by Chris Turney
Meeting Edgeworth David was fortuitous for the Japanese. Not only did he alleviate fears in Sydney about their expedition; he also spent considerable time bringing them up to speed on Antarctica, particularly on how best to approach to the continent, the ocean depths, the currents, and its known geography and geology. Shirase and his men finally had access to one of the few experienced Antarctic scientists.
With news that at least some of the funding was secured for a second attempt, Count Okuma telegrammed Shirase in Sydney: ‘Go forth. Set sail anew. Though you perish in the attempt, do not return until you have achieved your aims.’ The official account of the expedition later stated, ‘How did the twenty-seven gallant men of the expedition feel when they received the Count’s instructions? There is no need to ask!’ Indeed.
On 10 November 1911 the Royal Society of New South Wales gave a farewell dinner in Sydney for the Australasian expedition to Antarctica, led by Douglas Mawson. Attending were representatives of the Japanese expedition, for which a toast was proposed by the University of Sydney’s registrar. Japan’s Vice-Consul Miho responded that ‘they had all one common object in their search after scientific truth—the advancement of humanity.’
By the time Shirase and his men left Australia they were considerably better placed to make a scientific contribution to the exploration of Antarctica. In a letter later published in Sydney’s Daily Telegraph, Shirase and several key team members wrote to Scott, informing the British leader of the Japanese expedition’s intentions. They also wrote to Edgeworth David, thanking him for his endeavours:
Dear Sir,
As you are aware, we are leaving Sydney to-morrow on our journey to Antarctica; but we cannot go without expressing our heartfelt thanks to you for your many kindnesses and courtesies to us during our enforced stay in this port.
When we first arrived at Sydney we were in a state of considerable disappointment, in consequence of the partial and temporary failure of our endeavour. To add to this we found ourselves, and in some quarters, subjected to a degree of suspicion as to our bona-fides, which was as unexpected as it was unworthy.
At this juncture you, dear sir, came forward, and after satisfying yourself by independent enquiry and investigation of the true nature of our enterprise—which no one in the world at the present day is better able to do—you were good enough to set the seal of your magnificent reputation upon our bona-fides, and to treat us as brothers in the realm of science.
That we did not accept all of your kind offers to bring us into public notice was not from any lack of appreciation of the honour you desired to do us. But we felt there was a danger that your generosity and magnanimity might unwillingly place us in a position to which we could only regard ourselves as entitled when our efforts should have been crowned with success.
Whatever may be the fate of our enterprise, we shall never forget you.
We are, Dear Sir, Yours most sincerely
Signed
Nobu Shirase Commander
Nackichi Nomura Captain of the ‘Kainan-Maru’
Terutaro Takeda Scientist
Masakichi Ikeda Scientist
Seizo Miisho Physician
On 19 November, their last day in Sydney, Shirase’s men bestowed a tremendous honour upon Edgeworth David. For the only known time, a samurai sword was willingly given to a non-national. Its blade measuring only a few millimetres in thickness, the weapon had been forged by the master swordsmith Mutsu no Kami Kaneyasu in what is now Osaka, sometime between 1644 and 1648. It is now held in the Sydney Museum, and is a beautiful thing to behold.
The sword had been presented to Shirase by his sponsor in 1910 as he embarked for Antarctica, with a dedication: ‘In admiration of the expedition’s courage.’ It had seen innumerable battles—but after his first experience in the South Ocean, and the media frenzy in New Zealand and Australia, Shirase felt a huge debt to David. The Australian professor was touched.
The gift-giving over, the Kainan-maru departed Sydney Harbour for its second attempt to reach Antarctica. This time the Japanese were better prepared—they had provisions for twenty-seven men and thirty sledge dogs—and heading south at a far more sensible time of year.
Hopes were high among the members of the Japanese team. Although they were a year too late to make a bid for the South Geographic Pole, they could still carry out valuable scientific work. And at least this time they were arriving at the start of the season. Instead of the Southern Ocean threatening to trap the Kainan-maru, as it had at the end of the previous summer, ‘the floes that now assailed us were all half melted and extremely varied in shape,’according to the expedition report. Working through the pack ice, however, was still fraught with danger: ‘The noise the ice floes made as they banged into the ship would be followed by an interminable grating as they scraped their way along the hull followed by yet another bang. Lying in one’s bunk listening to these noises was like being shut in a barrel while somebody on the outside attacked it with a stick. With every bang the ship shuddered and seemed to jump astern, and rolled in a most unsettling way.’
Working through the pack, they frequently met enormous icebergs: ‘With a ferocious tiger at the front door and a vicious wolf at the back, one peril was followed by another in quick succession.’ The pressure was sometimes too much for those on board. Most arguments would blow over, but others were terminal. Shirase fell out badly with Keiichi Tada, the secretary to the expedition, who had argued with the captain and many of the ship’s officers during both voyages. Shirase finally had enough: he relieved the secretary of his duties and took him off the expedition roster.
In just a few days they were through the sea ice and into the open water of the Ross Sea. The Kainan-maru made good progress and, by 3 January, the Admiralty Mountains of South Victoria Land were sighted. Antarctica was in reach. What would the Japanese do now? They did not have sufficient supplies to reach the South Geographic Pole, but they could explore as far and as widely as possible. In addition to measuring the weather and ocean conditions, Shirase decided to focus part of his expedition’s efforts on King Edward VII Land. Scott was known to be working in Victoria Land and some research had already been undertaken there by earlier expeditions. Unaware of the Norwegian disagreements during the aborted attempt on the South Geographic Pole, Shirase felt King Edward VII Land would offer the best return.
Here was a part of Antarctica that Scott and Shackleton had only seen from afar. Neither had managed to land a ship there, and it was uncertain how the region related to the rest of the continent. One possibility was the popular theory that the Great Ice Barrier might be one end of a vast ice-filled strait, stretching across to the Weddell Sea, splitting Antarctica in two. If Shirase could explore this area, and define its boundaries and geology, the Japanese would provide important insights. Quite possibly David had encouraged the Japanese to consider this option, given their limited resources and time. The ship set sail east for King Edward VII Land.
The official expedition report does not quite have the eloquence of Shackleton’s or Scott’s writings, but the descriptions are often effective as well as lyrical: as they approached the coastline on 10 January, for instance, the Japanese had seen a glowing ‘dim white of light, reflected from the ice’ and then, shortly afterwards, a cry went up of ‘Barrier ahoy’ and they saw it like the ‘sinuous length of the Great Wall of China, stretching in an unbroken line from the virgin snows of morning to the moon-white light of evening before our very eyes’.
But the conditions suddenly changed. Temperatures dropped—so much so that the ink on the nibs of their pens froze. The Kainan-maru was attacked by a school of twenty killer whales, perhaps believing it to be prey. The two Ainu dog drivers declared the whales messengers of the gods, and were soon lost in fervent prayers during the attack. Thankfully it ended quickly, with the whales withdrawing.
The official expedition narrative indicates a predilection for fighting with the local wildlife. Whether the Japanese had read Hints for
Travellers is unknown, but they seem to have taken to heart its list of equipment for collecting biological samples. Almost all interactions with the fauna involved a gun or a stick, and were undertaken with almost militaristic zeal.
In the sea, on the ice and in the air, nothing was safe. Albatrosses were regularly caught; one was ‘killed by having its head pushed into a barrel of water, sentenced to death by drowning’. They shot at seals on nearby floes, and the expedition report recounts the story of a young crew member diving half-naked into the sea to fight a wounded seal in the freezing water. The man was rewarded for his efforts with a tin of fruit.
It was the penguins, though, that captured the expedition’s imagination. Shirase and his men saw many Adelie penguins and decided to take some home for scientific research. The process of capturing these unfortunate creatures was recounted as a tongue-in-cheek military engagement. Going ‘penguin hunting’, four of the men disembarked from the Kainan-maru and, ‘armed with just one gun between them, they set off gallantly, rowing towards the crystal island’ where the birds stood. The men disappeared behind a mound on the surface of the floe, ‘a battle plan cleverly devised to prevent the enemy from detecting their approach’.
After capturing a couple of the birds, they found two remaining penguins were not so easy to grasp and a couple of men were required for the task. The expedition report remarked, ‘This made it an excellent match…It was a fight well worth watching, with both men and birds falling over and scrambling to their feet again and again. Though it is hard to give a proper account of this action, the best word is probably comical and we in the audience all fell about the deck laughing.’ They later captured another four penguins, described as ‘a formidable enemy’, and built an enclosure for these ‘important guests’ outside the research cabin.
On 15 January, after the expedition found a cove in the barrier at 78°17’S and 161°50’W that they called Kainan Bay, four men were sent ashore to explore. The area was far too heavily crevassed to become their base. Deciding to move on, they sailed westward until a ship unexpectedly hove into sight some forty kilometres ahead. A cry of ‘pirates’ went up. Chaos ensued as the crew tried to get a clear view of the vessel. Shirase prepared his men for action, but they soon made out the Norwegian flag and realised it was the Fram, waiting patiently in the Bay of Whales for Amundsen’s return later that month.
The Kainan-maru sailed past and anchored just a couple of kilometres from the Norwegian ship. It was an ideal location: the bay was close to the barrier edge, and brimming with penguins and seals, which would provide a welcome extra supply of food to supplement their provisions. No one was more surprised than the Norwegians that two expeditions should meet like this at the bottom of the world—they had last heard the Japanese were in Sydney. Amundsen’s team could understand little of Shirase’s plans, and only managed to solicit enthusiastic statements such as ‘nice day’ and ‘plenty ice’ from his men.
Unlike the Norwegians, the Japanese had no intention of staying over the winter. They were at the Bay of Whales to get as much work done as possible in two weeks and return home. On the ice the crew went ‘hunting penguins, seals and suchlike to dissipate the weariness of the long journey, like little birds let out of their cage’. The Norwegians were horrified.
Stores were unloaded, and equipment moved off the sea ice and onto the barrier. Cutting a route up through the ice, Shirase took six men with him to establish a base camp. Capturing moments like this, the official expedition report has a fine sense of the poetic, describing the snow and ice layers that made up the barrier as being like ‘Mother Nature herself had painted this mural, this infinite masterpiece, which had been conjured into existence by heavenly beings with celestial pigments of unearthly hues’.
After a few days the Main Landing Party had broken a route up on to the barrier and transported the supplies there. The official report later called this ‘indescribably difficult and fraught with danger…without doubt the worst of all the trials and tribulations we had experienced since we left our mother’s womb’. The Kainan-maru left the seven-man party with an agreement to return in a couple of weeks, during which time the vessel would explore the coastal side of King Edward VII Land and attempt a landing.
Heading south on 20 January, Shirase led four men on sledges pulled by dogs for a dash into the interior. Never realistically intending to reach the South Geographic Pole, Shirase instead aimed for the Dash Patrol to explore as far south as possible, in an area to which no one had been. So, rather than head directly south as Amundsen had, the group went southeast. The two other men remained to continue making weather observations at the base camp.
The Japanese were entirely dependent on the dogs and sledges. They had no knowledge of skis and were amazed when they later saw Amundsen’s team using ‘special Norwegian snow shoes made from long, narrow boards of wood’. Instead, wearing felt-lined boots, the five men forged on through strong winds, snowstorms and temperatures as low as -25°C, covering the ground as best they could. And yet, despite their inexperience and the frequent need to halt—staying in dog-fur-lined sleeping bags inside their tents—the Japanese made good time. As they went they made observations of the weather and ice.
Condensation in the Japanese snow goggles was a common complaint. Even today this is an occupational hazard in Antarctica: perspiration regularly leads to glasses fogging up and dimming. There is nothing for it but to take them off and wipe them with a cloth. The relief at being able to see clearly makes it tempting to leave the glasses off, even knowing the risk of snow blindness. For those teams on the ice for weeks on end, even the most disciplined eventually succumbed. Snow blindness was a common and painful experience for all of the expeditions of 1912.
By 28 January the Dash Patrol had reached as far as it could safely manage. Shirase was nervous about missing the Kainanmaru and getting trapped in Antarctica for the winter. The Japanese had covered 237 kilometres after travelling for just eight days—remarkable, compared to the distances achieved by earlier expeditions. Scott’s attempt on the South Geographic Pole, during the Discovery expedition, covered four hundred kilometres but in fifty-eight days. The Japanese put much of their success down to the dogs.
Reaching 80°5’S and 156°37’W, they buried a cache: a copper casket containing a list of those who had supported the expedition. A bamboo pole with the Japanese flag was planted in the ice and, after three banzai—an exclamation meaning ‘ten thousand years of life’, and used as a salute to the emperor—Shirase claimed the area for Japan and declared it Yamato Yukihara, or the Japan Snow Plain. After taking a few photographs, the men quickly packed up their gear and headed north, back to the Bay of Whales and, they hoped, the waiting Kainan-maru.
After dropping off the Main Landing Party the Kainan-maru left the Bay of Whales on 19 January and headed towards King Edward VII Land, sailing as far east as 155°W—a record unsurpassed until 1934. The Japanese later considered this part of the expedition to be ‘far more fortunate and successful’. They became the first people to land on the coast of King Edward VII Land, finding a bay further east than either Scott or Shackleton had reached—which in turn allowed them to be the first to explore the interior from the seaward side.
Scaling the ice barrier, two members of the expedition managed to reach the Alexandra Mountains, first described by Scott. Looking beyond they saw a new mountain range branching off south-southeast. It was not necessarily Carmen Land, but it was yet more proof that King Edward VII Land formed the eastern limit of the Great Ice Barrier. They left a memorial post with a list of those on this part of the expedition, announcing their visit, and the Kainan-maru headed back west to the Bay of Whales.
In a bid to help finance the expedition Shirase had sold film rights to M. Pathe, which sent a junior technician from its Tokyo office for the second voyage. Cameraman Taizumi Yasunao was only twenty-three when he joined the expedition in Sydney, and was not keen on the trip to Antarctica. But he was at least partly placated
by a twentyfold increase in his monthly salary and ¥5000 in life insurance.
Taizumi may not have had quite the same eye as some of the better-known Antarctic photographers of the time, but he managed to capture the essence of the expedition. Unfortunately, a large amount of the footage was lost on the return journey due to poor conditions; but there was enough to make a unique film of almost an hour’s length that was a huge success when shown back in Japan. The silent black-and-white flickering images are an eerie but enchanting record of this unusual expedition and its work in Antarctica.
In the M. Pathe film is one of the funniest—and also more alarming—pieces of Antarctic footage, an ‘experiment’ that went largely unreported at the time. The film was not distributed overseas, and before the recent publication of the complete English translation of the report on Shirase’s expedition, most of the Japanese team’s activity was related to outsiders through a brief summary translated by an enthusiastic Norwegian whaler, Ivar Hamre, which was published in 1933. In this article Hamre reports that, after the Kainan-maru reached King Edward VII Land, the expedition members encountered ‘a flock of Emperor Penguins showing no signs of fear. One of the men presumed to “shake hands” with one of these beings so human in their behaviour. But his patting seems to have been taken up in a way quite their own, for the result was a round of beak-strokes from one individual to another until it came back to the starting-point and the circuit was closed.’
The new translation is quite different. After finding more than half a dozen emperor penguins, ‘One of the expedition members punched a penguin to see what would happen. The stupid creature did not seem to grasp the fact that it was one of the men who had punched it, and assuming that it had been pecked by the penguin standing next to it, it pecked its neighbour back with its long thin beak. That penguin in turn pecked the next penguin, and so on until finally all six penguins had been pecked.’ Later attempts to do the same thing were recorded in Taizumi’s film, with Japanese team members herding groups of penguins, and apparently punching and kicking them as they try to get away. No doubt, when shown to the public, it must have caused much amusement.