Frank Bickerton

Who was Frank Bickerton?

Francis "Frank" Howard Bickerton was a treasure-hunter, Antarctic explorer, soldier, aeronaut, entrepreneur, big-game hunter and movie-maker. He not only made a major contribution to the Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911–14 but was also recruited for Sir Ernest Shackleton's "Endurance" Expedition; he fought with the infantry, the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Air Force in both world wars and was wounded on no fewer than four separate occasions. According to his obituary in The Times, "His loyalty to his friends, his gallantry... and the unembittered courage with which he continued to meet the difficulties of a world which gave little recognition in peace to men of his mould – leave to us who shared in one way or another his various life the memory of a rich, rewarding and abiding spirit".

Bickerton was a friend of author Vita Sackville-West and was the model for the character of Leonard Anquetil in her 1930 novel, The Edwardians.