High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Southern Whale Fishery Company was established by the granting of a Royal Charter in 1846 to Charles Enderby, for the purpose of operating a permanent whaling station on the Auckland Islands. Charles Enderby was the grandson of Samuel Enderby, founder of the of the prominent sealing and whaling firm, Samuel Enderby & Sons. The Enderby family business had been in decline following losses made by several ambitious expeditions to the Southern Ocean, and especially since 1845, when Enderby's Hemp Rope Works, its rope-making factory on the Greenwich Peninsula in the London Borough of Greenwich was destroyed by fire. Looking for a way to save the family business, Charles Enderby successfully petitioned for government backing to establish a settlement on the Auckland Islands 'for the purpose of the whale fishery, as a station at which to discharge the cargoes and refit vessels'.