Happy Birthday: William Dampier (1651 – March 1715) was an English explorer, pirate, privateer and naturalist who became the first Englishman to explore parts of what is today Australia, and the first person to circumnavigate the world three times. He has also been described as Australia's first natural historian, as well as one of the most important British explorers of the period between the 16th-century explorer Sir Francis Drake and the 18th-century explorer James Cook; he "bridged those two eras" with a mix of piratical derring-do of the former and scientific inquiry of the latter.

Dampier's expeditions were among the first to identify and name a number of plants, animals, foods and cooking techniques for a European audience, being among the first English writers to use words such as avocado, barbecue and chopsticks. In describing the preparation of avocados, he was the first European to describe the making of guacamole, named the breadfruit plant, and made frequent documentation of the taste of numerous foods foreign to the European palate at the time, such as flamingo and manatee.

After impressing the Admiralty with his book A New Voyage Round the World, Dampier was given command of a Royal Navy ship and made important discoveries in western Australia, before being court-martialed for cruelty. On a later voyage he rescued Alexander Selkirk, a former crewmate who may have inspired Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Others influenced by Dampier include George Anson, James Cook, Horatio Nelson, Charles Darwin, and Alfred Russel Wallace.

Jonathan Swift mentions Dampier in his Gulliver's Travels as a mariner comparable to Lemuel Gulliver, and the novel itself occasionally parodies Dampier's travel books as well as other tales of exploration.

He is cited over 80 times in the Oxford English Dictionary, notably on words such as "barbecue", "avocado", "chopsticks", and "subspecies". That is not to say he coined the words, but his use of them in his writings is the first known example in English.

He recorded the first English language recipes for guacamole and mango chutney.

[Side Note: He was baptised on 5 September, but his precise date of birth is not recorded]

Just Finished Reading: Foreign Devils on the Silk Road – The Search for the Lost Treasures of Central Asia by Peter Hopkirk (FP: 1980) [241pp] 

It was arguably one of the most important trade routes in history. It connected the great Empires of the West to those of the East and allowed goods, ideas and disease to travel the globe in relative ease. They were the Silk Roads (plural). But all things pass and trade routes are no exception. First, they pass into disuse, then history and finally into legend itself. But around the turn of the 20th century rumours of lost cities, ancient sites lost in the desert and uncounted treasure began circling the European capitals. Strange exotic objects began appearing in markets and, finally, expeditions were planned and funded in institutions from Britain, Germany, Russia, Japan and the USA.  

Knowledge of the exact route of the various strands that made up the Silk Routes was approximate at best. The only way to find them at that time was travel overland with the knowledge available and ask the locals what they knew – which, all too often, was very little. Rumours, legends, warnings, stories of ghosts in the desert and the curses placed on treasure by jealous spirits wasn’t exactly a road map. But hints of sunken cities and a handful of ancient objects in the homes of the headmen was enough to start with. The first tentative diggings yielded little but then, finally, paydirt. In the disputed areas bordering China a host of documents emerged from the sand. The burgeoning world of archaeology was aflame. Museums and galleries across the world demanded their own examples of artifacts, paintings, documents and anything small enough to transport across the vast (and often uncharted) distances safely to London, Berlin, Paris or New York.  

The men who responded to the call were a varied bunch. Some, indeed most, were experts in their respective fields. Others were there for the glory of being first, of making their names and reputations and, of course, for sheer the adventure of it all. What almost no one cared about was the rights of the locals to their own history. Naturally some serious rationalisation went on. The locals were all too often ignorant of what lay beneath the sand or high in the mountains. There was also the very real danger that time and the environment would destroy much of cultural or historic significance – so why not remove it and place it in a museum thousands of miles away for ‘safe-keeping’. Of course, later Chinese authorities couldn’t help but mention the number of irreplaceable artifacts destroyed by the Allied bombing of Germany in WW2 held in its city museums. 

This was honestly a fascinating read. If you’ve ever enjoyed an Indiana Jones movie (well the first decent one) you’ll enjoy the reality even more. Although there’s no Nazi archaeologists looking for supernatural wonder weapons there are plenty of Chinese warlords, mysterious priests, Japanese spies, British agents and competing dig teams almost coming to outright conflict over who had a right to dig where. Added into the mix, if that wasn’t enough, was extreme weather events, the very real possibility of death from cold, heat, disease, wild animals, local treasure hunters, and thirst. Coming out of the region alive, even empty handed, was an achievement in itself! This is definitely recommended for all adventure fans and those interested in the real-life origins of one of our own cultural icons – Indie! More to come from this author.

Just Finished Reading: Icemen – A History of the Artic and Its Explorers by Mick Conefrey and Tim Jordan (FP: 1998) [180pp] 

It is no real exaggeration to call it an obsession. For several centuries now Europeans and, more recently Americans, have become fascinated with the Artic – AKA the North Pole. First it was the idea, largely a fantasy until Global Warming made it an increasing reality, of the Northwest Passage across the top of the world. Rumours of an ice-free ocean at the Pole warmed by a sun always above the horizon but enclosed behind a wall of ice drove explorers on, often to their deaths or disappearance. Many tried and the lucky ones returned to tell their tales of hardship and failure. 

Technology seemed to come to the aid of explorers everywhere with the invention of balloons and, later, rigid airships. Able to accomplish much with somewhat reduced risk – although crashing into the ice (or worse the Artic Ocean) was a real possibility – these allowed improved mapping of the region and were swiftly followed by heavier-than-air craft to break further records and more than a few bones and bank accounts. As technology advanced even further it was the submarine that allowed humans to glide under the ice and surface even at the Pole itself. The Cold War had found its very own cold home. 

Of course, technology all too often meant military technology from long-range nuclear bombers to ballistic missiles. The only early ‘defence’ was early warning and the best place for those early warning stations was the Artic. Much was learned from building, supplying and maintaining outposts in some of the most hostile places on Earth. 

The pull of the Artic wastes has a long and often fascinating history. Despite the comparative brevity of the book the authors pack a LOT of information here along with a host of brave and often very strange people who helped write that history – and themselves in to it. I was particularly interested in the weird battle between Allied and German weather stations during WW2 scattered throughout the region each giving their owners vital information with which to plan their attacks. Hopefully more on THAT topic at some point! 

Well written, often humorous, sometimes tragic and endlessly interesting this was a delight from beginning to end. Much more to come on both Poles and the very brave people who went there to find out everything they could about some of the most inhospitable and dangerous places on the planet. Recommended if you can source a copy. 

Happy Birthday: Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton CVO OBE (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.

Born in Kilkea, County Kildare, Ireland, Shackleton and his Anglo-Irish family moved to Sydenham in suburban south London when he was ten. Shackleton's first experience of the polar regions was as third officer on Captain Robert Falcon Scott's Discovery Expedition of 1901–1904, from which he was sent home early on health grounds, after he and his companions Scott and Edward Adrian Wilson set a new southern record by marching to latitude 82°S. During the Nimrod Expedition of 1907–1909, he and three companions established a new record Farthest South latitude of 88°23′ S, only 97 geographical miles (112 statute miles or 180 kilometres) from the South Pole, the largest advance to the pole in exploration history. Also, members of his team climbed Mount Erebus, the most active Antarctic volcano. On returning home, Shackleton was knighted for his achievements by King Edward VII.

After the race to the South Pole ended in December 1911, with Roald Amundsen's conquest, Shackleton turned his attention to the crossing of Antarctica from sea to sea, via the pole. To this end, he made preparations for what became the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917. The expedition was struck by disaster when its ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice and finally sank in the Weddell Sea off Antarctica on 21 November 1915. The crew escaped by camping on the sea ice until it disintegrated, then by launching the lifeboats to reach Elephant Island and ultimately the South Atlantic island of South Georgia, enduring a stormy ocean voyage of 720 nautical miles (1,330 km; 830 mi) in Shackleton's most famous exploit. He returned to the Antarctic with the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition in 1921 but died of a heart attack while his ship was moored in South Georgia. At his wife's request, he remained on the island and was buried in Grytviken cemetery. The wreck of Endurance was discovered just over a century after Shackleton's death.

Away from his expeditions, Shackleton's life was generally restless and unfulfilled. In his search for rapid pathways to wealth and security, he launched business ventures which failed to prosper, and he died heavily in debt. Upon his death, he was lauded in the press but was thereafter largely forgotten, while the heroic reputation of his rival Scott was sustained for many decades. Later in the 20th century, Shackleton was "rediscovered", and he became a role model for leadership in extreme circumstances. In his 1956 address to the British Science Association, one of Shackleton's contemporaries, Sir Raymond Priestley, said: "Scott for scientific method, Amundsen for speed and efficiency[,] but[,] when disaster strikes and all hope is gone, get down on your knees and pray for Shackleton", paraphrasing what Apsley Cherry-Garrard had written in a preface to his 1922 memoir The Worst Journey in the World. In 2002, Shackleton was voted eleventh in a BBC poll of the 100 Greatest Britons.

Just Finished Reading: Life at the Extremes – The Science of Survival by Frances Ashcroft (FP: 2000) [306pp]

As a species that evolved to live, and indeed thrive, on the African veldt we have over the millennia moved far beyond it. There is now little ground that we have not explored and few territories that we have not settled – in time. In other to do so though we have had to adapt to some harsh conditions. Some of that adaptation has been biological but a great deal of it has been technological and cultural – allowing us to move into or at least explore areas that are not only inimical to our own species but to life in general. This is the story, the science, of mankind’s encounter with the extremes of climate and environment on Earth, below the oceans and into Space.

It is a rare place indeed that has not felt the tread of mankind. Starting at height the author (who interestingly sprinkles her own personal experiences of extreme environments throughout the book) looks at the early experiences of mountain climbers and balloonist who, for the first time in human history travelled to the edges (and sometimes beyond!) of the breathable atmosphere and looks at the effects of low oxygen on the body and why some people cope much better with altitude sickness that others. Moving into the opposite realm she explores the issues with working under enhanced air-pressure and the operation of early diving suits and the painful discovery of conditions like ‘the Bends’ first experienced in significant numbers of workers during the use of caissons used in bridge and tunnel construction in the 19^th century. Further discussion moved to the capabilities (and dangers!) of the lives of pearl divers and, later, scuba divers and the use of increasingly exotic gases to enable deeper and deeper dives.

So with pressure (and the lack thereof!) so to temperature with the science of living in both Hot and Cold zones on the planet and the adaptations forced upon those who live there – even for short expeditions to the hottest and coldest places imaginable. Lastly the author takes a few diversions – into space (and how we cope with low – or zero – gravity as well as issues like cosmic radiation) and seemingly a bit more off-topic into the realm of speed – essentially running and finally a look at the latest (20 years ago) insights into bacterial and viral extremophiles found, once we actually started looking, just about everywhere from the tundra to hot springs, and from the deepest caves to the most acidic lakes.

This was a fascinating romp through Earth’s more extreme environments and how people have adapted to live there – or simply survived brief encounters with temperatures or other factors that would, in other more sustained instances have killed them. There is a lot of information here from all over the world showcasing how humans have used both their natural abilities and their ever inventive brains to push envelopes further than most of us can imagine. So if you want a real insight into how your body copes (or fails to cope) with a cold winter or hot dry summer this is definitely the book for you. It might even save your life one day…. Recommended.  

Just Finished Reading: Darwin’s Armada – Four Voyages to the Southern Oceans and Their Battle for the Theory of Evolution by Iain McCalman (FP: 2009)

It was not an idea that struck him out of the blue out of a clear sky. On the contrary it was a long, long time coming. When the young Charles Darwin managed to get himself assigned to the HMS Beagle and its mission to map the Sothern Ocean the prevailing thought was that each species on earth was a special creation of God and though some local adaptation was possible the transmutation of species was not. Each species had been created in its place and time as part of a divine plan. So it was a shame that anomalies and unanswerable questions had steadily been accumulating. One thing was almost universally accepted now – that the Earth was more likely to be millions of years old that the previously accepted six thousand. There was enough time for oceans to fall and mountains to rise and for the land itself to be transformed. Darwin brought back (or often sent back) copious notes, observations and specimens from across the globe to investigate further on his return to England. But he was not the last to do so. Other intrepid explorers of the world – geological, geographical and natural – followed in his footsteps, added pieces to the jigsaw puzzle of life, sent specimens home (including to Darwin himself) and thought about what they had seen with their own eyes. Often they were the first European to have set foot on an island or to have observed the rituals of primitive peoples. Alfred Wallace in particular spent 8 long years in South-East Asia and in the Amazon basin cataloguing, observing and living in close contact with the natives of those far off lands. In the early 1850’s he wrote to Darwin expressing the ideas so close to his own that Darwin thought that his years of vacillation on the topic had undone him and that he could not, in all conscience, claim a prime place in the Evolutionary debate. His friends Thomas Huxley and Joseph Hooker (all three pallbearers at Darwin’s funeral) persuaded him otherwise and encouraged him to publish Origin of Species giving due credit to the work of Wallace. All four of the voyagers, each in their own way, contributed to getting Natural Selection accepted in the Victorian scientific establishment somewhat quicker than Darwin had anticipated. A revolution in human thought had taken place.

This was generally an excellent book focusing on the foundational voyages of Darwin, Hooker, Huxley and Wallace as each encountered, assimilated and speculated on what each had experienced away from the confines of Europe and how those encounters had convinced each of them that Evolution by Natural Selection was a scientific fact. The only wobble (for me) was the section on Huxley’s voyage to Australia which seemed concentrate on his love life and depressive tendencies rather than any scientific discoveries. Apart from Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle my favourite passages concerned the adventures of Alfred Wallace in South-East Asia and the Amazon. I have added his published book on the subject to my Wish List. It sounds amazing. If you’ve ever wondered where the ideas put forward in Origin of Species came from this entertaining work of popular science will answer many of your questions. Recommended. 

Just Finished Reading: Voyages of Delusion – The Search for the Northwest Passage in the Age of Reason by Glyn Williams (FP: 2002)

It HAD to be there. If only they could find it. Discovery meant fame, wealth both personally and for the Company and its shareholders and, more importantly, it would allow the British navy to dominate the Pacific in the same way that it now dominated the Atlantic. So it HAD to be there. The Northwest Passage running between the two great oceans would allow whoever could both find and defend it to shave weeks or even months off the voyages between Europe, India and the Orient which would enhance profits, undercut the commercial and political enemies of the British Empire and make her power unassailable. The search had already begun in the Hudson Bay with tantalising possibilities emerging out of the mists and between the icepacks that few ships could penetrate without difficulty. Rumours abounded – that a Spanish ship had already completed the voyage years or even decades before, that polar waters were ice free all year, the salt water simply couldn’t freeze, that native Indians had travelled days inland and had seen the Pacific ocean and returned with tales of great lakes linked by great rivers stretching across the continent. If only they could find the entrance to this interlinked system.

Despite being aware of the potential profits the secretive Hudson Bay Company was reluctant to search for the Passage themselves. They knew enough about their local environs to suspect that the Passage did not actually exist and, at every opportunity, called its existence into question. But obsessed men in London had other ideas and pressed Parliament to fund a survey of Hudson Bay beyond the area already mapped by the Company. This was the first of many private ventures and, later, Royal Navy missions sent to find the Holy Grail of navigation. Years of hardship in freezing temperatures the likes of which could scarcely be imagined, shipwreck, starvation and the ever present and mysterious scurvy, failed to blunt the search. As newly drawn maps arrived back in London, Madrid and St Petersburg the possible location of the Passage narrowed and narrowed again. But with the weather set against them for most of the year the journeys into the far North on the eastern seaboard gave way to the possibility of gaining access to the Passage on the Pacific side. The Russians had already discovered the Bering Strait and the edge of Alaska which showed great promise. To discover more the great navigator of the age – Captain James Cook – was sent to investigate the west coast north of Spanish California. After many months of travel and many more months of exploration and coastal mapping a few tantalising hints were found but there was no sight of the fabled inlet spoken of in awe in old Spanish texts. It was left to Captain George Vancouver to undertake the tedious task of mapping every twist of the western coast and the exploration of every river or estuary heading inland. Time and again hope turned to disappointment as the towering mountain chain (later known as the Rocky Mountains) seemed to be impenetrable. With ever more detailed treks inland failing to uncover any great east-west navigable watercourses hope of the true Northwest Passage began to fade and finally the much talked about earlier voyages were seen as fantasy and hoax. 

This is a brilliantly told tale of one of the driving obsessions of the 17th and 18th centuries in the seafaring nations of Europe. With competing expeditions from Britain, France, Spain and Russia a great deal of effort, time and gold was spent trying to find something that did not exist. In the Age of Enlightenment this was a very strange phenomena indeed but the author shows just how this drive came about and what sustained it for so long despite so many setbacks. Not only a fascinating tale of geographical exploration but also an interesting insight into the European mind of the time. Definitely recommended for naval history buffs. (R)

Coming next: The Cinema Book Blitz.