A beautiful monument to the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, the Mawson’s Huts Replica Museum is, as its name implies, an exact reconstruction of the main research hut built in 1911 on Cape Dension by members of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, lead by famed Australian geologist, explorer, and academic, Sir Douglas Mawson.
The expedition – made up of Mawson, Lieutenant Belgrave Edward Ninnis, and Xavier Mertz – met with disaster on December 14, 1912, during a survey of the largely uncharted Victoria Land when Ninnis' sledge plunged through a crevasse, never to be recovered. With most of the expedition’s supplies, as well as its strongest sled dogs, lost, and over 300 miles away from base camp, Mawson and Mertz rationed their meager supplies and headed back, resorting to eating the remaining sled dogs as they went. Mertz ultimately succumbed to starvation, dysentery, and frostbite, forcing Mawson to carry on alone.
On February 8, 1913, Mawson – near-death, skin literally peeling off of his body – stumbled into base camp. Only six hours before, the ship Aurora had departed Cape Denison after failing to locate Mawson and his team. A relief party of six men stayed behind and nursed Mawson back to health, and the weary explorer was forced to spend another winter on the cape.