Alfred Cheetham (6 May 1866 – 22 August 1918) was a member of several Antarctic expeditions. He served as third officer for both the ''Nimrod'' expedition and

Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917 is considered to be the last major expedition of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Conceived by Sir Ernest Shackleton, the expedition was an attempt to make the first land crossing ...

. He died at sea when his ship was torpedoed during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Early life

Alfred Buchanan Cheetham was born in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

, England to John and Annie Elizabeth Cheetham. His family moved to Hull sometime during his youth (possibly around 1877), and he went to sea as a teenager, working on the fishing fleets of the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea, epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the ...

and farther afield. He married Eliza Sawyer and they had 13 children together. Cheetham worked from his base in Hull as a merchant navy boatswain and a reservist for the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

Antarctic career

During the ''Discovery'' expedition of 1901–1904 Cheetham made his first visit to the Antarctic when served on the relief ship . He travelled to the Antarctic again, this time under the command of

Ernest Shackleton Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of ...

, on the ''Nimrod'' expedition where he was third officer and boatswain. He returned once more with the ''Terra Nova'' expedition,

Robert Falcon Scott Captain Robert Falcon Scott, , (6 June 1868 – c. 29 March 1912) was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the ''Discovery'' expedition of 1901–1904 and the ill-fated ''Terra Nov ...

's ill-fated attempt to be the first to reach the

South Pole The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole, Terrestrial South Pole or 90th Parallel South, is one of the two points where Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface. It is the southernmost point on Earth and lies antipod ...

. He served as boatswain aboard the ''Terra Nova'' and although he volunteered for the search party that was to look for Scott's party he was turned down as he was a family man. By the time of the

Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917 is considered to be the last major expedition of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Conceived by Sir Ernest Shackleton, the expedition was an attempt to make the first land crossing ...

in 1914, the 48-year-old Cheetham was the crew member with most experience of the Antarctic, having spent almost six years in the seas around the continent He was Third Officer on board the and was a popular and cheerful member of the crew. Frank Worsley refers to him as "a pirate to his fingertips". After ''Endurance'' was crushed in pack ice and the men set up for

Elephant Island Elephant Island is an ice-covered, mountainous island off the coast of Antarctica in the outer reaches of the South Shetland Islands, in the Southern Ocean. The island is situated north-northeast of the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, west-so ...

in the three lifeboats, he was part of Worsley's crew in the ''Dudley Docker''. Worsley mentions that matches had become such precious currency that Cheetham bought a single match from him for the price of a bottle of champagne, to be paid when Cheetham opened his pub in Hull after the war. Cheetham's death in 1918 meant the debt was never paid. For his efforts during the expedition Cheetham was awarded an appropriate clasp to the Silver

Polar Medal The Polar Medal is a medal awarded by the Sovereign of the United Kingdom to individuals who have outstanding achievements in the field of polar research, and particularly for those who have worked over extended periods in harsh climates. It ...

that he had previously received for his role in the Discovery Expedition.

After the ''Endurance'' expedition

Cheetham returned to Hull after the expedition where he learnt that one of his sons, William Alfred, had been lost at sea while Cheetham had been travelling back from Antarctica. His son, who was 16 years old, was presumed drowned while serving on . Cheetham enlisted in the Mercantile Marine and was serving as second officer on when on 22 August 1918, he was killed when the ship was torpedoed in the North Sea by a German

U-boat U-boats were naval submarines operated by Germany, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Although at times they were efficient fleet weapons against enemy naval warships, they were most effectively used in an economic warfare ro ...

. Cheetham is commemorated on the Tower Hill Memorial. In 2016, a plaque was installed at Hull Paragon station, jointly commemorating Cheetham and fellow Antarctic explorer William Colbeck: 'Two of many Hull seafarers on the ship Morning who participated in the Antarctic expeditions to relieve Captain Scott 1902–1904 and were welcomed by thousands at this station on their return'.

Footnotes

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Cheetham, Alfred 1866 births 1918 deaths British military personnel killed in World War I English explorers Explorers of Antarctica Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition Terra Nova expedition