Mortimer McCarthy (15 April 1882 – 11 August 1967) was an Irish sailor and

polar explorer This list is for recognised pioneering explorers of the polar regions. It does not include subsequent travelers and expeditions. Polar explorers * Jameson Adams * Stian Aker * Valerian Albanov * Roald Amundsen * Salomon August Andrée * Piotr F ...

Early life

McCarthy was born in Kinsale, County Cork, Ireland on 15 April 1882. He was brought up in Lower Cove, a small settlement on the east side of the mouth of the River Bandon, about south-east of Kinsale. He started his career as a mariner at the age of 12, when he joined the Royal Navy as a boy seaman. He received the South Africa war medal for serving during the Second Boer War. McCarthy left the navy and moved to New Zealand in 1907, where he became a merchant seaman.

Polar exploration

In 1910, McCarthy volunteered to join the British Antarctic Expedition under Captain Robert Falcon Scott. With Scott, he made three Antarctic voyages. He served on the crew on Scott's failed 1912-13 Terra Nova Expedition which attempted to reach the South Pole. For his service with this expedition he received the Silver Polar Medal from King George V at a

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investiture. After failing in his attempt to get a place on another

Antarctic The Antarctic ( or , American English also or ; commonly ) is a polar region around Earth's South Pole, opposite the Arctic region around the North Pole. The Antarctic comprises the continent of Antarctica, the Kerguelen Plateau and other ...

expedition, on Endurance with

Sir 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 An ...

for the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, he joined the

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in Tromsø in

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which gave him the opportunity to work in the Arctic.

First World War

McCarthy rejoined the Royal Navy to serve on

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s during the First World War. He settled again in Lyttelton, New Zealand in 1920.

Later life

In 1963, at 84 years old, as one of the last three living survivors of Scott's Antarctic expedition, he accepted an invitation from the American Antarctic Survey to visit the Antarctic once more. On the trip he became the oldest person to ever visit the South Pole. He died in New Zealand in 1967 aged 85.

Family

He had three sons with his wife Ellen Coughlan who he married in 1923 and who was also from Kinsale.

Memorials

Timothy and Mortimer McCarthy memorial by Graham Brett, Kinsale

Mount McCarthy in Antarctica is named after him. McCarthy's brother, Tim, was also a sailor and polar explorer, and in September 2000 joint statues of the two of them were unveiled in their home town of Kinsale.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:McCarthy, Mortimer 1882 births 1967 deaths Irish Antarctic explorers People from Kinsale Recipients of the Polar Medal Irish sailors in the Royal Navy Terra Nova expedition Military personnel from County Cork 20th-century Irish explorers