John Philip Rolleston was born in 1859. He served in HMS Royalist on the British Naval Voyage, 1886-1887 (leader George Hand), making a sketch survey of Gough Island. In 1895, he served as lieutenant in HMS Active on the British Royal Naval Training Squadron Expedition (leader George L Atkinson), visiting Spitsbergen to conduct surveys, take photographs and examine the glaciers in the area. Rolleston returned to the Antarctic in 1901, leading the British Naval Voyage in HMS Archer, in which he visited the Auckland Islands and collected bird specimens for the Natural History department of the British Museum. He served in the First World War, receiving the DSO in 1918. He retired from the Royal Navy as admiral in 1924 and died on 12 December 1936.
From the guide to the John Philip Rolleston collection, 1887, (Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge)
