Compañia Argentina de Pesca

Larsen’s role in Pesca was to command the whaling ship fleet and manage the shore-based whaling station. His position was secure for at least five years with a salary of 15% of company profits. Larsen’s vision was within his grasp.

Establishing a whaling station on South Georgia was a mammoth task. All materials and workers had to be transported by ship. Most were transported from Norway upon Larsen’s insistence. Larsen planned to start Grytviken with three ships: Whale catcher Fortuna and the transport vessels Louise and Rolf. These were all sailed to South Georgia via Buenos Aires. The Louise left Sandefjord on the 23 July 1904. It was followed by Fortuna and Rolf on the 21 September 1904.

This 1,065-ton wooden copper-clad barque was commanded by Thorvald Thorsen. It was intended for transporting products directly to Europe from South Georgia. On its way south it carried the majority of supplies necessary for establishing the whaling station including:

• Factory plant
• Two wooden pre-fab houses (to house main factory, eight cookers, two blubber presses, two steam boilers, cooper’s workshop)
• Home for workers (barracks)
• 1 ½ year provisions
• Other operational supplies including: 765 tons of coal, 30 harpoons and early 2,000 empty barrels

This 371-ton three-masted sailing ship was intended for transport between Buenos Aires and Grytviken. When it left Sandefjord it was commanded by Larsen’s brother Lauritz and Larsen’s brother-in-law Julius Anton Løkke. After being towed to Falmouth by the Fortuna, the Rolf carried on to South Georgia on its own. The Rolf was replaced by Cachalote in 1908. Before then, transport between Grytviken and Buenos Aires was also carried out by the Argentinian naval transport ship ARA Guárdia Nacional.

Louise and Fortuna arrived in Grytviken on the 16th November followed by Rolf on the 28th December. The founding party finished establishing the whaling station in around a month. During this time they cleared the area of tussock grass, built three houses for accommodation, installed machinery, set up the workshops, dammed a stream for water, and set up a hydroelectric dynamo at the dam.

The first period of whaling was busy for everyone. Grytviken initially had 27 men working at the station.

The early factory was steam-powered and equipped with eight open boilers. When a whale was caught, it was brought to a buoy near the station and towed to shore by motorboat. From here it was hooked to steam-powered winches and dragged up to the flensing plan. On the plan, the the name given to the area where the whales were processed, the blubber was peeled away in big strips by the flensers using flensing knives. The strips were then cut into smaller pieces and fed into the boiler.

Larsen’s conviction was paying off with his early success in South Georgia, but Pesca’s operation in Grytviken had been established without a permit from the British Government. This became a problem as others realised the potential of the island.

In 1900 the British government were worried about the strength of their claim to South Georgia. They published a pamphlet calling for prospectors to settle in the Falklands and prospect in South Georgia. This was answered by Ernest Swinhoe, a Yorkshireman who had settled as a sheep farmer in Patagonia. He became managing director of South Georgia Exploration Company which aimed to raise sheep, practice sealing, and potentially mine for minerals in South Georgia. The company signed a lease for the whole island for two years in July 1905 and set out to explore business prospects on the island. Swinhoe arrived in Cumberland Bay on the 14 August 1905 to find the fully operational whaling station at Grytviken.

Swinhoe was not pleased to find another company using the land his company had leased. He handed a written protest to the manager, who at the time was Lauritz Larsen, Larsen’s brother. Swinhoe also sent a copy of this protest to the Governor of the Falkland Islands, William Allardyce. He attached an accompanying letter emphasising the national importance of the issue.

As part of their lease agreement, Pesca maintained sufficient supplies of coal, water and provisions to supply British ships and naval vessels coming through South Georgia. Grytviken became a centre of activity for ships visiting South Georgia. The combination of the science and supplies has meant that Grytviken and King Edward Point remained the administrative centre on South Georgia even as other whaling stations were established to the north and south.