David Tatham

Vice President

Donald was the founding Chairman of FIMA Friends, serving from 2013 to 2019. He is now Chairman of the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust, which organised and funded the Expedition that located and surveyed the wreck of Endurance in the Weddell Sea in March 2022. 

Donald served in HM Diplomatic Service from 1974 to 2006. After postings to Vienna and Moscow, he returned to the FCO in late 1982, spending three years in Falkland Islands Department. He was then appointed Political Adviser to the British Commandant n Berlin through the fall of the Wall in 1989. After three years as HM Ambassador to Uruguay (1991-94), followed by time in London and Bosnia, Donald served as Governor of the Falkland Islands and Commissioner for South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands from 1999 to 2002. After a final posting as HM Ambassador to Venezuela and a period as Chief Executive of Wilton Park, Donald has been involved in his retirement with a number of charities.

Honorary Secretary and Trustee

Hugh graduated from Peterhouse, Cambridge and retired from Project Management in the electronic industry in 2002. He and his wife Mary live in Camberley, Surrey.

He was the Chairman  of the Falkland Islands Philatelic Study Group for seven years from 2006. He has developed his philatelic interests, particularly postal history of the Falkland Islands and South Georgia, successfully exhibiting internationally.  Hugh is a fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society. His first visit to the Falklands was in 2003. Further visits followed, enabling Hugh to visit most settlements and many of the islands.  In recent years he has spent austral summers at Fox Bay.

He contributes to the Falkland Islands Journal and publishes in many philatelic journals mainly on Falkland subjects. For the Stephen Jaffray Memorial Fund, he has used his philatelic skills to convert donated used FI postage stamps into useful funds.

In 2014, he volunteered to help with the relocation of the Museum to its current Historic Dockyard location and worked (2015 - 2019) with fellow trustee Stefan Heijtz, restoring the Old Post Office at Fox Bay and the establishment of the co-located Postal Museum. 

Committee Member 

Originating in the Peak District of Derbyshire his banking career saw him become a consultant on electronic clearings, and took him to Kyrgyzstan and Saudi Arabia. Interest in the Falkland islands started in the early 1970s through philately, and was for 17 years editor of the specialist Falkland stamp group’s journal. Former Treasurer of Falklands Conservation, FIMA Friends, and Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust. In fact over the years Bill has probably clocked up a cumulative 100 years of charity treasurerships. Still closely involved with these and other charities. Inveterate collector who has made large donations of ephemera and printed material to the FI Museum, amongst more than 20 museums worldwide. When not adding things up or collecting them,he finds time for writing, male voice choir singing, canal boating, and walking in the Pyrenees. Married to Elizabeth for over 40 years they  have one son, Richard a civil engineer, who shares many of his Father’s interests.      

Committee Member and Trustee

Alexandra is the granddaughter of Sir Ernest Shackleton. She has been President of the James Caird Society (effectively the Ernest Shackleton Society) since 1994. She is also a Patron of the Antarctic Heritage Trust, a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, a Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society and a member of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society.

Alexandra has visited the Falkland Islands on nine occasions and Antarctica five times. As well as giving talks about Sir Ernest Shackleton (in 16 countries so far with more planned) she has been the Patron of a number of Polar Exhibitions. 

Alexandra has opened many exhibitions, written many forewords to books about her famous grandfather and has been interviewed often. Alexandra considers all of this activity important if the story of Shackleton and his men is to be kept alive and inspirational to new generations.

Committee Member and Trustee

Mensun's first job was wool boy at Dunnose Head. He was  a Schepp Foundation scholar 1972-76 and a research assistant  at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY. He received a Commonwealth Scholarship to Oxford and founded first academic unit in England for maritime archaeology.

He was Triton Fellow in Maritime Archaeology at St Peter’s College, Oxford and directed numerous wreck excavations including the Giglio ship now on display at the National Underwater Archaeology Museum, Italy. He also directed the rescue of the Hoi An junk in the South China Sea, the largest and deepest underwater excavation there has been and the only time mixed-gas and saturation diving methods have been used in underwater archaeology.

Mensun pioneered the use of remote operated vehicle (ROV) technology in archaeology. There are permanent exhibitions of material excavated by Bound in over twelve museums. He organised major exhibitions at the Tower of London and National Archaeological Museum, Florence.

His work has been the focus of many documentaries including a four-part series ‘Lost Ships’ by the Discovery Channel. He is the author or editor of several books and organiser of four international conferences on underwater archaeology. Currently  Mensun is Director of Exploration for the deep-ocean search and survey company Ocean Infinity. Recent work includes the successful searches  for Shackleton’s Endurance and Admiral von Spee’s lost fleet from the 1914 Battle of Falklands.