Lieutenant-Colonel Llewellyn Wood Longstaff OBE FRGS (23 December 1841 – 20 November 1918) was an English industrialist and fellow of the Royal Geographical Society.
He was also a member of several nongovernmental organizations, including the Freemasons, the Hull Chamber of Commerce and Shipping, and the Royal Geographical Society (RGS).
[3] Longstaff's Society membership coincided with the presidency of longtime RGS leader Sir Clements Markham, whose dream was to organize a British expedition to the then-unknown Antarctic continent.
The British government then promised to appropriate £40,000 as matching funds, thus creating a budget to support the construction in 1900-1901 of a ship for the expedition, RRS Discovery.
Longstaff got the sea officer, Ernest Shackleton, a crucial interview with Markham that led to his selection for the expedition.