The Southern Antarctic Monument in the Falkland Islands

 

Dockyard Point

The Southern Monument sits on the tip of the historic Dockyard Point in Stanley,
Falkland Islands, close to the newly located Falkland Islands Museum.

 

The stainless steel needle catches reflections of the water and the small town of Stanley.

 Reflections

Reflections

The unveiling of the Southern Monument, 25 February 2015

The unveiling of the Southern Antarctic Monument was reported by MercoPress, a news agency based in Montevideo.  Here follows their news item.

The Falkland Islands historic link as the gateway for British Antarctic exploration was acknowledged this week with the dedication in Stanley's Dockyard Point of the southern component of a unique memorial to the 28 men and one woman of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), and before that the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey (FIDS) who have perished in the Antarctic since the establishment by the British Government of the first permanent research base there in 1944.

The monument created by Oliver Barratt is made up of two parts, separated by 8,000 miles. Addressing the crowd, Roderick Rhys-Jones, chairman of the British Antarctic Monument Trust (BAMT), said the northern part of the sculpture which has been erected in the grounds of the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge, consists of two columns of British oak so carved and positioned as to surround an extended elliptical shape between them.  The southern monument represents that shape in stainless steel, as if the wooden northern part had been its mould. 3.25m high and 350mm at its widest point, the mirror-polished metallic needle inclines to the south and particularly towards the Narrows of Stanley Harbour through which those who lost their lives would have departed for Antarctica.

The British Antarctic Monument Trust believe that Oliver Barratt’s design reflects the environmental and scientific link between Britain and Antarctica, but also recognizes the emotional and physical separation experienced by explorers and their families.  In addition to the separated sculpture, BAMT have also placed a memorial plaque in the crypt of St Paul’s cathedral in London.

Memorial Unveiling

Governor Roberts, MLA Cheek, Brian Dorsett-Bailey and Roderick Rhys-Jones, chairman of the British Antarctic Monument Trust, at the unveiling ceremony together with the officiating clergy.

The ceremony was attended Governor Colin Roberts, members of the Legislative Assembly, the Bishop of the Falklands Nigel Stock and Rector of Christchurch Cathedral Reverend David Roper. Member of the Legislative Assembly Jan Cheek opened the ceremony by welcoming the invited guests and the monument to the Islands.

Trustee and relative Brian Dorsett-Bailey thanked Falkland Islands Government and Falkland Islanders for providing such a “perfect place” for a monument that means so much to the families of those lost in the pursuit of knowledge in the region. It was particularly fitting he said, “that the monument pointed to the narrows in Stanley, a passage that every explorer passed through on their way to Antarctica”.

The Trust’s Chairman, Roderick Rhys-Jones, told Penguin News that the service in the crypt of St Paul’s and the reception which followed the unveiling of the memorial in the crypt of St Pauls on May 10, 2011 brought together some 300 families and friends from all over the world.  “It was an incredibly moving occasion,” said Mr. Rhys- Jones, who lost three of his own companions when their Muskeg Tractor disappeared into a crevasse when he was working for BAS at Halley Bay in 1996. Their bodies, like many others of those who died in the Antarctic, were never recovered.

 

Maquettes

 The two parts of the Antarctic Monument on display in the Falkland Islands Museum

 

Unveiling

 

A video of the unveiling of the monument may be watched by clicking on the picture above. 

You can see Oliver Barratt's slides of the erecting of the Southern Monument here.

More about the plinth and its manufactures can be seen here.

 

In the year following the unveiling of the monument, signs of corrosion became apparent in the steel needle.  The foundry was quick to agree to replace the needle with a new casting.  This next casting failed a weathering test in Portsmouth Harbour, so the Trust employed a specialist consultant to liaise with the foundry to ensure that a further casting would be impervious to the Falkland’s climate.  This casting passed all tests and in December 2020 the new monument was swapped for the old in Stanley.

The images below show the work involved in re-erecting the Southern Monument and its appearance in the sunshine of the Falkland Islands.

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