South with Scott Part 22

From Gran's diary the following is taken:

"It has happened--horrible, ugly fate, only 11 miles from One Ton Depot, Scott, Wilson, and Birdie. All ghastly. I will never forget it as long as I live: a terrible nightmare could not have shown more horror than this 'Campo Santo.' In a tent, snow covered to above the door, we found the three bodies. Scott in the middle, half out of his bag, Birdie on his right, and Uncle Bill on the left, lying head towards the door. .. Bowers and Wilson seem to have pa.s.sed away in a kind of sleep.... Concerning our unlucky Polar Party we learned that Petty Officer Evans died at the Lower Glacier Depot; he was done, and had fallen coming down the Glacier: death was the result of a concussion of the brain. On the Barrier they met with extreme low temperatures. Down to -50 degrees in the night time for weeks, also head wind.

"'Soldier' had got his feet frost-bitten badly and suffered enormously. He understood that the salvation of the party depended on his death--but as death would not relieve him he went out of the tent in a blizzard to meet it. The three others arrived here at this camp March 21 with food for two days and fuel for one meal. A terrible blizzard prevented them from getting in, and on March 29 all was finished.

"Scott writes in his diary: 'There is no more hope, and so G.o.d look after our people....' All this only a day's march from plenty.... We buried them this morning, a solemn undertaking. How strange it was to see men bareheaded whilst the wind blew with the thermometer at -20 degrees. We are now going to look for 'Soldier' and then return to look for Campbell. I must say our Expedition is not given much luck ... the sun is shining beautifully in this place of death: over the Bluff this morning stood a distinct cross in clouds."

It continues: "November 12, Lunch time:

"We have built a cairn--a 12-foot cairn--and put a cross made of a pair of skis on it...." Gran says later, and it is worth quoting: "When I saw those three poor souls the other day, I just felt that I envied them.

They died having done something great. How hard death must be for those who meet it having done nothing."

Atkinson in his account says:

"We recovered all their gear and dug out the sledge with their belongings on it. Amongst these were 35 lb. of very important geological specimens which had been collected on the moraines of the Beardmore Glacier: at Doctor Wilson's request they had stuck to these up to the very end, even when disaster stared them in the face and they knew that the specimens were so much weight added to what they had to pull...."

The following record was left:

"November 12, 1912, Lat.i.tude 79 degrees, 50 minutes, South. This cross and cairn are erected over the bodies of Captain Scott, C.V.O., R.N., Doctor E.A. Wilson, M.B., B.C., Cantab., and Lieutenant H.R. Bowers, Royal Indian Marine--a slight token to perpetuate their successful and gallant attempt to reach the Pole. This they did on January 17, 1912, after the Norwegian Expedition had already done so. Inclement weather with lack of fuel was the cause of their death. Also to commemorate their two gallant comrades, Captain L.E.G. Oates of the Inniskilling Dragoons, who walked to his death in a blizzard to save his comrades, about eighteen miles south of this position; also of Seaman Edgar Evans, who died at the foot of the Beardmore Glacier. 'The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"

This was signed by all the members of the party.

"I decided then to march twenty miles south with the whole of the Expedition and try to find the body of Captain Oates. For half the day we proceeded south, as far as possible along the line of the previous season's march. On one of the old pony walls, which was simply marked by a ridge of the surface of the snow, we found Oates's sleeping-bag, which they had brought along with them after he had left.

"The next day we proceeded thirteen miles more south, hoping and searching to find his body. When we arrived at the place where he had left them, we saw that there was no chance of doing so. The kindly snow had covered his body, giving him a fitting burial. Here, again, as near to the site of the death as we could judge, we built another cairn to his memory, and placed thereon a small cross and the following record: 'Hereabouts died a very gallant gentleman, Captain L.E.G. Oates of the Inniskilling Dragoons. In March, 1912, returning from the Pole, he walked willingly to his death in a blizzard, to try and save his comrades, beset by hardships. This note is left by the Relief Expedition of 1912.'"

Atkinson writes also, and it should be inserted most certainly here, referring to their return after hunting for poor Oates's body:

"On the second day we came again to the resting place of the three and bade them there a final farewell. There alone in their greatness they will lie without change or bodily decay, with the most fitting tomb in the world above them."

Atkinson could not have expressed himself more beautifully. My book should end here, but there is an epilogue to it: it is the illuminating story of Campbell and his northern party, with a short indication of what was done elsewhere by the Expedition's men. The homeward journey was made in sorrow and doubt, for Atkinson's little band of brothers had to shoulder another responsibility--the determination of Campbell's fate.

On November 27, 1912, Gran's diary gives as follows:

"Great news again--great, good news. Campbell here and his party safe at Cape Evans. They just missed us going out. They lived a winter a la Eskimo, Igloo and so on, and have been quite comfortable, so they say.

Campbell is looking very well. He is now in command, and intends to do only small trips--Erebus and so on...."

Atkinson now handed over to Campbell, and whilst mentioning this it is just as well to call attention to the splendid services of Dr. Atkinson.

Grit and loyalty were his outstanding qualities. He was later on specially promoted to Surgeon Commander for his work in the Expedition.

CHAPTER XVIII

ADVENTURES OF THE NORTHERN PARTY

To set forth concisely the adventurous story of Campbell's Northern Party in a single chapter is no light task. Raymond Priestley has written it in book form already, just as Griffith-Taylor has published his particular narrative of the Western Journey in "The Silver Lining." Both books are of absorbing interest to those who are fond of Polar literature.

I have, I hope, made clear the reason of Campbell's landing at Cape Adare. Mr. Borchgrevink in his "Southern Cross" Antarctic Expedition used this position as his winter quarters, and found, just as Campbell did, that it was not a suitable part of the Antarctic continent for making extensive sledge journeys from. Still, King Edward's Land was denied him.

Amundsen was established before him in the Bay of Whales, and in spite of diligent search the Cape Adare choice was the only one left to Victor Campbell and his five companions. Scott's instructions have already been reproduced in this volume: he mentioned Robertson Bay, and Cape Adare is at the N.E. extreme of the Promontory bounding the Bay to the Eastward.

Campbell was by no means satisfied with his landing place, but coal was short in the "Terra Nova" and the season drawing in. He had vainly searched for a more profitable wintering place, and it was not until February 17 that he got his chance of landing here even.

The party and their stores were put ash.o.r.e on the beach which the "Southern Cross" Expedition had chosen, for want of a better spot where their stuff could be set safely on land. Loose ice and surf hampered operations, for owing to shallow water, boats had to convey hut, gear, and equipment from the ship instead of sledges taking it over fast ice, as was the case at Cape Evans. It was truly a case of bundling Campbell and Co. out of the ship, and only their great optimism and _bonhomie_ kept this party from despair. As it turned out they had some of the best of the Expedition game, since neither disaster nor terrific disappointment dogged their steps as in Scott's case, for up till the very last they were in blissful ignorance of our dreadful plight in the main party.

The old huts left by Borchgrevink in 1900 were much dilapidated: one snowed up inside, and the other roofless and full of penguin guano. The snow was all removed from the snow-choked hut, and this shack used as a temporary shelter during the building of the Chateau Campbell. The work of landing stores from the "Terra Nova" was accomplished in two days, and the ship, after tooting a farewell to the little party on her siren, steamed away and left them to their own devices.

The Cape Adare locality is a famous penguin rookery, and Campbell's men might for all the world have been erecting their hut on Hampstead Heath during a Bank Holiday, for the penguins gathered in their thousands around them in a cawing, squawking crowd.

Penguins are the true inhabitants of Antarctica, and have flourished for countless ages in these parts. Surgeon Levick, Campbell's doctor, has written a splendid little book ent.i.tled "Antarctic Penguins" (Heinemann), which tells all about the little beggars in popular language. The members landed with Lieutenant Victor Campbell were:

Levick . . . Surgeon and Zoologist.

Priestley . . Geologist.

Abbott . . . Seaman.

Browning . . Seaman.

d.i.c.kason . . Seaman.

The three seamen were chosen by Campbell after careful observation on the outward voyage.

The Northern Party Hut was completed and first inhabited by March 5. An ice house for the storage of fresh meat was constructed, or rather hollowed out of an iceberg grounded close to. Unfortunately, this had to be evacuated owing to a surf causing the berg to disintegrate, and V Campbell puts it, "we had only just time to rescue the forty penguins with which we had stocked it, and carry the little corpses to a near ice-house built of empty cases filled with ice."

To appreciate best the surrounding hereabouts one may as well give a brief description of the Cape Adare and Robertson Bay environment. The place on which the hut was built is a small triangular beach cut off from the mainland by inaccessible cliffs. A fine bay, containing an area of perhaps nine hundred square miles, lies to the westward, and south and behind this the Admiralty Range of Mountains rises in snowy splendour to heights of 10,000 feet or more; other ranges are visible far to the westward, whilst black basalt rocks overhang the station.

Several wall-faced glaciers are visible, but according to Campbell none are possible to climb on to, nor do they lead up to the inland plateau.

On this account the party were unable to accomplish any serious sledging whilst landed here. Other things were undertaken, and the members did excellent meteorological, geological, and magnetic work, while Campbell himself made some good surveys. Priestley has added, greatly to our geological knowledge, and he, with his previous Antarctic experience, made himself invaluable to his chief. The Aurora observations show much more variegated results than we got at Cape Evans, where, as pointed out, there was a great absence of colour beyond pale yellow in the displays.

The princ.i.p.al drawback of the beach here was its covering of guano and manure dust from the myriads of penguins and their predecessors. I had gone ash.o.r.e at Cape Adare as a sub-lieutenant on January 8, 1903, to leave a record, and I remember that we had literally to trample on the penguins to get across the beach to Borchgrevink's hut--how interesting it all was, my first landing on this inhospitable continent: my impressions left a wonderful memory of mouse-coloured, woolly little young of the Adelie penguin--I even remember taking one away and trying unsuccessfully to bring it up. It must have taken Campbell's crew a long time to get accustomed to the pungent odour thereabouts. Levick dressed the ground with bleaching powder to help dispel that dreadful odour of guano before Campbell's men put down their hut floor.

There is little to be set down concerning the Cape Adare winter--the routine much resembled our own winter routine at Cape Evans; it was much warmer, however, and being six degrees farther north the sun left the party nearly a month later and returned the same amount earlier; they had little more than two months with the sun below the horizon in fact.

There is a certain amount of quiet humour about Campbell's record; for instance, he states that they used their "pram" or Norwegian skiff and tried trawling for biological specimens on March 27--"our total catch was one sea-louse, one sea-slug, and one spider."

It is very interesting to note that in March they had Aurora in which "an arc of yellow stretched from N.W. to N.E., while a green and red curtain extended from the N.W. horizon to the zenith."

The "pram" was Campbell's gift to the Expedition. He was always alive in the matter of small boats and their uses, and he was the first to use "kayaks" by making canvas boats to fit round the sledges; these were light enough and might have well been used by us in the Main Party. Had poor Mackintosh possessed one in Shackleton's last expedition he and his companions would probably have saved themselves--if they had carried a canvas cover on a sledge with them however it is always easy to be wise after the event.

Levick's medical duties were very light indeed: they included the stopping of one of Campbell's teeth, and the latter says, "As he had been flensing a seal a few days before, his fingers tasted strongly of blubber."

Priestly took charge of the meteorology for this station in addition to his own special subjects. Abbott was the carpenter, Browning the acetylene gas-man, and d.i.c.kason the cook and baker. With these ends in view Mr. Archer had had d.i.c.kason in the galley on board during the outward voyage.

This hut of theirs was stayed down with wire hawser on account of the gales recorded by the "Southern Cross" Expedition.

The company's alarm clock, an invention of Browning's, deserves the description taken from Campbell's diary: "We have felt the want of an alarm clock, as in such a small party it seems undesirable that any one should have to remain awake the whole night to take the 2-4 a.m.

observations, but Browning has come to the rescue with a wonderful contrivance. It consists of a bamboo spring held back by a piece of cotton rove through a candle which is marked off in hours. The other end of the cotton is attached to the trigger of the gramophone, and whoever takes the midnight observations winds the gramophone, 'sets' the cotton, lights the candle, and turns the trumpet towards Priestley, who has to turn out for the 2 a.m. At ten minutes to two the candle burns the thread and releases the bamboo spring, which being attached to the trigger, starts the gramophone in the sleeper's ear, and he turns out and stops the tune; this arrangement works beautifully and can be timed to five minutes."

Curiously enough Campbell's men sustained far more frostbites than we at Cape Evans did: in all my four Antarctic voyages I have never been frost-bitten beyond a touch here and there on the finger-tips working instruments, yet I occasionally now get chilblains in an ordinary English winter.