Almost 70 years after being taken as souvenirs, historic artefacts to be returned to Antarctica

Caught in a polar storm, the Americans had no choice but to hunker down in their tents.

It was 1956 and their base was more than 20km away, across the Antarctic ice.

The team knew about a hut in Cape Evans, which had been unused since Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Ross Sea party left in 1917.

They decided to investigate, partly out of curiosity but also in the hope it might offer them better protection if the conditions continued.

READ MORE:
* MetService unearths ‘priceless’ artefacts linked to famous Antarctic explorers
* Captain Scott’s scales returned to Antarctica after being taken as a ‘souvenir’
* Oldest Antarctic artifacts on show at Canterbury Museum still ‘smell fresh’

The hut was covered in snow, but they managed to pry open a window. Inside it had been undisturbed for almost four decades.

Among the Americans was Dave Baker, a US Navy ensign who was part of the dog-sled rescue crew, stationed to assist any downed aircraft.

It was during a training mission that they found themselves in the storm.

Built for Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s 1910-1913 Terra Nova Expedition, the hut provided the Americans with shelter and even had supplies.

“Someone unfamiliar with the hut’s history might have assumed that the occupants had stepped out to return any minute,” he said.

Baker and his team deemed the hut a “sacred space”, and left it as they found it.

However, while looking for food stores outside the hut, he found a case of Fry’s cocoa and a wooden box, labelled “Scott’s Antarctic Expedition 1910”.

He took them as a souvenir.

Today, visitors to Antarctica cannot remove items. Although guided tours can go inside the historic hut, under the Antarctic Treaty visitors are not allowed to touch items.

But the rules were not in place when Baker took the artefacts.

He owned them for the next six decades, often taking them with him when he lectured on Antarctica across the US.

Now, aged in his 90s, he has gifted them to the Christchurch-based Antarctic Heritage Trust, which cares for five expedition bases in Antarctica, including those of Shackleton and Scott.

Lizzie Meek, conservation collections manager, said it is always exciting when items are returned to the organisation.

“We know there are still some artefacts out there that were collected from Antarctica during some of the early 1940s-60s missions,” she said.

Baker’s souvenirs will be flown to McMurdo Station in November before being transported by helicopter back to Scott’s Hut.

After his time on the ice, Baker has remained a “passionate enthusiast and promoter of Antarctica” for the rest of his life, said Meek.

“He’s been pretty keen to makes sure that when he’s no longer with us that these are looked after,” Meek said.

“Rather than put them in a museum he wanted then to go back to where he found them.”

Meek encouraged anyone else with Antarctic artefacts removed from the sites to also get in touch.

“We’d love to hear from you and discuss how we can work together to add these important pieces of history back to the sites”.