Louis Charles Bernacchi (8 November 1876 – 24 April 1942) was an Australian physicist and astronomer best known for his role in several Antarctic expeditions. Early life Bernacchi was born in Belgium on 8 November 1876 to Italian parents in one of the communes of Brussels known as Schaerbeek. His father, Diego Bernacchi, established a vineyard on Maria Island in 1884. He was educated in Hobart, Tasmania, at the Hutchins School from May 1889 and finishing at the school around Easter 1891. He entered the Melbourne Observatory in 1895 where he spent about three years studying magnetism and meteorology. During this period he developed an interest in Antarctic exploration, expressed in letters to the press and by following the proceeding of Antarctic Exploration Committees. Polar exploration He joined Carstens Borchgrevink's Southern Cross expedition (1898–1900) which wintered at Cape Adare, Antarctica, joining the expedition in Christchurch, New Zealand after the previous physicist candidate had been rejected on medical grounds. The expedition was the first to spend the winter on the Antarctic continent (the Belgian Antarctic Expedition having been first to overwinter in 1898) and the first to sledge towards the South Pole. He was awarded the Cuthbert-Peek Grant of the Royal Geographical Society that allowed him to work on the geomagnetic data. He wrote a book about the expedition To the south polar regions: expedition of 1898–1900 published in 1900. His granddaughter Janet Crawford has edited a version of his diaries from the expedition under the title That First Antarctic Winter: The story of the Southern Cross Expedition of 1898–1900. He was again a physicist on the Discovery expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott (1901–1904). Bernacchi was the only man on this expedition who had previously been to the Antarctic. During the trip, he made extensive magnetic observations. Following the trip, Bernacchi was awarded the Royal Geographical Society and Polar Medals as well as the Légion d'honneur. Scott was the best man at Bernacchi's marriage in 1906. Subsequent career Following two short expeditions to Africa and the upper Amazon Basin in Peru, Bernacchi made two unsuccessful attempts to run for the House of Commons as a Liberal Party candidate, standing in Widnes in 1910. He also invested in rubber plantations in Malaya, Java and Borneo. During World War I, he served in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, the Admiralty in the anti-submarine division, and later with the United States Navy. In