Voyage of the Scotia 1902-04

The Antarctic

Nine men standing on beached sperm whale at Leith Harbour, South Georgia

Although the results of the Dundee Antarctic Expedition of 1892-93 inevitably led to the conclusion that whaling in the Antarctic seas was not then a viable economic proposition, improvements in equipment did eventually lead to the development of a briefly thriving industry in that region.

Scottish interest revived, but switched from Dundee to Leith, where three companies were involved: the New Whaling Co. (1908), the South Georgia Co. Ltd. (1909), and Christian Salvesen & Co. (1911).

The South Georgia Co. established a factory at Leith Harbour in Stromness Bay, South Georgia, where this 1913 photograph shows a female cachalot or sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus) at the flenching platform, on which it would be cut up to remove the commercially valuable parts.