The day of departure arrived.  I gave the order to heave anchor at 8.45 a.m. on December 5, 1914, and the clanking of the windlass broke for us the last link with civilization.  The morning was dull and overcast, with occasional gusts of snow and sleet, but hearts were light aboard the ‘Endurance’.  The long days of preparation were over and the adventure lay ahead.

We had hoped that some steamer from the north would bring news of war and perhaps letters from home before our departure.  A ship did arrive on the evening of the 4th, but she carried no letters, and nothing useful in the way of information could be gleaned from her.  The captain and crew were all stoutly pro-German, and the “news” they had to give took the unsatisfying form of accounts of British and French reverses.  We would have been glad to have had the latest tidings from a friendlier source.  A year and a half later we were to learn that the ‘Harpoon’, the steamer which tends the Grytviken station, had arrived with mail for us not more than two hours after the ‘Endurance’ had proceeded down the coast.

The bows of the ‘Endurance’ were turned to the south, and the good ship dipped to the south-westerly swell.  Misty rain fell during the forenoon, but the weather cleared later in the day, and we had a good view of the coast of South Georgia as we moved under steam and sail to the south-east.  The course was laid to carry us clear of the island and then south of South Thule, Sandwich Group.  The wind freshened during the day, and all square sail was set, with the foresail reefed in order to give the look-out a clear view ahead; for we did not wish to risk contact with a “growler,” one of those treacherous fragments of ice that float with surface awash.  The ship was very steady in the quarterly sea, but certainly did not look as neat and trim as she had done when leaving the shores of England four months earlier.  We had filled up with coal at Grytviken, and this extra fuel was stored on deck, where it impeded movement considerably.  The carpenter had built a false deck, extending from the poop-deck to the chart-room.  We had also taken aboard a ton of whale-meat for the dogs.  The big chunks of meat were hung up in the rigging, out of reach but not out of sight of the dogs, and as the ‘Endurance’ rolled and pitched, they watched with wolfish eyes for a windfall.

I was greatly pleased with the dogs, which were tethered about the ship in the most comfortable positions we could find for them.  They were in excellent condition, and I felt that the Expedition had the right tractive-power.  They were big, sturdy animals, chosen for endurance and strength, and if they were as keen to pull our sledges as they were now to fight one another all would be well.  The men in charge of the dogs were doing their work enthusiastically, and the eagerness they showed to study the natures and habits of their charges gave promise of efficient handling and good work later on.