A First Rate Tragedy (14 page)

Arriving back at the
Discovery
on Christmas Eve Scott was disappointed to find her still fast in the ice. However, he now gave his time to writing up the achievements of the western journey. He calculated that they had averaged nearly fourteen and a half miles a day during their fifty-nine-day journey, sledging some 700 miles. This confirmed Scott’s view that men were better than dogs. The distances compared well with the agonizingly slow progress made on the journey south when the average was only around ten miles a day. Scott was also able to record a number of important geological discoveries arising from his journey, including one of the glacier’s tributaries where they found a deep moraine of mud
that struck the vegetable-loving Lashly as ‘a splendid place for growing spuds’ and a steep dry valley, one of the three forming the McMurdo oasis, the largest ice-free area in Antarctica.

During his absence a number of other trips had gone well. Scott knew that the expedition would be returning to England with some useful scientific information under its belt. Royds, Bernacchi and a party had sledged for thirty-one days south-east over the Barrier proving that it continued level and Bernacchi had made a number of observations yielding useful data about the region’s magnetic conditions. He also left a more down-to-earth account of sledging, describing some of the problems not addressed in Scott’s loftier and more dignified accounts. In particular he described ‘one of the nightmares of sledging in Antarctica’ – going to the loo in sub-zero temperatures. Explaining that there was no room for facilities in the tiny tents, that latrines took too long to dig and that temporary shelters were an impossibility in the whirling snow, he described how:

Feeling like a ham in a sack, you go through various preparatory antics of loosening garments – preferably within the tent, and prowl around some distance away facing always the biting wind, and watchfully awaiting a temporary lull. The rest is a matter of speed and dexterity, but invariably the nether garments are filled instantly with masses of surface-drifting snow, which you must take along with you and suffer the discomforts of extreme wetness for hours.

Later less inhibited explorers have also commented that few Polar travellers avoid piles, the agony of which can all too easily be imagined in a rushed evacuation.

Mulock, who had joined the
Discovery
from the
Morning
in place of Shackleton, had fixed the position and heights of over 200 mountains. Armitage, Wilson and Heald had surveyed the Koettlitz Glacier to the south-west. Armitage had wanted to sledge south but Scott, after consulting Wilson, had ruled that there was no point going over old ground. It would be more productive to explore somewhere new. A reasonable proposition, but Armitage interpreted it as Scott’s desire to keep the record for farthest south for himself. Wilson had been able to make another visit to the emperor penguin rookery at Cape Crozier, and had solved the mystery of how the young birds, still downy and unable to swim, were able to leave the Cape. He had watched them float serenely out to sea with their parents on the ice floes.

However, all the parties were now safely back on board the
Discovery
in relative warmth and security. Lashly and Evans were tucking into some fine dishes created by Ford, who had taken over as cook and took his inspiration from a copy of Mrs Beeton, and were fast regaining their strength and lost weight. Indeed Scott observed that Evans was assuming gigantic proportions. He himself was suffering from his recurring problem of dyspepsia, perhaps stress-related, and could not indulge quite so freely. His condition was not helped by worry over whether the
Discovery
could be freed from the ice in time to sail from McMurdo Sound when the relief vessel joined them. Psychologically and emotionally the
Discovery
meant a great deal to Scott. She was the symbol of everything that had been achieved during their stay in Antarctica and she had been their home and their refuge. She was also his first independent command and abandoning her would be very difficult for him.

By early January twenty miles of solid ice still separated the
Discovery
from the open sea. The sawing camp which Armitage
had set up on Scott’s orders to try and cut a channel was achieving little and Scott ordered the work to stop. He faced a real possibility of yet another winter in McMurdo Sound and ordered his men to lay in a stock of penguin meat. Meanwhile he and Wilson made a journey northwards. Scott was watching for signs that the ice was breaking up. Wilson was studying penguins. They enjoyed a relaxed couple of days breakfasting off fried penguin liver and seal kidneys and resting and chatting in their tent. Then Scott looked out and saw the relief ship
Morning
barely three miles out to sea. And she was not alone. ‘Lo and behold, there before us lay a second ship . . .’ This was the whaler
Terra Nova
. Scott and Wilson were looking at the ship that would take them back to Antarctica for their race to the Pole.

For the moment Scott’s chief concern was to understand what was going on. ‘Sun scorched, unwashed, unshaven and in rags’,
³
Wilson and Scott hurried on board the
Morning
to learn that, because of the wranglings of the two societies, the government had felt obliged to undertake the relief of the
Discovery
itself. The Admiralty had accordingly despatched the
Morning
and the
Terra Nova
, considered a more powerful ship. Shackleton, by then fit and well again, had been asked to go as chief officer of the
Terra Nova
but had, perhaps wisely, refused. The orders brought for Scott were unequivocal. If the
Discovery
could not be freed in time to leave with the relief ships she must be abandoned.

Scott was deeply upset at being put in ‘a very cruel position’ and his men shared his sentiments, greeting the Admiralty’s orders with a ‘stony silence’. However, he had to obey. There seemed a real prospect that the ice would not break up in time and so he began to arrange the transfer of equipment from the
Discovery
across the ice to the relief ships. He had not abandoned all hope and ordered the ice to be blasted at various strategic points but this
had only limited success. If the ice broke up it would be of its own volition and at last this began to happen. By 12 February there was only two and a half miles of solid ice between the
Discovery
and freedom. Would it break up in time?

14 February brought what might have seemed to a religious man to be a miracle but to the agnostic, fatalistic Scott may have seemed the smile of fortune. A combination of sea swell and firing charges finally broke open the way. Captain Colbeck of the
Morning
left an astute description of Scott’s joy: ‘Scott was terribly excited. He came on board as soon as I got alongside the ice face and could scarcely speak. It meant all the difference of complete and comparative success to him and there was not a happier man living than Scott on that night.’
⁴
The news had been broken on the
Discovery
by a shout of ‘The ships are coming, Sir!’ during dinner. In a moment the men were racing for Hut Point from where they could see the ice breaking up. Scott described how no sooner was one great floe borne away when a dark streak cut its way into the solid sheet which remained and carved out another: ‘Our small community in their nondescript, tattered garments stood breathlessly watching this wonderful scene. For long intervals we remained almost spellbound, and then a burst of frenzied cheering broke out . . .’ The
Terra Nova
and the
Morning
raced for the distinction of being the first to reach the
Discovery
and at about half past ten the
Terra Nova
broke through amid scenes of huge excitement. The men on Hut Point ran up their silken Union Jack in celebration.

The last of the ice around the
Discovery
was dislodged two days later by explosive charges. The final blast shook the vessel from end to end but it did the trick. Scott wrote thankfully that ‘our good ship was spared to take us homeward’. On 16 February 1904 a sombre ceremony took place. The company of the
Discovery
gathered bare-headed around the cross erected to George Vince while Scott read prayers. Nine years later another cross would be erected nearby to mark another tragedy.

The next day brought near disaster. As if a malicious southern spirit was reluctant to give her up, a gale forced the
Discovery
headlong onto a shoal. For a few hours ‘truly the most dreadful I have ever spent’, Scott wrote, it looked as if she might not survive. The engines would not function and she was trapped in the gale, being pounded against the shoal. However, during the evening the current turned, running south rather than north, and the
Discovery
began to work astern. The crew managed to get the engines running again and were relieved to find that the ship had sustained little damage. She was ready to begin her long journey home.

As the
Discovery
set sail for New Zealand and the now familiar landmarks of McMurdo Sound faded from view, Scott must have wondered what kind of reception his expedition would receive when he reached England. He could look back on some remarkable achievements but he was wise enough to realize that he faced enemies as well as allies in the establishment and that his reception might not be all he wished.

7

The Reluctant Celebrity

On 10 September 1904 a spruce and gleaming
Discovery
steamed into Portsmouth Harbour. Friends and relatives packing the quayside were delighted to see that the crew looked ‘wonderfully well’. These fit bronzed men, with skins ‘like seasoned mahogany’ according to the
Daily Express
, were the antithesis of the wasted and exhausted figures that some had expected to return. Sir Clements Markham bore some of the responsibility for stirring up anxieties about the men’s condition because he had wanted to ensure that a relief expedition was sent. The horrors of the Franklin Expedition had made a deep impression on him in his youth and he was determined there should be no similar tragedy in the South. In fact the figures standing proudly on the deck were not only in the rudest of health, they had actually put on weight. The only sign of their ordeal was that they appeared to talk rather slowly and to move ponderously as if still shrouded in their heavy weatherproof garments.

A few days later the
Discovery
sailed for London where she tied up in the East India Docks. However, there was no official reception – the only dignitary to greet the returning heroes was the
Mayor of Gravesend. The following day a lunch was given by the Royal and Geographical Societies but it was in a warehouse. The
Daily Express
condemned the shabbiness of this ‘luncheon in a shed’ and asserted that the City of London should have offered the intrepid explorers a Guildhall banquet. It was noted that none of the Lords of the Admiralty were present while ‘The Lord Mayor sent a sheriff to say a few words’. A guest at the lunch wrote with eerie foresight and a true understanding of human nature:

I cannot help feeling that there still ought to remain some sort of ceremony of a national character to show that we as a nation realize and appreciate the sacrifice these men have made for science and to the credit of their country. Had the ship’s crew perished in the Antarctic, we doubtless should have raised a national memorial to them. It seems to me a pity that we should suffer their deeds to pass to oblivion because they have returned safe and sound.

Scott had been worrying about how the expedition would be judged by the Admiralty and the waspish scientific establishment. He knew some would blame him for allowing the
Discovery
to be frozen in, thereby necessitating a second winter, but a more pressing concern was gnawing at him. In New Zealand the press had been quick to report that he had criticized the Admiralty for sending down the
Terra Nova.
He had been quoted as asserting that the men of the
Discovery
had been very well able to take care of themselves and that a single ship, the
Morning
, would have been quite sufficient for their relief. Indeed, that was what he genuinely believed. Like the rest of the crew he had felt humiliated by the scale of the relief expedition which had smacked of
overkill and melodrama. He prided himself on his self-sufficiency and resented being portrayed as vulnerable and in need of rescue. However, he had far too much common sense to have expressed these views publicly and had hastily issued a rebuttal to
The Times
and to Reuters and telegraphed the Admiralty and the Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society. He feared, correctly, that it would be hard to convince them of his innocence and he was afraid that his chances of promotion would suffer. Therefore it was a relief to learn that he had been promoted captain with effect from the day of his arrival.

Scott was also gratified by the generally positive reaction to the
Discovery
’s achievements. The accusation that he was not fit to lead a scientific expedition had rankled from the early days when the scientific establishment turned their noses up at him. Sir Clements Markham, of course, was quick to claim that splendid things had been achieved, pronouncing that ‘Never has any Polar expedition returned with so great a harvest of scientific results’.
¹
Yet Scott was aware that Sir Clements was regarded as tiresomely opinionated and thoroughly partisan.

Far more significant, therefore, was the endorsement of the scientific results by Chief Hydrographer to the Admiralty, Rear-Admiral Sir William Wharton, who had at one stage caballed with the scientists against Scott, but who now wrote that: ‘Commander Scott and his staff have most magnificently maintained the high standard of efficiency of former Polar explorers.’
²
The press took note of the growing swell of approval and began to lionize Scott. ‘True to the spirit of his instructions he has done what he set out to do, and even more,’ applauded
The Times
. A contributory factor was that by 1904 explorers were back in fashion. Scott had sailed away at a time when the country was struggling to come to terms with a disturbing and unsatisfactory war in South Africa
and interest in an adventure like his had been muted. However, by the time the
Discovery
returned, the Boer War had been won and people had regained their appetite for tales of romance and derring-do. There was a sufficient flavour of heroic recklessness about the
Discovery
expedition to excite the public. The other news sensation of the year was the Younghusband expedition to Tibet.