Scott / Wilson Memorial - Angus, Scotland. - Relief Art Sculptures on Waymarking.com

This granite memorial is the third such structure on this site since 1919. Captain Robert Falcon Scott came up to Glen Prosen near Kirriemuir on visits to his friend, Doctor Edward Wilson, who was here, employed by the government to undertake the grouse disease survey. Captain Scott would include Doctor Wilson as chief scientist and surgeon in his expedition to be the first to reach the South Pole in 1912, and it was at the nearby Burnside Cottage that they planned most of the Expedition. Unfortunately the party were beaten to the Pole by the Norwegian, Roald Amundsen, and it was on the way back, only 11 miles from basecamp that all the men perished due to the extreme conditions.

In 1919 a memorial fountain was erected at the roadside near the cottage in the glen, this stood until 1979 when it was badly damaged in a road accident. A cairn then replaced it in 1981, but after thirty years the inscription on it became badly faded, so Kirriemuir Landward East Community Council commissioned local sculptor Bruce Walker to make a new memorial for the site. The 30 ton block of granite came from Craigenlow Quarry in Aberdeenshire and would become the largest granite sculpture in Scotland since the 1920s. it was unveiled on December 8th 2012 by Falcon Scott and David Wilson and dedicated by the Rev. Oliver Vellacott, who coincidentally lived in Burnside Cottage.

The relief art includes both men, their ponies, dogs and also penguins. Both sides have inscriptions written by both men, the agony and ecstasy, the agony by Scott as he describes being with his dead colleagues, and the ecstasy by Wilson as he described the beauty of the Antarctic.

The stone can be found at the roadside on a bend at the entrance to Glen Prosen nearly a mile from Dykehead. A car park lies just around the bend on the right.