Robert Falcon Scott Markham's first choice as leader but, having decided on him, the older man's support remained constant. There were committee battles over the scope of Scott's responsibilities, with the Royal Society pressing to put a scientist in charge of the expedition's programme while Scott merely commanded the ship. Eventually, however, Markham's view prevailed; Scott was given overall command, and was promoted to the rank of commander before "Discovery" sailed for the Antarctic on 6 August 1901. King Edward VII, who showed a keen interest in the expedition, visited the Discovery the day before the ship left British shores in August 1901,
Lewis Bay Lewis Bay Lewis Bay is a bay indenting the north coast of Ross Island, Antarctica, between Mount Bird and Cape Tennyson. The bay was charted by the British National Antarctic Expedition under Robert Falcon Scott, 1901–04. It was named by the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names in 1964 for Captain Price Lewis, commanding officer of the during the US Navy's Operation Deep Freeze in 1959, and who in 1963 and 1964 was assistant chief of staff and ship group commander of the US Naval Support Force in Antarctica. On 28 November 1979 an Air New Zealand aircraft carrying 257 people