New Swabia

Like many other countries, Germany sent expeditions to the Antarctic region in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, most of which were scientific. The late 19th century expeditions to the Southern Ocean, South Georgia, the Kerguelen Islands, and the Crozet Islands were astronomical, meteorological, and hydrological, mostly in close collaboration with scientific teams from other countries. As the 19th century ended Germany began to focus on Antarctica.

The first German expedition to Antarctica was the Gauss expedition from 1901 to 1903. Led by Arctic veteran and geology professor Erich von Drygalski, this was the first expedition to use a hot-air balloon in Antarctica. It also found and named Kaiser Wilhelm II Land. The second German Antarctic expedition (1911–1912) was led by Wilhelm Filchner with a goal of crossing Antarctica to learn if it was one piece of land. As happened with other such early attempts, the crossing failed before it even began. The expedition discovered and named the Luitpold Coast and the Filchner Ice Shelf. A German whaling fleet was put to sea in 1937 and, upon its successful return in early 1938, plans for a third German Antarctic expedition were drawn up.

The third German Antarctic Expedition (1938–1939) was led by Alfred Ritscher (1879–1963), a captain in the German Navy. The main purpose was to find an area in Antarctica for a German whaling station, as a way to increase Germany's production of fat. Whale oil was then the most important raw material for the production of margarine and soap in Germany and the country was the second largest purchaser of Norwegian whale oil, importing some 200,000 metric tonnes annually. Besides the disadvantage of being dependent on imports, it was thought that Germany would soon be at war, which was considered to put too much strain on Germany's foreign currency reserves. Another goal was to scout possible locations for a German naval base.[3]

1938–1939 expedition logo

On 17 December 1938, the New Swabia Expedition left Hamburg for Antarctica aboard MS Schwabenland (a freighter built in 1925 and renamed in 1934 after the Swabia region in southern Germany) which could also carry and catapult aircraft. The secret[3] expedition had 33 members plus Schwabenland's crew of 24. On 19 January 1939 the ship arrived at the Princess Martha Coast, in an area which had lately been claimed by Norway as Queen Maud Land, and began charting the region. Nazi German flags were placed on the sea ice along the coast. Naming the area Neu-Schwabenland after the ship, the expedition established a temporary base and in the following weeks teams walked along the coast recording claim reservations on hills and other significant landmarks. Seven photographic survey flights were made by the ship's two Dornier Wal seaplanes named Passat and Boreas.[1][4] About a dozen 1.2-meter (3.9 ft)-long aluminum arrows, with 30-centimeter (12 in) steel cones and three upper stabilizer wings embossed with swastikas, were airdropped onto the ice at turning points of the flight polygons (these arrows had been tested on the Pasterze glacier in Austria before the expedition).[1][4][5] None of these have ever been recovered. Eight more flights were made to areas of keen interest and on these trips, some of the photos were taken with colour film. Altogether they flew over hundreds of thousands of square kilometers and took more than 16,000 aerial photographs, some of which were published after the war by Ritscher. The ice-free Schirmacher Oasis, which now hosts the Maitri and Novolazarevskaya research stations, was spotted from the air by Richardheinrich Schirmacher (who named it after himself) shortly before the Schwabenland left the Antarctic coast on 6 February 1939.

MS Schwabenland in 1938

German map of Antarctica (1941) showing Neuschwabenland (territorial claim)

On its return trip to Germany the expedition made oceanographic studies near Bouvet Island and Fernando de Noronha, arriving back in Hamburg on 11 April 1939. Meanwhile, the Norwegian government had learned about the expedition through reports from whalers along the coast of Queen Maud Land. Although some, notably Norwegian writer Bjarne Aagaard and German geographer Ernst Herrmann, have claimed that Germany never actually occupied the territory, it is well documented that Germany issued a decree about the establishment of a German Antarctic Sector called New Swabia after the expedition's return in August 1939.[2]

Any German claims to the region were abandoned in 1945.

• Esoteric Nazism
• List of Antarctic expeditions
• Operation Highjump
• Yamato Yukihara

• Murphy, D.T. (2002). German exploration of the polar world. A history, 1870–1940 Lincoln : University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 978-0803232051, OCLC 48084187

• Photographs of the MS Schwabenland and its seaplanes (in German)
• More photographs of the MS Schwabenland (in German)
• Erich von Drygalski and the 1901–03 German Antarctic Expedition, Scott Polar Research Institute
• Wilhelm Filchner and the 1911–12 German Antarctic Expedition, Scott Polar Research Institute
• Kartographische Arbeiten und deutsche Namengebung in Neuschwabenland, Antarktis
• Dunning, Brian (21 February 2017). "Skeptoid #559: Hitler's Antarctic Fortress Unmasked". Skeptoid.