June 1912

Scott
 

"Afterguard dinner mid-winter 1912", photo by Debenham, June 1912. From left, Cherry, Silas Wright, Atkinson, Nelson, and Gran. [1]

Atkinson's quiet leadership held together those waiting out the winter at Cape Evans. Lectures were given -- "but not as many as during the previous winter when they became rather excessive: and we included outside subjects," noted Cherry, who spoke once on rowing and later on Florence under the Medici -- a second edition of the expedition's South Polar Times was produced, and scientific experiments continued, and Oates's Indian mules occupied much of the men's time. [2]

"This winter is passing a lot better than I thought it would under the circumstances," Keohane wrote. "It is no doubt owing to our skelleywag board everybody is very keen on winning." [3]

"We usually wear our underclothing about a month," noted Williamson. "Now that we have run out of soap we shall be obliged to wear them much longer periods." [4]

But there was no escaping the sight of the empty bunks. "Cherry was his usual cheerful self," Silas remembered later, "but rather subdued by the loss of his two greatest friends." [5] Cherry himself wrote afterwards that it was at times "a ghastly experience." "The scenery has lost much of its beauty to us," wrote Deb, "the auroras are cheap and the cold rather colder." [6]


Notes:

[1] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[2] Apsley Cherry-Garrard, in The Worst Journey in the World, ch.14.
[3] Patrick Keohane, diary, 21 July 1912, quoted by Sara Wheeler in Cherry : a Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard (New York : Modern Library, 2003, c2001), p.139.
[4] Thomas Williamson, diary, 11 July 1912, quoted by Sara Wheeler in Cherry : a Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard (New York : Modern Library, 2003, c2001), p.139.
[5] Charles S. Wright, in Silas : the Antarctic Diaries and Memoir of Charles S. Wright (p.300), quoted by Sara Wheeler in Cherry : a Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard (New York : Modern Library, 2003, c2001), p.140.
[6] Frank Debenham, in The Quiet Land : the Antarctic Diaries of Frank Debenham (p.143), quoted by Sara Wheeler in Cherry : a Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard (New York : Modern Library, 2003, c2001), p.140.

Saturday, 30 March 1912

Scott

Faced with gales and drift, Atkinson and Keohane decided to turn back. They had collected Lt. Evans's sledge and got to Corner Camp.

"Taking into consideration the weather and temperatures and the time of the year," Atkinson wrote later in his report, "and the hopelessness of finding the party except at any definite point like a depôt, I decided to return from here. We depôted the major portion of a week's provisions to enable them to communicate with Hut Point in case they should reach this point. At this date in my own mind I was morally certain that the party had perished." [1]


Notes:

[1] Edward Atkinson, quoted in Scott's last expedition, v.2 (GoogleBooks edition), p.211.

Tuesday, 26 March 1912

Scott

Atkinson and Keohane left from Hut Point on a last-ditch effort to reach Scott and the Polar party. Neither of them had driven dogs before, and Atkinson felt that it would be cruel to take the dogs out again so soon after their journey with Cherry and Dimitri, so he and Keohane went on foot.

They knew that Scott's original plan had the Polar party returning around 27th March, and although they tried in this light not to worry, the strain was beginning to tell. The dogs would sing out, and the men would be sure a party was approaching. "Last night we had turned in about two hours," Cherry wrote, "when five or six knocks were hit on the little window over our heads. Atkinson shouted 'Hullo!' and cried, 'Cherry, they're in.' Keohane said, 'Who's cook?' Some one lit a candle and left it in the far corner of the hut to give them light, and we all rushed out. But there was no one there. It was the nearest approach to ghost work that I have ever heard, and it must have been a dog which sleeps in that window. He must have shaken himself, hitting the window with his tail. Atkinson thought he heard footsteps!" [1]


Notes

[1] Apsley Cherry-Garrard, diary [26? March, 1912], quoted in his The Worst Journey in the World, ch.XIII.

Saturday, 16 March 1912

Scott

Scott, realising by now that there was little hope for them, began to write letters, one of the earliest to Sir Edgar Speyer, the expedition's treasurer.

"Dated March 16, 1912. Lat. 79.5°.
MY DEAR SIR EDGAR,

"I hope this may reach you. I fear we must go and that it leaves the Expedition in a bad muddle. But we have been to the Pole and we shall die like gentlemen. I regret only for the women we leave behind.

I thank you a thousand times for your help and support and your generous kindness. If this diary is found it will show how we stuck by dying companions and fought the thing out well to the end. I think this will show that the Spirit of pluck and power to endure has not passed out of our race …

"Wilson, the best fellow that ever stepped, has sacrificed himself again and again to the sick men of the party …

"I write to many friends hoping the letters will reach them some time after we are found next year.

"We very nearly came through, and it's a pity to have missed it, but lately I have felt that we have overshot our mark. No one is to blame and I hope no attempt will be made to suggest that we have lacked support.

"Good-bye to you and your dear kind wife.

                Yours ever sincerely,
                        R. Scott."

Cherry and Dimitri arrived back at Hut Point. Atkinson and Keohane were waiting for them, but until the sea froze, they were unable to get back to Cape Evans.


Notes:

[1] R.F. Scott, letter to Sir Edgar Speyer, 16 March, 1912, quoted in Scott's Last Expedition, v.1.

Wednesday, 20 December 1911

Scott

"Camp under the Wild Mountains, 20 December 1911." [1]

At evening camp, Scott told off the next returning party. "Atkinson, Wright, Cherry-Garrard, and Keohane. All are disappointed -- poor Wright rather bitterly, I fear. I dread this necessity of choosing -- nothing could be more heartrending. I calculated our programme to start from 85° 10' with 12 units of food [one unit was a week's supplies for four men] and eight men. We ought to be in this position to-morrow night, less one day's food. After all our harassing trouble one cannot but be satisfied with such a prospect." [2]

"Aitch [sic], Cherry, Keohane and I turn back tomorrow night," Wright fumed in his diary. "Scott a fool. Teddy goes on. I have to make course back. Too wild to write more tonight. Teddy slack trace 7/8th of today." [3] Later he recalled more calmly, "Cherry was, I know, very disappointed and so was I. The reason for my disappointment was that I was quite certain that both Cherry and I were in better shape than at least one who was chosen to go on. I must have shown my disappointment since the Owner, most kindly, softened the blow by pointing out that I would have the responsibility as navigator of the party, of seeing that we did not get lost on the way back. It did soften the blow to a great extent. I was not entirely happy but soon recovered and indeed, probably took this responsibility too seriously." [4]

"This evening has been rather a shock," Cherry wrote in his diary. "As I was getting my finnesko on to the top of my ski beyond the tent Scott came up to me, and said that he was afraid he had rather a blow for me. Of course I knew what he was going to say, but could hardly grasp that I was going back -- to-morrow night. The returning party is to be Atch, Silas, Keohane and self." [5]

"Scott was very put about, said he had been thinking a lot about it but had come to the conclusion that the seamen with their special knowledge, would be needed: to rebuild the sledge, I suppose. Wilson told me it was a toss-up whether Titus or I should go on: that being so I think Titus will help him more than I can. I said all I could think of -- he seemed so cut up about it, saying 'I think, somehow, it is specially hard on you.' I said I hoped I had not disappointed him, and he caught hold of me and said 'No -- no -- No,' so if that is the case all is well. He told me that at the bottom of the glacier he was hardly expecting to go on himself: I don't know what the trouble is, but his foot is troubling him, and also, I think, indigestion."


Amundsen

Amundsen raised the daily allowance of pemmican from 350g to 400g per man. "God reward him for that," Bjaaland wrote. "Now I'm so full and satisfied, I can't express it in words." [6]


Notes:

[1] "The Lost Photographs of Captain Scott", 5 October 2011, Guardian.co.uk. "Scott took this impressive image to capture the interesting geological features around Mount Wild. On the sledge in the camp, two figures can be seen sketching. On the left, Apsley Cherry Garrard is drawing the view towards Mount Buckley; on the right, Edward Wilson is making detailed sketches and notes of the geological features so clearly visible in Scott's photograph. The other figure that can be seen is probably Birdie Bowers.... Scott returned his camera to base with the First Supporting Party as they departed from the top of the Beardmore Glacier towards Cape Evans.... Bowers, with his lighter camera, was chosen by Scott to become the photographer for the final pole party."
[2] R.F. Scott, diary, 20 December, 1911, quoted in Scott's Last Expedition, v.1.
[3] Charles S. Wright, diary, 20 December, 1911, quoted by David Crane in Scott of the Antarctic (New York : Knopf, c2005), p.476.
[4] Charles S. Wright, Silas : the Antarctic Diaries and Memoir of Charles S. Wright (Columbus : Ohio State University, 1993), quoted by David Crane in Scott of the Antarctic (New York : Knopf, c2005), p.476.
[5] Apsley Cherry-Garrard, diary, 20 December, 1911, quoted in The Worst Journey in the World, ch.10.
[6] Olav Bjaaland, diary, 21 December 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.497.

Friday, 8 December 1911

Scott

"Three days generally see these blizzards out, and we hoped much from Friday, December 8," recalled Cherry. "But when we breakfasted at 10 a.m. (we were getting into day-marching routine) wind and snow were monotonously the same. The temperature rose to +34.3°. These temperatures and those recorded by Meares on his way home must be a record for the interior of the Barrier. So far as we were concerned it did not much matter now whether it was +40° or +34°. Things did look really gloomy that morning." [1]

"But at noon there came a gleam of comfort."

The wind dropped. Almost immediately, the men were digging out the tents and sledges in the watery sunshine. Without sewn-in groundsheets, the tents had leaked profusely. "We bails the water off the floor cloth," Keohane wrote in his diary, "but that is small comfort." [2]

"We are all sitting round now after some tea," Cherry continued in the afternoon, "it is much better than getting into the bags. I can hardly think that the ponies can pull on, but Titus thinks they can pull to-morrow; all the food is finished, and what they have had to-day was only what they would not eat out of their last feed yesterday. It is a terrible end -- driven to death on no more food, to be then cut up, poor devils. I have swopped the Little Minister with Silas Wright for Dante's Inferno!"


Amundsen

"We stayed in bed late today," Amundsen wrote in his diary, "to prepare for the final onslaught."

The Norwegians laid their last depot, lightening Wisting's and Bjaaland's sledges by about 100 pounds each. The depot was marked especially carefully, with a traverse line of planks taken from empty sledging cases and painted black, earlier at Framheim. The planks were set a hundred skiing paces from each other, making a grid of three miles in either direction of the depot. Every other plank, Amundsen noted, "carries a black pennant. Those planks to the E. all have a notch under the pennant to indicate the direction they lie in relation to the depot.... In addition to the transverse marking we will put up a few snow blocks every other nautical mile on the way South." [3]

One of Wisting's dogs had disappeared the day before -- "presumably he has gone away to die."

"We leave here well supplied to get back here -- ca.30 days [rations] for humans, ca.20 days for dogs. Three of us -- H[elmer] H[anssen], W[isting], and I," Amundsen added, "look quite awe-inspiring since our faces were frostbitten in the SE storm a few days ago. Bj[aaland] & Hass[el], who went last, got off scot free. The dogs have begun to be quite dangerous and must be considered as mortal enemies when one leaves the sledges."

To the northeast in King Edward VII Land, Prestrud and his Eastern Party decided to head for home.


Notes:

[1] Apsley Cherry-Garrard, The Worst Journey in the World, ch.IX.
[2] Patrick Keohane, diary, 8 December, 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.463.
[3] Roald Amundsen, diary, 9 December, 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Race for the South Pole : the expedition diaries of Scott and Amundsen (London : Continuum, c2010), p.172-173. See the entry for 30 October 1911 for Nilsen's drawing of the similar markers at the 80° depot.