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Now that I have a copy of H M Dunnet's "Shackleton's Boat" (1996), I can
report on what it says about "Worsley's log of the boat journey" in part V.

He starts by claiming "Worsley's log of the boat journey is preserved at the
Scott Polar Research Institute.  It was found in a suitcaseful of papers
bequeathed to the Institute by Sir James Wordie's successors".

and later "Worsley's log. Transcribed  by J M Wordie ... from the original
in Worsley's second work book."

That's a bit of a surprise, in view of the evidence that the original
manuscript log was available to Brad from the Canterbury museum in New
Zealand. There can't be two such originals.

I've tackled the curator of the library of the Scott Institute about this,
and she accepts that what they have there may be a "fair copy" of that log,
not the original itself. Unfortunately, their archive is in a state of
upheaval at present, and won't be accessible again until July.

I won't reproduce Dunnet's 6 pages of log transcripts here, but will copy it
to Brad, who will find it helpful, off-list . It looks as if Wordie has been
able to transcribe words that have eluded Brad (he may have been familiar
with Worsley's handwriting / figuring, and closer in touch with the events
and terminology) so putting the two documents together should be productive.

However Dunnet omits all of Worsley's spherical-trig calculations that have
been providing us with a bit of fun. I wonder when they got left off? Are
they in Wordie's own transcript? Just a set of boring old numbers that
nobody can understand, perhaps?

One of the quantities that has puzzled me is that on two occasions when
Worsley refers to his chronometer he provides the numbers "192 / 262",
without explanation. What I suspect now is that this may just be a serial
number which identifies that chronometer (even if it was the only one
aboard).

George.

contact George Huxtable, at  george@hux.me.uk
or at +44 1865 820222 (from UK, 01865 820222)
or at 1 Sandy Lane, Southmoor, Abingdon, Oxon OX13 5HX, UK.


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