After five harrowing days at sea, the exhausted men landed their three lifeboats at Elephant Island, 346 miles (557km) from where the Endurance sank.

After a medical examination (which proved inconclusive), [34] Scott decided to send Shackleton home on the relief ship Morning, which had arrived in McMurdo Sound in January 1903. In a small boat, the six men spent 16 days crossing 1,300 km of ocean to reach South Georgia and then trekked across the island to a whaling station.The expedition very carefully matched legacy conditions, using a replica of the James Caird (named for the project's patron: the Alexandra Shackleton), period clothing (by Burberry), replica rations (both in calorific content and rough constitution), period navigational aids, and a Thomas Mercer chronometer just as Shackleton had used. The 'Stancombe Wills' and 'Dudley Docker' made into a hut for shelter, Elephant Island, The hut was known as the 'Snuggery' by the crew, Antarctica. When spring arrived in September, the breaking of the ice and its later movements put extreme pressures on the ship's hull.

Using basic navigational tools, Frank Worsley, the ship’s captain and navigator, recorded its location. Shackleton used his acquaintance with the son to obtain an interview with Longstaff senior, with a view to obtaining a place on the expedition. In 2002, Channel 4 in the UK produced Shackleton, a TV serial depicting the 1914 expedition with Kenneth Branagh in the title role. In his final term at the school he was still able to achieve fifth place in his class of thirty-one.Born in Kilkea, County Kildare, Ireland, Shackleton and his Anglo-Irish family [1] moved to Sydenham in suburban south London when he was ten. Until this point, Shackleton had hoped that the ship, when released from the ice, could work her way back towards Vahsel Bay. Even though he could no longer be the first to reach the South Pole, Shackleton still wanted to travel there. On 9 April 1904, he married Emily Dorman, with whom he had three children: Raymond, Cecily, and Edward, himself an explorer and later a politician. Two ships would be employed; Endurance would carry the main party into the Weddell Sea, aiming for Vahsel Bay from where a team of six, led by Shackleton, would begin the crossing of the continent.

From the ship they took food, bibles, books, clothing, tools, keepsakes and – crucially – three open lifeboats. During the following four years at sea, Shackleton learned his trade, visiting the far corners of the earth and forming acquaintances with a variety of people from many walks of life, learning to be at home with many kinds of people.Now, those on board removed their last remaining belongings from the ship and set up camp on the ice. b] [43] In the meantime he had taken a job with wealthy Clydeside industrialist William Beardmore (later Lord Invernairn), with a roving commission which involved interviewing prospective clients and entertaining Beardmore's business friends.

During the Antarctic winter of 1902, in the confines of the iced-in Discovery, Shackleton edited the expedition's magazine the South Polar Times.

Besides the official honours, Shackleton's Antarctic feats were greeted in Britain with great enthusiasm.