Following in their footsteps: The First Adventurers

Escape from Elephant Island by Frank Hurley

Sir George Hubert Wilkins MC (and Bar) and Captain Frank Hurley OBE

Two great Australians born within three years of each other, lived lives full of rich adventure and to this day serve as inspiration for Australian travellers. The two men lived almost parallel lives, but held contrasting views on their craft.

Frank Hurley c.1914

James Francis (Frank) Hurley was born in Glebe, Sydney on 15 October 1885 and showed an early interest in photography, joining a local postcard company in 1905, a trade he would later fall back on.

Hurley joined the 1911 Australasian Antarctic Expedition of Douglas Mawson as photographer and upon return in 1914 set out again with Shackleton on his now legendary Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition that became marooned in the Weddel Sea ice. When the survivors finally abandoned ship, he fought with Shackleton to retain his precious glass plate negatives, arguing that they would be needed to tell the story – should they survive or not. His famous documentary film and book, South, are the results.

Hurley was a showman who made full use of the available technology and travelled widely exhibiting his films. Some of his methods were controversial, but nevertheless, he received both critical acclaim and commercial success for his adventurous exploits, including the sensational Pearls and Savages filmed during his two extensive trips into Papua New Guinea in primitive floatplanes between 1920 and 1923.

Hurley clashed with the new wave of daring filmmakers who saw him as old-fashioned and eccentric, but he continued to produce everything from government documentaries to landscapes. A self-styled loner, he retained the title of captain to enhance his profile. He died of heart failure in Sydney in 1962.

Sir George Hubert Wilkins

Born near Adelaide in 1888, Wilkins was the youngest of a large pioneering rural family and, disheartened by the cruel farm life, set out for Sydney, then England to find his fortune. By 1912, he was on the front line of the savage Balkan War filming for the Gaumont Film Co.

From that moment on, Wilkins’ life was one of almost non-stop adventure, exploration and discovery. After returning from a controversial arctic expedition, he worked under Hurley in the trenches of WWI, often photographing forward of enemy lines and having many narrow escapes. Described by Australian Commander General Sir John Monash as “the bravest man I have ever seen”, Wilkins was awarded the Military Cross and Bar.

Wilkins returned to exploration and aviation, making numerous daring and ground breaking flights at both ends of the Earth. He also spent many months living with uncontacted tribes of Australian Aborigines while under assignment from the British Museum. For this and his other work, he was knighted by King George V in 1928.

His collaboration with media mogul, Randolph Hearst, saw him travel around the world on the German airship, Graf Zeppelin, attempt to take an old US submarine under the ice to the North Pole and make yet more trips to the Antarctic with his buddy and benefactor, Lincoln Ellsworth.

A man of enormous integrity and honour, Wilkins’ lack of fame was described by one contemporary as a result of “his aggressive modesty.” He died quietly and suddenly of heart failure in his hotel room in 1958 and his ashes were scattered at the North Pole by US submariners as a mark of respect.

Tips: Aurora Expeditions, Quark and Hapag-Lloyd are famous for enriching historical cruises