The women who 'inspired' polar-explorers Shackleton and Scott
The wives of Britain's best-known polar explorers inspired them to make their important voyages, a historian has claimed.
Kari Herbert claims that Sir Ernest Shackleton only made his first expedition to impress his lover.
Miss Herbert, the daughter of the Polar explorer Sir Wally Herbert, said Capt Robert Falcon Scott would "absolutely not" have reached the South Pole without the robust encouragement of his wife, Kathleen.
Miss Herbert, who researched the women for her new book Heart of the Hero, said the stories of explorers' wives were "fantastically important" in expeditions to the Antarctic.
"In the case of Scott, absolutely he would not have gone down to the Antarctic again without Kathleen," she said....