An Unsung Hero: Tom Crean - Antarctic Survivor (10 page)

Six weeks later, on 1 April 1904 the three ships sailed quietly into Lyttelton. It was Good Friday, the weather was pleasantly warm and the reception given by the generous people of New Zealand was even warmer. Scott said they showered the party with a ‘wealth of hospitality and kindness’. Relieved at touching dry land again, the party settled down for two months of well-deserved rest and recuperation before heading back home to England.

Discovery
reached Spithead in the Solent on 10 September, before finally berthing at East India Docks on the Thames on 15 September 1904. They had been away for three years and one month. In their absence, the Boer War had come to an end, the Wright brothers had made man’s first powered flight and war had broken out between Russia and Japan.

T
om Crean arrived back to greenery and civilisation in September 1904 having exceeded even his wildest expectations. He had established himself as a thoroughly dependable and valuable member of the polar team, which was a notable achievement in an age when class distinction and rigid lines of demarcation above and below decks made it difficult for ordinary seamen to gain the attention of the officers.

For the first time in his life the modest Irishman would be elevated above others. Only a very small exclusive band of men had been to Antarctica by 1904 and the 27-year-old Kerryman was now among the select few. For the first time he had truly achieved something and in naval terms was a ‘cut above the rest’.

His popularity with the officers and men of the expedition was a tribute to his enthusiasm as was the speedy way in which he had so easily adapted to the hostile environment of the South. His work, especially in the man-hauling harness, had caught the eye of his team leader, Barne. Scott, too, had recognised the worth of the genial Irishman. Notably, he was also a team player, which was an important consideration in the South where men came to rely upon each other for support at critical moments.

Before his chance meeting with the
Discovery
expedition three years earlier, Crean had been going nowhere fast, drifting
aimlessly through the unappealing and unrewarding life in the British navy towards the end of the Victorian era and with no particular purpose or direction. He was just another sailor, working slowly towards his pension.

But that had all changed now and Antarctica, the most unforgiving place on earth, had given him that purpose and direction. He had made the transition from boyhood to manhood in the navy and had matured into a responsible and capable polar figure during his spell in the Antarctic. Crean, by chance, had found his true calling.

It was no surprise that Scott and Shackleton recognised his qualities and that the Irishman was one of the first people they sought when they went South again. Nor that he would go back to Antarctica again without hesitation.

Crean’s wages for well over two and half years’ hardship and privation in the South was the sum of £55 14s 11d (£55.74 or about £2,850 at today’s equivalent).
¹
But his contribution to the
Discovery
expedition was formally recognised and placed on the record by a grateful Scott. He recommended that Crean should be promoted to the rank of Petty Officer 1st Class and that the promotion – and the extra pay – be backdated to the day
Discovery
arrived home. Scott’s judgement, written in early September 1904, made impressive reading for the Irishman and provided its own testimonial. He said Crean should be:

Like all members of the expedition, Crean was also awarded the Antarctic Medal for his services in the South. He was also given the special Royal Geographical Society Medal for his part in the
Discovery
adventure and Scott’s earlier praise was echoed by Sir Clements Markham, the ‘father’ of the expedition. Writing after
Discovery
’s return to England and doubtless after consulting Scott, Markham provided his own idiosyncratic and slightly offbeat assessment which surprisingly compared the
Kerryman with one of England’s most famous heroes of an earlier age. Crean, he said, was:

However, Crean had arrived back in New Zealand to learn that his mother, Catherine, had died while he was out of contact in Antarctica. According to Markham, he was immediately offered a free discharge from the navy. But in the circumstances there was nothing Crean could do about the loss and so he elected to remain in the service. He had, after all, been away from home for more than eleven years and developed a new life entirely apart from the farming community in the Kerry hills.

However, Markham’s private comments on the death of Crean’s mother lacked understanding and portrayed the insensitive side of the old man’s nature. He wrote:

His appointment as Petty Officer 1st Class took effect on 9 September 1904 and he was soon back in the familiar naval ranks, where his exploits would have been a major topic of conversation and the subject of friendly banter among fellow seamen. However, he was a typically loquacious Irish character and would have had no difficulty holding his own against the mess-deck ribaldry.

Crean’s first appointment after
Discovery
was something of an anticlimax after the adventures in the South. He was sent to the naval base at Chatham, Kent, where for accounting purposes, he was assigned to HMS
Pembroke
on 1 October 1904. The naval routine may have been somewhat drab and unexciting after the more colourful two and a half years in Antarctica and he was doubtless keen for a return to more active duties. However, he did not have to wait very long before he was reunited with Scott, a relationship which would continue almost unbroken until the explorer’s death in 1912.

Initially, he transferred to the torpedo school of HMS
Vernon
at Portsmouth and the following February he ran into an old
Discovery
friend, Taff Evans, now PO 1st Class at the gunnery school. Doubtless they shared a drink or two and talked over old times, plus the prospects of going South again. They made a formidable pairing, both tall and broad shouldered, seasoned and respected naval men in their late twenties with the proud record of having served in the famous
Discovery
expedition.

Scott wanted Crean back under his wing. Scott, not an easy man to get close to, was evidently much impressed with the work of Crean on their first visit to Antarctica and had earmarked the Irishman as a prime candidate for his inevitable return to the South. However, for much of 1905, Scott was immersed in the arduous task of writing his book,
The Voyage of the
Discovery, which finally appeared on 12 October 1905.

Shortly before publication, he sent a copy of the book to all members of the
Discovery
crew. But inserted in Tom Crean’s copy was a personal request that Crean rejoin his former leader as coxswain as soon as Scott managed to get back to sea. Crean was delighted and eager to team up with Scott again. On 10 October, the day before he was transferred to duties at the Harwich naval base, Crean wrote back to Scott:

In September 1906, precisely two years after
Discovery
had returned to England, he was duly reunited with Scott and the prospects of returning to the South had suddenly brightened. Scott had requested that the Irishman join him on board the battleship HMS
Victorious
in the Atlantic Fleet.
⁶

Although Tom Crean was never a close friend to Scott, it is clear that the Irishman was held in particularly high regard. In-built class distinction and social barriers ensured that a personal friendship was unlikely, and they were also two entirely different characters. Scott was an introverted, moody man who did not make friends easily, whereas Crean was a large, outgoing, gregarious, self-confident character at home in the company of others.

Scott was attracted by the Irishman’s unshakeable loyalty and reliability, particularly in the forbidding Antarctic climate where these qualities were even more important. Crean, Scott felt, could be trusted and wanted him alongside for the return to the South.

Scott, a navy man through and through, saw great strengths in the ordinary seaman and regarded Crean and the two other
Discovery
veterans, Taff Evans and Bill Lashly, with particular affection. The three men represented what Scott saw as the finest qualities of the navy ranks and he came to trust and rely upon them, giving them considerable responsibilities and influence. Indeed, he saw them almost as talismanic.

After the near disaster of his ‘furthest south’ journey in 1902–3, Scott never again went on a major polar sledging journey without at least one member of the Crean–Evans– Lashly triumvirate in the harness alongside him.

By the beginning of 1907, Crean and Scott had joined HMS
Albermarle
, also in the Atlantic Fleet. Crean was coxswain and Scott flag captain of the battleship, which had a full complement of 700 men. He was already planning a second voyage to Antarctica and in the light of his work on
Discovery
, had already pencilled in the Irishman’s name as a member of the next team. There was little doubt Crean would be asked to go and little doubt that he would say yes.

Their relationship – overwhelmingly a working relationship – continued to grow and expand. Crean also followed Scott to HMS
Essex
and HMS
Bulwark
in 1908. One of the
naval surgeons on board was George Murray Levick, who would later find himself alongside Crean on Scott’s fateful last expedition to the Antarctic.

By spring 1909 Crean was back at the Chatham naval barracks, assigned to HMS
Pembroke
. This was the defining moment for Scott, when after much personal debate and deliberation, he finally decided to go South again. And, with fortunate timing, Crean was present when the historic and, for Scott, fateful, decision was taken to seek the South Pole.

The occasion was March 1909, when the news broke that Shackleton had returned from the Antarctic in
Nimrod
after smashing Scott’s ‘furthest south’ record and coming within striking distance of the Pole. Shackleton and three companions – Jameson Adams, Eric Marshall and Crean’s former
Discovery
colleague, Frank Wild – had suffered terrible hardship and overcome dreadful travelling conditions to reach 88° 23′ south. It was a tantalising 97 miles (155 km) from the Pole but it might as well have been 97,000,000 miles.

Shackleton could have made it over those remaining few miles and achieved lifelong fame by becoming the first man to reach the South Pole. But the four-man party would almost certainly have died on the appalling journey home, struck down by a combination of scurvy and starvation. Shackleton had to make the heartbreaking and very brave decision to turn his back on fame and glory and struggle back to base camp with the prize within his grasp. As it was, the four men survived by the narrowest of margins.

Shackleton was deeply disappointed and knew that, with Scott’s own plans coming to fruition, the glory of being the first to reach the South Pole would inevitably be snatched from him. But in a memorable remark to his wife, Emily, he said that ‘a live donkey is better than a dead lion’.

Scott learned about Shackleton’s achievement when he and Crean, then coxswain on HMS
Bulwark
, were travelling by train to London in spring 1909. Scott bought a newspaper at the station with news of the remarkable journey and ran
along the platform to tell Crean: ‘I think we’d better have a shot next’.
⁷
Some years later, Dr Edward Atkinson, who was to become a key figure in the subsequent expedition, would declare that this unheralded and insignificant event ‘… settled the moment of the commencement …’ of Scott’s last expedition.
⁸

Crean was barely four months away from his thirty-second birthday.

News of Shackleton’s near-miss in the South came in the same year as the Americans Robert Peary and Dr Frederick Cook had each claimed to have reached the North Pole. It helped ignite a growing international interest in conquering the South Pole, by now the last unexplored spot on the globe.

The lurid stories of Shackleton’s memorable journey and his penchant for publicity had effectively turned the South Pole challenge into a race. The Americans were rumoured to be interested in a dash to the Pole; so, too, the Germans and Japanese. But little was heard about any interest from Norway, the most seasoned and highly respected of polar travellers.

Scott took up the challenge and set about what for him was the uncomfortable task of raising funds for the British Antarctic Expedition, as it was formally called. Scott disliked the fund-raising element of his expeditions, which was a combination of begging and cajoling from governments, institutions, private companies, wealthy benefactors and public subscriptions.

Scott was no rabble-rouser and he lacked the charm and wit of Shackleton to handle an audience at fund-raising events. Shackleton, in turn, did not possess the administrative ability of Scott.