Friday, 5 May 1911

Scott

In the long, quiet winter days at Cape Evans, Scott reflected upon the men around him.

"Bill" Wilson working up a sketch, 18 May, 1911, photographed by Ponting. [1]

"One sees Wilson busy with pencil and colour box, rapidly and steadily adding to his portfolio of charming sketches and at intervals filling the gaps in his zoological work of Discovery times; withal ready and willing to give advice and assistance to others at all times; his sound judgment appreciated and therefore a constant referee." [2]

Simpson in his lab, photographed by Ponting, 21 December, 1911. [3]

"Simpson, master of his craft, untiringly attentive to the working of his numerous self-recording instruments, observing all changes with scientific acumen, doing the work of two observers at least and yet ever seeking to correlate an expanded scope. So the current meteorological and magnetic observations are taken as never before by Polar expeditions.

"Wright, good-hearted, strong, keen, striving to saturate his mind with the ice problems of this wonderful region. He has taken the electrical work in hand with all its modern interest of association with radio-activity.

"Evans, with a clear-minded zeal in his own work, does it with all the success of result which comes from the taking of pains. Therefrom we derive a singularly exact preservation of time -- an important consideration to all, but especially necessary for the physical work. Therefrom also, and including more labour, we have an accurate survey of our immediate surroundings and can trust to possess the correctly mapped results of all surveying data obtained. He has Gran for assistant. [4]

"Taylor's intellect is omnivorous and versatile -- his mind is unceasingly active, his grasp wide. Whatever he writes will be of interest -- his pen flows well."

Debenham, Gran, and Taylor in their cubicle, photographed by Ponting, 18 May, 1911. [5]

"Debenham's is clearer. Here we have a well-trained, sturdy worker, with a quiet meaning that carries conviction; he realises the conceptions of thoroughness and conscientiousness."

Bowers reading the thermometer at the top of the Ramp, with Wilson taking notes, photographed by flash-light by Ponting, 7 June, 1911. [6]

"To Bowers' practical genius is owed much of the smooth working of our station. He has a natural method in line with which all arrangements fall, so that expenditure is easily and exactly adjusted to supply, and I have the inestimable advantage of knowing the length of time which each of our possessions will last us and the assurance that there can be no waste. Active mind and active body were never more happily blended. It is a restless activity, admitting no idle moments and ever budding into new forms.

"So we see the balloons ascending under his guidance and anon he is away over the floe tracking the silk thread which held it. Such a task completed, he is away to exercise his pony, and later out again with the dogs, the last typically self-suggested, because for the moment there is no one else to care for these animals. Now in a similar manner he is spreading thermometer screens to get comparative readings with the home station. He is for the open air, seemingly incapable of realising any discomfort from it, and yet his hours within doors spent with equal profit. For he is intent on tracking the problems of sledging food and clothing to their innermost bearings and is becoming an authority on past records. This will be no small help to me and one which others never could have given."

Atkinson in his lab, photographed by Ponting. [7]

"Adjacent to the physicist's corner of the hut Atkinson is quietly pursuing the subject of parasites. Already he is in a new world. The laying out of the fish trap was his action and the catches are his field of labour. Constantly he comes to ask if I would like to see some new form and I am taken to see some protozoa or ascidian isolated on the slide plate of his microscope. The fishes themselves are comparatively new to science; it is strange that their parasites should have been under investigation so soon.

"Atkinson's bench with its array of microscopes, test-tubes, spirit lamps, &c., is next the dark room in which Ponting spends the greater part of his life. I would describe him as sustained by artistic enthusiasm. This world of ours is a different one to him than it is to the rest of us -- he gauges it by its picturesqueness -- his joy is to reproduce its pictures artistically, his grief to fail to do so. No attitude could be happier for the work which he has undertaken, and one cannot doubt its productiveness. I would not imply that he is out of sympathy with the works of others, which is far from being the case, but that his energies centre devotedly on the minutiae of his business."

Cherry typing up the "South Polar Times", photographed by Ponting. [8]

"Cherry-Garrard is another of the open-air, self-effacing, quiet workers; his whole heart is in the life, with profound eagerness to help everyone. 'One has caught glimpses of him in tight places; sound all through and pretty hard also.' Indoors he is editing our Polar journal, out of doors he is busy making trial stone huts and blubber stoves, primarily with a view to the winter journey to Cape Crozier, but incidentally these are instructive experiments for any party which may get into difficulty by being cut off from the home station. It is very well to know how best to use the scant resources that nature provides in these regions. In this connection I have been studying our Arctic library to get details concerning snow hut building and the implements used for it."

Meares and Oates at the blubber stove in the stables, cooking mash for the ponies, photographed by Ponting, possibly May 1911. [9]

"Oates' whole heart is in the ponies. He is really devoted to their care, and I believe will produce them in the best possible form for the sledging season. Opening out the stores, installing a blubber stove, &c., has kept him busy, whilst his satellite, Anton, is ever at work in the stables -- an excellent little man."

"Thomas Crean (on left) and Petty Officer Evans (on right) mending sleeping bags. Taken by Herbert George Ponting on 16 May 1911 during British Antarctic ('Terra Nova') Expedition (1910-1913)". [10]

"Evans and Crean are repairing sleeping-bags, covering felt boots, and generally working on sledging kit. In fact there is no one idle, and no one who has the least prospect of idleness."


Notes:

[1] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[2] R.F. Scott, diary, 5 May, 1911, quoted in Scott's Last Expedition, v.1.
[3] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[4] "Evans himself is a queer study," Scott wrote in a passage cut from the published diary, "his boyish enthusiasm carries all along till one sees clearly the childish limitations of its foundations and appreciates that it is not a rock to be built on -- He is altogether a good fellow and wholly well-meaning but terribly slow to learn and hence fails altogether to grasp the value of any work but his own -- very desirous to help everyone he is mentally incapable of doing it. There are problems ahead here for I cannot consider him fitted for a superior position -- though he is physically strong & fit for a subordinate one. It was curious to note how his value (in this respect) suddenly diminished as he stepped ashore -- The ship's deck was his trained position -- on the land he seems incapable of expanding beyond the limits of an astonishingly narrow experience." Quoted by David Crane in Scott of the Antarctic (New York : Knopf, c2005), p.443-444.
[5] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[6] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[7] Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand.
[8] Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand.
[9] Scott Polar Research Institute.
[10] Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand.

Wednesday, 26 April 1911

Amundsen

Nansen in Bergen, around 1910. [1]

Feelings against Amundsen ran so high that Nansen defended him in a letter to The Times: "I have had much to do with Amundsen, and on all occasions ... he always acted as a man, and my firm conviction is that an unfair act of any kind would be entirely alien to his nature.... Fearing that [his supporters] might advise him not to go to the Antarctic, he decided not to tell any of us.... And in this he was perhaps right ... he thought he had no right to make us co-responsible and so has taken the whole responsibility upon himself. I cannot help thinking that this is a manly way of proceeding.... As regards the question of whether Amundsen had a right to enter [another explorer's territory] ... [it must] be remembered that the bases of operations of Scott and Amundsen lie far apart, there being about the same distance between them as between Spitsbergen and Franz Josef Land. I am certain that not even the keenest monopolist would venture to suggest that it would be unfair to go to Franz Josef Land on an expedition in quest of the North Pole, because another expedition with the same object in view was already on its way to Spitsbergen." [2]

Leon wrote a month later to Don Pedro, "When my brother received your charitable offer before his departure from Norway, he had no idea he would be compelled to take advantage of it to the extent that now has been necessary; he felt convinced that his supporters and the Norwegian people would sympathise with the decision he had made to go South, when his reasons were so strong and good ... and he believed definitely he could count on the necessary support to carry out his journey. In that belief he remains today."

"He does not know what I know, that his actions have been condemned in nearly all quarters.... It is a fact which in the highest degree will hurt his sense of honour and sow bitterness in his mind when he learns about it." [3]


Notes:

[1] Nansen Electronic Photographic Archive, Nasjonalbiblioteket.
[2] The Times, 26 April, 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.378.
[3] Leon Amundsen, letter to Don Pedro Christophersen, 21 June 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.379.

Monday, 24 April 1911

Scott

"Lunar corona", a watercolour by Wilson. [1]

The sun set for the winter at Cape Evans.


Notes:

[1] "Scott's Last Expedition: Illustrations in the First Volume".

Wednesday, 19 April 1911

A snowed-under Framheim in the moonlight, April 1911. [1]

The sun set for the winter at Framheim.

Rather than dig out the hut from its accumulation of snow, wrote Amundsen, "we began to extend our premises. Along the axis of the house, facing west, a huge snowdrift had formed just in front of the entrance. It was our intention ... to remove it. At the last moment, it occurred to me that we could possibly use the drift and escape the work of shovelling and carting it away. We have now started to excavate it and arrange a direct connection with the house through an underground passage. By digging downwards, we can obtain all the space we need. Provisionally, we are digging out a carpenter's workshop for Bjaaland and Stubberud.... I think the idea is good!" [1]


Notes:

[1] Roald Amundsen Bildearkiv, Nasjonalbiblioteket. This is one of the glass slides that was coloured in for use in Amundsen's lectures in 1912.
[2] Roald Amundsen, diary, [20 April, 1911], quoted by Roland Huntford in The Amundsen Photographs (London : Hodder & Stoughton, c1987), p.104.

Monday, 17 April 1911

Amundsen

The only scientific work done by the men at Framheim was the routine meteorological observations. "Our plan is one, one and again one alone," Amundsen wrote in his diary, "to reach the pole. For that goal, I have decided to throw everything else aside. We shall do what we can without colliding with this plan. If we were to have a night watch, we would have to have a light burning the whole time. In one room, as we have, this would be worrying for most of us, and make us weak. What concerns me is that we all live properly in all respects during the winter. Sleep and eat well, so that we have full strength and are in good spirits when spring arrives to fight towards the goal which we must attain at any cost." [1]

The Fram arrived in Buenos Aires. Due to ill-feeling in Norway against Amundsen's behaviour, the Government had hesitated to ask the Storting for further grants, and the expedition was completely broke -- Nilsen did not even have the money to hire a tender to take him ashore, as all spare change had been confiscated at the Bay of Whales for soldering and sealing paraffin tanks.

Don Pedro Christophersen generously agreed to pay Amundsen's bills.

But, Nilsen wrote to Alexander Nansen, the expedition's business manager, "It was not fair to draw too big a draft on one man. [At] home they can naturally say that the expedition went South in all secrecy, and therefore it can manage as best it can. But what is one to do? Norway spends money now and then on vessels to represent the country. Is Fram not the best vessel that can be sent out? I won't pretend to say that there is anybody on board particularly qualified to represent the country, but who doesn't know Fram? Norway can scarcely be better known than by its flag flying the the world's greatest harbours from the gaff of the world's most famous ship."

"Every man from chief to cook has done, and will do everything for the expedition to reach its goal. It is therefore not exactly encouraging to hear in the first port of call that the country has washed its hands of us." [2]

Don Pedro payed for the refit Fram needed, and Nilsen left on 8th June as planned for his oceanographic cruise between South America and Southern Africa.

That part of the ocean was, as Fridtjof Nansen wrote to Nilsen, "so to say, all an unknown world, where previous expeditions have ... done little or nothing of significance. It would be splendid if Norwegians could also show themselves superior in this field. In addition, it will show clearly that the Fram expedition is not only a sporting stunt, as some say, but also a scientific enterprise worthy of respect." [3]


Notes:

[1] Roald Amundsen, diary, 18 April, 1911, quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.380.
[2] Thorvald Nilsen, letter to Alexander Nansen, [date not given], quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.376-377.
[3] Fridtjof Nansen, letter to Thorvald Nilsen, [date not given], quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.377.

Friday, 14 April 1911

Scott

After weeks on the Barrier, and with their faces black with smoke from the Discovery hut's blubber stove, the men walked off the sea-ice and into the hut at Cape Evans.

"I shall never forget the breakfast that Clissold prepared for us," Teddy Evans remembered with feeling, "hot rolls, heaps of butter, milk, sugar, jam, a fine plate of tomato soup, and fried seal cooked superbly. The meal over, we shaved, bathed, and put on clean clothes, smoked cigarettes, and took a day's holiday." [1]

The party back at Hut Point were very anxious about those who had gone ahead, and upon seeing the prearranged signal gun from Cape Evans that evening, "all went wild with excitement," wrote Cherry in his diary, "knowing that all was well. Meares ran in and soaked some awning with paraffin, and we lifted it as an answering flare and threw it into the air again and again, until it was burning in little bits all over the snow. The relief was great." [2]

Scott himself wrote, "It was not until I found all safe at the Home Station that I realised how anxious I had been concerning it. In a normal season no thought of its having been in danger would have occurred to me, but since the loss of the ponies and the breaking of the Glacier Tongue I could not rid myself of the fear that misfortune was in the air and that some abnormal swell had swept the beach; gloomy thoughts of the havoc that might have been wrought by such an event would arise in spite of the sound reasons which had originally led me to choose the site of the hut as a safe one." [3]

"Anton considers the death of Hackenschmidt to have been an act of 'cussedness' -- the result of a determination to do no work for the Expedition!!"


Notes:

[1] E.R.G.R. Evans, South with Scott, p.107, quoted by David Crane in Scott of the Antarctic (New York : Knopf, c2005), p.436.
[2] Apsley Cherry-Garrard, The Worst Journey in the World, ch.5.
[3] R.F. Scott, diary, "Impressions on returning to the Hut, April 13, 1911", quoted in Scott's Last Expedition, v.1.

Thursday, 13 April 1911

Scott

Castle Rock, three miles (4.8 km) northeast of Hut Point, in 2000. Photo by Josh Landis. [1]

Scott at last made a start for Cape Evans at nine in the morning, after three more days' delay due to bad weather. "Party consisted of self, Bowers, P.O. Evans, Taylor, one tent," he wrote, "[Lt.] Evans, Gran, Crean, Debenham, and Wright, second tent. Left Wilson in charge at Hut Point with Meares, Forde, Keohane, Oates, Atkinson, and Cherry-Garrard." Scott reckoned that a new route could be found along the base of Mt. Erebus to the north; the dogs and ponies would have to wait to go back the usual way over the sea ice to Cape Evans.

"All gave us a pull up the ski slope; it had become a point of honour to take this slope without a 'breather.' I find such an effort trying in the early morning, but had to go through with it." [2]

Their way led past Castle Rock, northeast of Hut Point, and on to Hutton Cliffs, within sight of Cape Evans. They had to lower themselves and the loaded sledges by Alpine rope down these cliffs, which at one point dropped a sheer 24 feet (7.3 m).

"It was a good piece of work getting everything down safely," Evans later wrote, "and I admired Scott's decision to go over; a more nervous man would have fought shy because once down to the sea ice there was little chance of our getting back and we had to fight our way forward to Cape Evans somehow." [3]

"Quite pleased with the result," noted Scott.


Notes:

[1] Wikipedia.
[2] R.F. Scott, diary, 13 April, 1911, quoted in Scott's Last Expedition, v.1.
[3] E.R.G.R. Evans, South with Scott, p.105, quoted by David Crane in Scott of the Antarctic (New York : Knopf, c2005), p.435.

Monday, 10 April 1911

Amundsen

The last depot party, under Johansen, arrived back at Framheim, three days later than expected. The delay had been caused by a thick fog which led them to wander into a maze of crevasses that collapsed underneath them. Two dogs had been lost -- Johansen's leading dogs -- but it was a blessing in disguise as it demonstrated the advantages of the Greenland fan harness. With the Alaskan single-trace harness, the whole team would have been dragged down.

The temperatures had been ten to fifteen degrees higher than before, with fog most of the way. They had missed the depot by a mile and a half, but had run into one of their marker flags to the west and had no difficulty tracing their way back to the depot.

They had rebuilt the depot at 80°, adding a ton of seal meat, 165 litres of paraffin, and other supplies, totalling almost two tons. Johansen had also arranged the six seal carcasses standing on end around the cairn of cases and snow blocks, to prevent the snow from drifting up around them and to save the trouble of having to dig them out later.

There were now depots at 80, 81, and 82 degrees, with the route marked every mile to 80°.

"Tomorrow," Amundsen wrote, "we celebrate the end of the autumn's work, and truly we can celebrate it with a good conscience." [1]


Notes:

[1] Roald Amundsen, [diary, 11 April, 1911], quoted by Roland Huntford in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.359.