of the Endurance expedition that unfolded is one of the great tales of polar history, and is central to the history of the island of South Georgia. Still from interactive map – see link below
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