A First Rate Tragedy

by Diana Preston

  Evans was the heaviest and should, in theory, have had larger rations than the others. As Cherry-Garrard observed, larger machines need more fuel to drive them. Dr Mike Stroud, who manhauled to the Pole himself a few years ago, calculated that Evans would have lost more weight than anyone else, perhaps over 15 kilos, by the time he reached the Pole, equivalent to about one fifth of his body weight.4 As he was ‘in hard condition’, the loss would have been mainly to his muscles, with consequent effects on his pulling power. A concerned Scott noted that he seemed very run down, with badly blistered fingers and frostbites. He also noticed something more disturbing – Evans seemed ‘very much annoyed with himself’. The usually ebullient and self-reliant Welshman was losing confidence. Unused to physical weakness and afraid of letting his companions down he was becoming depressed and withdrawn. This hesitant, fretful Evans was a far cry from the man who had tumbled down a crevasse with Scott on the Discovery expedition and made calm conversation as he dangled over a chilly abyss.

  Scott made an anxious survey of the rest of the team. He concluded that he himself, Wilson and Bowers were as fit as possible under the circumstances, though Wilson was suffering the torments of snowblindness as a result of trying to sketch and was using cocaine ointment as a painkiller. By 24 January Scott was referring to Wilson and Bowers as ‘my standby’, adding, ‘I don’t like the easy way in which Oates and Evans get frostbitten.’ In fact, one of Oates’s big toes had turned black and he was secretly worrying whether it would hinder him from marching. Scott was also increasingly concerned about the blizzards and gales they were encountering: ‘Is the weather breaking up? If so, God help us, with the tremendous summit journey and scant food.’ Their late start for the Pole, the result of the decision to use ponies, had inevitably left them on the plateau late in the season and vulnerable to the falling temperatures. The thin air of the plateau did not help. Amundsen’s men, better fed and less stressed, had found the conditions difficult enough. Amundsen described how: ‘The asthmatic condition in which we found ourselves during our six weeks’ stay on the plateau was anything but pleasant.’5 For Scott and his exhausted team it was very debilitating. It would not have comforted Scott to know that on 26 January his rival reached Framheim after a journey that had taken only ninety-nine days and with men and dogs in rude good health. Amundsen and his companions crept into the hut at Framheim at four in the morning and took delight in waking the sleeping inmates with a casual request for coffee.

  They marched on – Oates with his bad foot, Evans with badly frostbitten nose and fingers, Wilson with his snowblindness and all of them increasingly hungry. Lack of vitamins and malnutrition were affecting their mental as well as their physical wellbeing. Scott was observing how thin everyone looked, particularly Evans. The conversation turned more and more to food – Bowers had begun fantasizing about the pig he would make of himself at journey’s end, but with some 700 miles to go he knew such dreams were premature. His more immediate problem was that ‘I am in tribulation as regards meals now as we have run out of salt, one of my favourite commodities.’

  30 January was a bad day. Wilson strained a tendon in his leg, Oates had revealed that his big toe was turning blue-black, while Evans was beginning to lose his fingernails. Scott observed that ‘his hands are really bad, and to my surprise he shows signs of losing heart over it’. Poor Evans’s transformation had continued and he had become a different person, taciturn, introverted, concentrating on keeping going. There were none of his colourful anecdotes or wild curses about the seven blind witches of Egypt to cheer his companions. Ironically, it was on this bad day for Scott that a triumphant Amundsen set sail on the Fram to take his momentous news to the outside world.

  Wilson’s leg began to recover, much to Scott’s relief. As he noted, ‘it is trying to have an injured limb in the party’. However, Evans continued to decline – ‘Evans’s fingers now very bad, two nails coming off, blisters burst.’ Yet this was the time when Evans most needed strength and endurance. They were approaching the crazy terrain of crevasses and ice-falls heralding the gateway to the Beardmore Glacier. As they attempted to negotiate their way down a steep and slippery slope Scott lost his footing and landed on the point of his shoulder. That meant that there were now ‘three out of five injured’ as Scott ruefully recorded. Interestingly he did not consider Oates to be one of the sick, but the reality was that only Bowers was in reasonable shape, cheered no doubt by the retrieval of his skis on 31 January. Oates had also found the pipe he had dropped on the outward journey, which must have comforted him. The party struggled on but had difficulty in picking up their track, adding to their anxiety. Bowers ceased to keep a diary around this time, making his final entry on ‘Feb 3rd (I suppose)’. On 4 February Evans and Scott both fell into a crevasse and had to be hauled out. Scott now wrote: ‘The party is not improving in condition, especially Evans, who is becoming rather dull and incapable.’ Also at this time Wilson observed that Oates’s other toes were blackening and that his ‘nose and cheeks are dead yellow’.

  In this ominous situation Scott relied increasingly on Bowers, who seemed immune from the mishaps: ‘Bowers is splendid, full of energy and bustle all the time.’ Scott needed Bowers’s resilience to buoy his own flagging spirits as they looked for their way down the glacier. Their situation was becoming critical. The next days saw them weaving through a perilous maze of crevasses as they tried to find their way to the Upper Glacier Depot and the badly needed supplies of food stored there. The depot would also point the way down the Beardmore and it was important they descended quickly. Evans was in a very bad way: ‘Evans is the chief anxiety now; his cuts and wounds suppurate, his nose looks very bad, and altogether he shows considerable signs of being played out.’ Scott clung to the hope that his condition might improve as they descended the glacier and the temperature rose.

  However, the next day there was momentary panic with the discovery that a whole day’s biscuit ration was missing. Bowers, who prided himself on his efficiency in looking after their stores, was shaken. However, by early evening they at last reached the Upper Glacier Depot. Their plateau ordeal was over and they could reprovision. They reflected that they had taken twenty-seven days to reach the Pole from this point and twenty-one days to return. Scott wrote: ‘we have come through our 7 weeks’ ice camp journey and most of us are fit, but I think another week might have had a very bad effect on P.O. Evans, who is going steadily downhill.’

  It seems strange to read in Scott’s diary that the party spent a large part of the next day ‘geologising’. They veered off towards Mount Darwin and Bowers was sent ahead on skis to collect specimens. The task would normally have fallen to Wilson, but he was still suffering from his strained tendon. Later on they steered for the moraine under Mount Buckley which Scott found so interesting he decided to make camp there. Scott described a pleasant few hours of pottering:

  We found ourselves under perpendicular cliffs of Beacon sandstone, weathering rapidly and carrying veritable coal seams. From the last Wilson, with his sharp eyes, has picked several plant impressions of thick stems, showing cellular structure. In one place we saw the cast of small waves on the sand. To-night Bill has got a specimen of limestone with archeo-cyathus . . . Altogether we have had a most interesting afternoon . . .

  Wilson even managed to do some pencil sketches of Mount Buckley.

  No doubt the break from manhauling and the relief of being in a sheltered spot out of the harsh summit winds had their effect on hungry and weary men. More important to their morale, however, was the fact that they were doing what they had come for – scientific research. They could regain some pride after the ignominy of their arrival at the Pole, reminding themselves of the differences between their carefully planned programme of scientific work and Amundsen’s opportunistic Viking raid. Indeed on his return journey to Framheim, Amundsen made a conscious decision not to let anything deflect him from making a dash straight back to Framheim, not even the prospect of discovering some
new geographical features. Whether Scott’s geologizing was a magnificent example of dedication or a foolish diversion depends on your point of view. It added some 35 pounds to a sledge already piled with five kitbags, a cooker, an instrument box, biscuit boxes, a paraffin tank and a tent. On the other hand these rocks were to prove for the first time that Antarctica had once been covered in vegetation and had formed part of a great semi-tropical southern continent – the so-called ‘Gondwanaland’ – once believed to be only a myth. As scientists of the British Antarctic Survey have acknowledged:

  The plant fossils collected . . . from the Beardmore Glacier and found with their bodies, were of particular significance. Although the expedition failed to reach the Pole first, its scientific achievements were more than sufficient to justify it. Amundsen won the race but his efforts provided virtually nothing in terms of scientific information.6

  They geologized again the next day during their march, enjoying the milder temperatures now they had left the dreadful Polar plateau. Scott sounds more relaxed and confident: ‘It is remarkable to be able to stand outside the tent and sun oneself. Our food satisfies now, but we must march to keep in the full ration, and we want rest, yet we shall pull through all right, D.V. We are by no means worn out.’ There are no references here to the state of Evans or of Oates, suggesting that they too were benefiting from the change in conditions. Alternatively, Scott may have been trying to convince himself that everything would indeed turn out all right. We can never know.

  However, on 11 February everything went wrong again. The surface was wretched and their journey rapidly became a nightmare as they got lost in a maze of pressure ridges. It was the worst day of their whole trip and stemmed from a fatal decision to steer to the east in the hope that this would lead them out of the pressure. However, after hours of hauling they seemed to be trapped in a mass of crevasses. Twisting this way and that, they at last glimpsed a smoother slope, but it lay far away across a surface riven by deep chasms. At about 10 p.m., after twelve hours of appalling grind, they were back on the right track. However, they had made little progress towards their next depot and food was beginning to run out. They reduced their rations, squeezing an extra meal out of pemmican only meant for three meals and halving their meagre lunch ration.

  The next day they again became disorientated, plunging into a labyrinth of crevasses and fissures and wandering about ‘absolutely lost for hours and hours’ as Wilson recorded. There was clearly debate if not argument about what to do. Scott described how ‘Divided councils caused our course to be erratic’ and they were forced to make camp in ‘the worst place of all’. Oates recorded that: ‘We are in rather a nasty hole tonight.’ They were grimly aware that they now had only one meal left. The wording in Scott’s diary is tense. He speaks of endurance, of how the group must and will get through and how they can cope with less food.

  The next morning brought thick snow cloaking everything around them. The only option was to remain in their sleeping bags, hungry and anxious. However, they were able to get under way by mid-morning and after struggling through a chaotic expanse of broken ice hit an old moraine track. It was easier to make progress on this smoother surface. Evans, confused by a shadow on the ice, shouted out, believing they had reached the next depot, but not long after Wilson spotted the real depot flag. Scott was not exaggerating when he wrote that it was ‘an immense relief’. They now had a further three and a half days’ food. Wilson even geologized for an hour or two as they tramped on. They were also relieved to learn from messages left for them that the two supporting parties had passed through safely, though Teddy Evans ‘seems to have got mixed up with pressures like ourselves’.7 In fact at that very moment Teddy Evans was not safe. He had collapsed from scurvy with some hundred miles to go and that day was still on the Barrier.

  Scott brooded over the unnerving experiences of the last days: ‘In future food must be worked so that we do not run so short if the weather fails us. We musn’t get into a hole like this again.’ Recent events had made him feel very insecure and it was being brought home to him that he had cut things too finely. He was revising the opinion he had expressed earlier in the year that: ‘it must be sound policy to keep the men of a sledge party keyed up to a high pitch of well-fed physical condition as long as they have animals to drag their loads. The time for short rations . . . comes when the men are dependent on their own traction efforts.’ He also had time to assess the condition of his companions. Bowers and Wilson were suffering badly from snowblindness. However, the news of Evans was much worse. This once hearty and vigorous giant had ‘no power to assist with camping work’ but Scott does not explain why. Perhaps his wounded and frostbitten hands were preventing him, or perhaps it was a further manifestation of the slowness which Scott noted after Evans fell down the crevasse.

  They set off again the next day, carrying their new provisions but covered only six and a half miles. Scott knew a crisis was coming:

  There is no getting away from the fact that we are not going strong. Probably none of us: Wilson’s leg still troubles him and he doesn’t like to trust himself on ski; but the worst case is Evans who is giving us serious anxiety. This morning he suddenly disclosed a huge blister on his foot. It delayed us on the march . . . Sometimes I fear he is going from bad to worse, but I trust he will pick up again when we come to steady work on ski like this afternoon. He is hungry and so is Wilson.

  Hunger had also affected the returning Norwegians, but as Amundsen wrote: ‘Fortunately we were so well supplied that when this sensation of hunger came over us, we could increase our daily rations.’8

  There are hints that their morale was breaking down. All of them must have been reaching the end of their tether, while Scott was becoming frustrated and disappointed with their progress. The goal of reaching the Terra Nova in time was slipping away – she was due to sail northwards around the end of February. ‘We are inclined to get slack and slow,’ he complained. ‘I have talked of the matter to-night and hope for improvement.’ They were now some thirty miles from the Lower Glacier Depot with nearly three days’ food in hand, but on 15 February Scott was again noting that provisions were running low. In desperation he had reduced both their rations and their rest time so they could reach the depot before the rations ran out. Perhaps, as they hauled their heavy sledge, his thoughts turned to home and Kathleen as a source of strength and comfort. In fact, on 15 February, she was lunching with the Prime Minister, Asquith, no doubt in the hope of charming some funds out of him.

  The next day heralded tragedy. Scott’s diary for 16 February records: ‘A rather trying position. Evans has nearly broken down in brain, we think. He is absolutely changed from his normal self-reliant self. This morning and this afternoon he stopped the march on some trivial excuse.’ If this sounds unsympathetic it must be remembered that Scott was under great mental and physical strain. He probably also felt responsible for the poor state of his comrade and hence guilty. Oates’s verdict sounds equally callous: ‘It is an extraordinary thing about Evans, he has lost his guts and behaves like an old woman or worse,’ and yet Oates was the most popular officer among the men of the lower deck. Wilson’s verdict was that: ‘Evans’s collapse has much to do with the fact that he has never been sick in his life and is now helpless with his hands frost-bitten.’

  The next day they pressed on, hoping to make the depot, but it was ‘anxious work with the sick man’.9 The crisis was about to break and it was, in Scott’s words, ‘a very terrible day’. Evans had slept well and prepared for the march, gamely declaring, as he always did, that he was fit and well. He took his place in the traces but within half an hour had to drop out because his ski shoes had loosened. The others plodded on with the groaning sledge over a thick treacly surface. Evans slowly caught them up again and once more took his place. However, after half an hour he again dropped out and asked Bowers to lend him some string. Scott told Evans to catch up when he could and the seaman apparently answered him cheerfully.

&
nbsp; Again the others continued to haul, anxious to reach the depot and sweating heavily. At lunchtime they sat and waited, expecting the lonely shambling figure of Evans to come into view. When he failed to appear they went to look for him and caught sight of him still some way behind. It was obvious something was wrong. Scott was the first to reach Evans and was shocked at his appearance: ‘He was on his knees with clothing disarranged, hands uncovered and frostbitten, and a wild look in his eyes.’ Asked what had happened he replied that he did not know but thought that he must have fainted. He could no longer walk and was showing signs of complete collapse. Oates remained with him while the others hurried to fetch the sledge. By the time they managed to get him into the tent he was comatose and died quietly that night without regaining consciousness. He had been out from Cape Evans for three and a half months and had marched over 1,200 miles. In his final letter to his wife he had written: ‘I am always thinking of you on this great ice platform ten thousand feet above the sea level.’10

  His shocked companions debated the cause of his death. They concluded that he had begun to weaken before reaching the Pole and that his downward spiral had been hastened by the discovery of his frostbitten fingers, his falls on the glacier and his loss of confidence. Wilson believed he must have injured his brain during a fall. Whatever the cause of their companion’s death it was a chilling moment for the four survivors, emphasizing their own vulnerability, with so many miles still to go. Yet at the same time it was the solution to a horrible dilemma. As Scott commented, ‘It is a terrible thing to lose a companion in this way, but calm reflection shows that there could not have been a better ending to the terrible anxieties of the past week . . . what a desperate pass we were in with a sick man on our hands at such a distance from home.’