The Last Viking

by Stephen Bown

  When they were not on depot journeys, the men hunted on the ice. They processed hundreds of seals and penguins, storing them up as food both for the dogs and for themselves in the long, dark winter to come. In a few months, they stocked an incredible 55,000 kilograms of meat. Nearly a tonne of seal meat for the dogs had been hauled toward the South Pole and placed in the depots.

  The Norwegians felt confident: with a trail marked to within 800 kilometres of the South Pole and vast quantities of provisions securely stashed along their route, they could settle into their snug quarters at Framheim and wait out the punishing Antarctic winter.

  A Featureless Expanse of Snow

  Victory awaits him who has everything in order—luck, we call it. Defeat is definitely due for him who has neglected to take the necessary precautions—bad luck, we call it.

  “THE SUN LEFT us today,” Amundsen wrote, “and we did not see it again for four months . . . and then began the longest night ever experienced by men in the Antarctic.” By late April, winter had closed around Framheim and the explorers hunkered down for the long wait. The snow quickly piled up, covering most of the house, so that only the tip of the roof was visible. The men dug snow tunnels between the handful of destinations that formed their dark, submerged community: the storage rooms, the forge, the sewing room, the packing room, the general workshops and the dog pits. The rooms had been all dug out of the accumulated snow. “Thus we got large and spacious rooms without buying or fetching materials,” Amundsen noted with evident pleasure. Photos of Framheim before and after the April snows show the huge difference. Once the tunnels were dug, the men and dogs seldom had to venture outside. Although the mean temperature was –14°F (–26°C), on many occasions it dropped to –58°F (–50°C) and as low as –74°F (–59°C) on the coldest day, August 13.

  Amundsen and his men spent this time perfecting their equipment, packing and repacking the sledges, measuring and testing them for maximum weight and ease of loading. Photos from that winter variously show the men sitting down to eat at the table, Lindstrøm preparing his latest culinary treat, the crew experimenting with their custom-designed goggles and in their rooms packing, sewing, working on skis and tweaking bindings, rigging up a steam bath, venturing out for meteorological observations and tending to the dogs. Kristian Prestrud, the only of the Fram’s officers to join the Polar Party, gave refresher courses on navigation and English. “Everyone had his hands full all the time; our house was warm and dry, light and airy, consequently the health of everybody was excellent. We had no physician, and we didn’t need one.”

  Following Amundsen’s lead, there were no social distinctions between the men, everyone contributing equally to the common goal and participating in discussions of importance. There was no head of the table, nor overt superiority or bossing. The daily routine involved waking at 7:30 a.m., when Lindstrøm laid out the table for the first of the day’s communal meals. “Nothing wakes one up so well as the noise of knives, plates and forks,” Amundsen wrote in his diary. The favourite was breakfast “hot cakes,” freshly baked with yeast to get vitamin B in the men’s diet, and smothered in preserved berries. Helmer Hanssen recalled that “to the end of my days I shall see before me Lindstrøm standing at the end of the table, comfortable and round, while four of us at each side of the table sat expectant like hungry young birds in a nest.”

  Lindstrøm also served seal meat undercooked to preserve its vitamin C content, to prevent scurvy. Because the daily rations for the sledging journeys consisted only of pemmican, biscuits, chocolate and powdered milk—high in calories but lacking in many nutrients and vitamins—Amundsen and Lindstrøm planned meals carefully to ensure adequate amounts of vitamins B and C throughout the winter. If the men subsisted on a diet lacking these nutrients, they would never be in the physical condition necessary to survive a race to the South Pole in the spring.

  After breakfast, the men departed for their separate work stations until the next meal, at noon, and then worked again in their separate rooms until 5:15 p.m., when they cleaned up for dinner. Because they worked alone for most of the day, the men had something to talk about at the communal meals. The routine was part of Amundsen’s strategy to keep everyone busy, with a sense of purpose, to prevent melancholic brooding and quarrelling and to make all the men feel important and vital to the expedition’s success. He wanted them to feel that they were their own overseers, the masters of their respective tasks. He also instigated a contest to guess the temperature each day, offering a prize each month. It got the men out in the morning to start the day and sharpened their ability to detect changes in the weather. They also had dart competitions, storytelling and a weekly sauna night. Liquor was served at intervals, as a celebration—something to look forward to on birthdays, holidays and Saturdays.

  There really was a lot of work to do, besides shovelling out the snow tunnels and snow rooms and repairing clothing and equipment. The men enlarged the ski boots to accommodate many layers of socks and further planed the wood to reduce the weight of the sledges. There were two models of sledges, one for speed over level ground, and the other, slightly heavier, for more rugged terrain. Bjaaland eventually shaved an incredible 50 pounds from the heavier 150-pound sledges and up to half the total weight off of the lighter ones. And they practised igloo building, according to the style Amundsen learned from the Inuit. Make, test, remake, repeat, until the design was perfect. Even a barely noticeable flaw or something that caused minor irritation on a short excursion of a day or two was unacceptable because these minor issues would become magnified into serious, perhaps life threatening, problems over the course of a month or more of hard travel on difficult terrain. As he expressed it later in life: “Victory awaits him who has everything in order—luck, we call it. Defeat is definitely due for him who has neglected to take the necessary precautions—bad luck, we call it.”

  The most peculiar aspect of Framheim was, oddly, the latrine. Like most of the other buildings, it too was dug in the snow, but with a special corridor to the dog tents, so that the dogs could go for a short walk and scavenge for excrement. Amundsen, following his generally curious and accepting approach to life, an approach augmented by his time in the Arctic with the Inuit, didn’t feel the need to bend the natural environment to his will or to uphold preconceived notions of propriety. With respect to the dogs, he shrugged and accepted the fact that they were different from humans, letting them do what he had seen them do in the past, even if others regarded it as disgusting. This roll-with-the-punches approach made him flexible in dealing with the challenges of an unforgiving and rigid environment. It was the same lesson he had been taught by his father when he was a boy: don’t fight unless you have to; and when you do have to, approach your battles wisely so that the outcome is not in question.

  Most of his men were better than Amundsen at something, particularly skiing, dog running and dog tending. But he didn’t mind. The prime skill he had was his ability to recognize the strengths and weaknesses of others. This was furthered by an instinctive understanding of how to motivate people and keep them content and optimistic, an innate appreciation of their psychology and interpersonal relations, and the knowledge of how to keep things running smoothly and reduce grumbling and discontent.

  Amundsen also took responsibility for tough decisions. The only interpersonal issues that could have endangered the expedition arose between Amundsen and Hjalmar Johansen, the one person on the crew he had taken on against his instincts, as a favour to Nansen. Amundsen notes that Johansen frequently challenged his leadership, boldly questioning him in front of the other men, with the implication that Johansen was a better polar explorer than Amundsen. Amundsen could sense in him an underlying resentment and a sense of repressed superiority. Johansen was already a source of mild muttering and complaining. He was inclined to quarrel with some of the other men as well. He did have skill, or Amundsen would never have taken him on: he had been with Nansen on the famous polar drift, struggling across jagged ice on
skis in their ultimately failed attempt to reach the North Pole. But Johansen had not weathered well the return to regular life after this monumental journey. Once the expedition’s fame had subsided, he slipped into erratic employment and bouts of heavy drinking. He was an alcoholic and struggled with the restricted access to alcohol at Framheim. If there was to be a nucleus of discontent when things became tense, Amundsen knew it would likely start with Johansen challenging his decisions.

  The sun returned in August, but the weather remained turbulent, with wildly fluctuating temperatures throughout the month. “The days went by and the temperature would give no sign of spring; now and again it would make a jump of about thirty degrees, but only to sink just as rapidly back to –58°F. It is not at all pleasant to hang about waiting like this; I always have the idea that I am the only one who is left behind.” The conversations at the dinner table kept turning over the same theme: Scott and the British expedition, and the weather conditions at the other end of the ice wall. “The uncertainty was worrying many of us—and personally, I felt it a great deal.”

  The original date scheduled for a departure to the South Pole was November 1, but Amundsen was growing nervous. He put to his men two earlier dates for departing, but he was voted down both times by secret ballot. Amundsen was not a military officer who could command blind obedience from his men—he didn’t want that role, and the men weren’t raised or trained to feel at ease with it either. If he wanted an earlier date, he would have to persuade them when the time was right. The men didn’t want to get caught in winter weather no matter how well prepared they were, though fear of the English expedition preyed on their minds. But Amundsen persevered and when there was a brief respite from the winds and cold, he finally persuaded the men to an early start on September 8. At this time of year, the weak rays of the sun only lingered on the horizon, providing little light and no warmth. The men loaded the sledges in the under-snow caverns, and then hoisted them to the wind-lashed ice surface by block and tackle. Comically huge quantities of boxes, bales and other equipment were strapped onto them. After fitting a little wheel on the rear of one of the sleds to measure distance, the eight men set off, leaving only Lindstrøm behind at the base.

  For the first couple of days the travel was “glorious,” but on the third day the weather turned while they were on their way to the first depot. The temperature dropped to a bitter –70°F (–56°C), and the men spent a near-sleepless night trying to stay warm. The dogs were miserable, whimpering and shivering. “They rolled up as tightly as possible, with their noses under their tails, and from time to time one could see a shiver run through their bodies.” Amundsen decided to press on, but only as far as the first depot. The next night the men built an igloo, as the weather remained deadly cold. “God help me it was just shit and best forgotten,” Bjaaland wrote in his diary. Amundsen mused philosophically about their predicament, as he often did: “To risk men and animals out of sheer obstinacy and continue, just because we have started on our way—that would never occur to me. If we are to win this game, the pieces must be moved carefully—one false move, and everything can be lost.” They dumped their load at the first depot, at 80 degrees, and turned back for Framheim. “It is grim to get going in such weather—but it has to be done,” wrote Amundsen; “God help me miserably cold,” wrote Bjaaland.

  On the return journey the going was slow in the face of raging winds and punishing temperatures. Several of the dogs froze to death, while others were “in agony with frostbitten paws.” Men got frostbitten heels while they slept. The final day of travel to Framheim was a miserable and dangerous dash. Amundsen, Hanssen and Oscar Wisting pulled ahead with their dogs, frantic to return to shelter. But the other men had a much more difficult time, nearly getting lost, and were unable to move fast with their frostbitten feet. Somehow, due to poor planning, no one in the slower contingent had packed a tent or a stove. The final two, Johansen and Prestrud, couldn’t ski properly and did not reach the base until after midnight, nearly collapsing from exhaustion. This trial run was the tipping point that exposed the festering personality clash between Amundsen and Johansen.

  Around the breakfast table the next morning, Johansen unleashed a wild burst of anger at Amundsen, uttering “scarcely flattering opinions of me [Amundsen] in my capacity as leader of the proceeding here.” Amundsen noted in his diary that the worst thing about Johansen’s outburst was not that he was angry, but that he had spoken in front of the entire crew. Amundsen knew that to avoid risking his authority to lead the assault on the pole, “the bull must be taken by the horns; I must make an example immediately.” Amundsen first tried to explain and justify rushing ahead with Hanssen and Wisting by claiming that Hanssen and Wisting were also complaining of frostbite and that he didn’t know about Prestrud’s frostbite. Amundsen had no way of knowing that Johansen and Prestrud were so far behind, or that they hadn’t packed a tent. He kept expecting them to arrive at any moment throughout the night, knowing it was pointless to go out into the blizzard to locate them. In fact, the distance between the men should never have grown so great. But while the men were mollified by his explanation at what had obviously been a rare lapse in judgment (in allowing the men to lose contact with each other on the wind-lashed plain), Amundsen knew that he needed to do more or risk losing the group’s trust and focus, perhaps even leading to a mutiny.

  Amundsen was so put out by Johansen’s challenge to his authority that he refused to speak directly to Johansen, apart from making simple requests like passing the salt. At lunch he announced that Johansen, Prestrud and the carpenter Jørgen Stubberud would not be going to the South Pole. They would instead explore the nearby King Edward VII Land. Bjaaland summarized Amundsen’s reasons in his diary: “Johansen could intrigue with the others during the journey and everything would grind to a halt.” Johansen protested the decision until he received written orders from Amundsen, who was still his employer, and he was further humiliated by having the inexperienced Prestrud placed in command, even though Prestrud was a naval officer with navigation and chart-making experience. Although Prestrud realized that he wasn’t in any condition to go the full distance to the pole, the “splendid unity” was over: only five men would be making the final dash to the South Pole.

  Amundsen knew it was safer to wait for milder weather to head for the South Pole, but he was in a race with Scott. No one at Framheim knew the conditions at McMurdo Sound, and they all—especially Amundsen—feared losing everything they had striven for. “It seems that many have criticized our early departure,” he wrote. “Well, it is easy to do so afterwards. Looking back, when I headed South as early as the beginning of September, the reason was that I assumed that we might possibly find more reasonable temperatures further in the Barrier than here. . . . To sit without doing anything would never occur to me, criticize me who will. With the exception of the three frostbitten heels, and some dogs, our little journey has not caused us any loss. It was a good trial run.” Hanssen corroborated this feeling when he wrote that the reasons for attempting an early departure were strong: “our goal, and our only goal, was to reach the South Pole. If we did not manage that our whole expedition and much more than that was completely wasted.”

  Several writers have implied that Amundsen contrived the entire scenario to weed out the men that he judged were unable to meet the challenge of the South Pole. Men seldom recognize their own weaknesses, and it certainly would have been an admission of weakness to voluntarily remove oneself from the Polar Party. But although Amundsen was a schemer, this goes too far. He may have suspected that Johansen was too unstable to let him make the group decisions, and he may have known that Prestrud was not hardy enough, but it doesn’t seem credible that Amundsen manipulated events to achieve this objective. It left Johansen an outcast; he had already quarrelled with some of the other men, and now he no longer enjoyed any respect as second-in-command, despite his considerable knowledge. The camaraderie of the group as they worked toward their single goal wa
s shattered. Yet Johansen knew that this was his fault, a result of being unable to contain his public outburst. As Bjaaland commented in his diary, Johansen’s were “words that would have been best left unsaid,” and Johansen regretted them as soon as his temper subsided.

  Amundsen glosses over these events in his published version of the epic race, with its jocular, smooth and entertaining style. “We sat in the tent cooking and chatting,” he wrote, and “Hanssen exclaimed ‘Why, I believe my heel’s gone!’ Off came his stockings, and there was a big, dead heel, like a lump of tallow. It did not look well. He rubbed it until he thought he ‘could feel something again,’ and then put his feet back in his stockings and got into his bag.” Clearly, though he could write with self-deprecating humour and a ready acknowledgement of the skills and abilities of his comrades, he was also disingenuous in describing what was real desperation during the return trip and the heated words it provoked. He wrote: “Heaven knows what they had been doing along the way!” The passage’s jaunty tone conceals the dark underbelly of the events and of Amundsen’s personality. Amundsen was capable of holding a grudge, and never forgot or forgave a challenge to his leadership while on an expedition—the time for challenge was before, not during, the event. Every man had the option of not coming along, he reasoned, and disunity could lead to the splintering of the group and ultimately failure or death.