How did Shackleton's crew pass the long polar night when their ship was trapped fast in the Antarctic ice? This episode drifts through the Endurance in the Weddell Sea in 1915, from the warm stove-lit mess called the Ritz to Dog Town on the floe, the Midwinter feast, the Antarctic Derby and the football played on the frozen sea, calm history for falling asleep.

Tonight you'll discover:
• Why the ship was travelling north even though she had not sailed for five months
• How the men built a warm mess room called the Ritz out of the old ship's hold
• Who the twenty-eight men aboard were, from Worsley's dream to Mrs Chippy the cat
• The story of how the Endurance was built, bought and renamed before sailing into war
• A night among the sledge dogs of Dog Town and their sixty-nine names
• The Antarctic Derby, a dog-sledge race run for bets of chocolate and cigarettes
• Football and hockey played on the ice, and the Midwinter concert in the hold
• What the night watchman did in the small hours while the floe carried the ship north
• The calm reassurance in Shackleton's own words about waiting out what cannot be changed

Calm, slow narration with gentle visuals, made for falling asleep, quiet evenings, insomnia, or just listening in bed with the lights off.

CHAPTERS
0:00 Welcome
1:23 A Ship That Drifts
13:13 The Ritz
25:27 Twenty-Eight Men
38:01 By Endurance We Conquer
50:10 Dog Town
1:02:36 The Antarctic Derby
1:14:37 The Sun That Set Twice
1:27:24 Footlights in the Hold
1:40:32 Supper at Midnight
1:53:06 The Night Watchman
2:06:03 The Floe Carries On
2:16:37 Twilight at Noon

Where are you listening from, and what time is it there? Tell me in the comments.

If these help you sleep, subscribe to Sleepy Bedtime History for more relaxing stories from the past.

FURTHER READING
Ernest Shackleton, South: The Story of Shackleton's Last Expedition 1914-1917 (1919), chapters 1-3 (Project Gutenberg 5199)
Frank Hurley, Argonauts of the South (1925), chapter 'In the Grip of the Pack-Ice', quoting his 1915 diary
Frank Worsley, Endurance: An Epic of Polar Adventure (1931)
Alfred Lansing, Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage (1959)
Caroline Alexander, The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition (1998) and Mrs Chippy's Last Expedition (1997)
State Library of New South Wales, Frank Hurley's Endurance photographs and Paget colour plates
Royal Museums Greenwich, Leonard Hussey's Windsor zither banjo (object 6273)
Smithsonian Magazine, 'Shackleton probably never took out an ad seeking men for a hazardous journey'
Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust, Endurance22 expedition (2022) reports
Wikipedia: Endurance (1912 ship); Mrs Chippy; Charles Green (cook); Leonard Hussey; Tom Crean; Frank Wild; Frank Worsley; James Weddell
Scott Polar Research Institute and Royal Geographical Society pages on the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition

HOW THIS IS MADE
Each script is researched and fact-checked from the sources above and written for this channel. The narration is an AI voice and the paintings are made with AI, then checked one by one against the period.

REAL PICTURES IN THIS VIDEO (Wikimedia Commons)
• Sir Ernest Shackleton, portrait by Frank Hurley, 1915: Author Ernest Henry Shackleton Photograph by F. Hu, Public domain (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:South_-_the_story_of_Shackleton%27s_last_expedition,_1914-1917_-_The_Leader.jpg)
• Ocean Camp on the ice floe, Weddell Sea, 1915: National Maritime Museum from Greenwich, No restrictions (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ocean_Camp_established_on_the_ice,_Weddell_Sea_(4792720221).jpg)
• Frank Wild with Shackleton at Farthest South, 1909: J. B. Adams, Public domain (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nimrod_South_9_Jan_09.jpg)
• Endurance frozen in the Weddell Sea pack ice, 1915: National Maritime Museum from Greenwich, No restrictions (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Endurance_in_the_ice.jpg)

#shackleton #antarctica #historyforsleep