Conserving Shackleton’s Venesta Cases

The largest and most challenging task this season was at Shackleton’s Nimrod hut at  Cape Royds. The cache of Venesta cases  along the south wall of the hut contains remnants of the expedition’s food supplies.

Harsh winds, blowing scoria, and snowmelt  over the past century led to the cases and their contents disintegrating. In 2006   the cases and associated artefacts were  excavated in very deteriorated pieces. In 2007 conservation was undertaken to prevent environmental contamination and  to preserve as much original material as possible. Modern ply wood boxes faced with the original Venesta sides were constructed, and the food tins inside were vacuum sealed in bags and replaced.

However, the boxes continue to deteriorate  at a noticeable rate, and create a moisture trap against the side of the building. This season the team detached the historic box sides from their inner modern support, then air dried and stored them in a more protected location. The box stack was also separated from the building, and work was done to reduce the moisture throughout the stack.

The team removed the tins from their plastic packaging inside the boxes and sorted  them. Most tins were severely corroded, with wet food products such as soups and stews oozing out of the corrosion holes. The heavily deteriorated contents were scooped out and disposed of to ensure the historic food does not contaminate the local environment or endanger wildlife. The dried tins are now stored back in the plywood boxes onsite.