NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The exquisitely researched and deeply engrossing” (The New York
Times) true survival story of an early polar expedition that went terribly awry—with the ship
frozen in ice and the crew trapped inside for the entire sunless Antarctic winter The energy
of the narrative never flags. . . . Sancton has produced a thriller.”—The Wall Street Journal
In August 1897 the young Belgian commandant Adrien de Gerlache set sail for a three-year
expedition aboard the good ship Belgica with dreams of glory. His destination was the uncharted
end of the earth: the icy continent of Antarctica. But de Gerlache’s plans to be first to the
magnetic South Pole would swiftly go awry. After a series of costly setbacks the commandant
faced two bad options: turn back in defeat and spare his men the devastating Antarctic winter
or recklessly chase fame by sailing deeper into the freezing waters. De Gerlache sailed on and
soon the Belgica was stuck fast in the icy hold of the Bellingshausen Sea. When the sun set on
the magnificent polar landscape one last time the ship’s occupants were condemned to months of
endless night. In the darkness plagued by a mysterious illness and besieged by monotony they
descended into madness.In Madhouse at the End of the Earth Julian Sancton unfolds an epic
story of adventure and horror for the ages. As the Belgica’s men teetered on the brink de
Gerlache relied increasingly on two young officers whose friendship had blossomed in captivity:
the expedition’s lone American Dr. Frederick Cook—half genius half con man—whose later infamy
would overshadow his brilliance on the Belgica and the ship’s first mate soon-to-be legendary
Roald Amundsen even in his youth the storybook picture of a sailor. Together they would plan
a last-ditch nearly certain-to-fail escape from the ice—one that would either etch their names
in history or doom them to a terrible fate at the ocean’s bottom.Drawing on the diaries and
journals of the Belgica’s crew and with exclusive access to the ship’s logbook Sancton brings
novelistic flair to a story of human extremes one so remarkable that even today NASA studies
it for research on isolation for future missions to Mars. Equal parts maritime thriller and
gothic horror Madhouse at the End of the Earth is an unforgettable journey into the deep.
