Explorer to be honoured with memorial stone

CEREMONY AT WESTMINSTER ABBEY FOR SHACKLETON

ANTARCTIC explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton will be honoured through the dedication of a memorial stone at Westminster Abbey this week.

The Dean of Westminster, David Hoyle, said the dedication on Thursday would help sustain Shackleton's "legacy of wonder" The stone will be located in the Abbey's south cloister, close to a memorial to pioneering sailors Captain James Cook, Sir Francis Chichester and Sir Francis Drake.

Shackleton led three British expeditions to the Antarctic, sailing from Millbay in Plymouth on the ship Endurance in August 1914 on his Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition 1914-17.

The Very Reverend Hoyle, who will dedicate the memorial, said Shackleton had helped create a "new excitement about science" and a "deeper reverence for the world in which we live" He added: "Shackleton's name conjures up a little bit of an old and familiar narrative about a great man with remarkable courage and resilience.