With Scott in the Antarctic

by Isobel E Williams

  After the southern journey Wilson’s knee stayed stiff and swollen, ‘a nice clean discomfort, not an illness, which needn’t worry other people’.5 He had to stay on the ship for six weeks until he was mobile. His appetite was enormous and he soon began to put on weight. His attack of scurvy does not appear to have affected his scarred lung. This is surprising because scurvy can cause the disintegration of old scars as the normal production of ‘repair’ protein is arrested and old ‘repair’ protein continues to be broken down. If the St George’s diagnosis of tuberculosis was correct, scurvy might well have caused a recurrence of the disease; the organisms that cause tuberculosis can survive for years in scarred lung tissue and can become active again if a scar breaks down. But he seems to have had no chest problems whatsoever. He was not concerned by the thought of another Antarctic winter; in fact he wanted to stay on to continue his observations on bird and marine life. He wrote to his mother, ‘A polar winter is not by any means the terrible experience we were led to imagine it was, but merely a period of rest and quiet and extra sleep’ and ‘I have no fear of the winter now, knowing what it means. The climate suits me down to the ground. I simply revel in it, bracing cold and clear air’.6 His plan was to spend the winter months, March to September, working up his paintings, and painting new scenes. Here he succeeded. By the end of the winter he had a portfolio of 200 coloured sketches: panoramic views, paintings of the Aurora (a hugely luminous display of colours in the atmosphere).7 Many of these were later reproduced in Scott’s Voyage of the Discovery.

  His main ambition for the spring in the coming September was to continue his studies on emperor penguins. He planned to study eggs at different stages of development and to capture specimen young chicks. Calculating from Royds’ return with chicks in October 1902 he decided that this would mean two journeys to Cape Crozier: September for eggs and October to observe the chicks. He also wanted to find how and when the penguins went north. In the event he was able to make the visits but failed in his aims because his calculations about the emperor’s life cycle were wrong and he arrived too late. The eggs are laid in May and the chicks emerge about nine weeks later, in July. This disappointment was one of the reasons for his eagerness to return with Scott in 1910, when his return to the emperor colony of Cape Crozier was the subject of one of the most famous travel books ever written about Antarctica: The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard.8

  When he was able to walk he went alone, because, as he wrote to his wife, ‘first I want to sketch and one cannot keep others waiting about in these temperatures and secondly, because it is the only time I get to myself to be alone with God and you’.9 To sketch, he took his right hand out of his glove for a few minutes, sketching until ‘you can no longer feel the pencil’. Then he put his hand back in his glove and ‘the pain makes you dance on one foot and then the other’.10 All pencils, soft or hard, made the same gritty marks. Throughout the winter, his body anticipated any coming storm, ‘A coming blizzard is always heralded by a headache, migraine over one eye as a rule shading to neuralgia of the face and touches of rheumatism even of the legs’.11 He suffered recurrent attacks of general ‘rheumatic’ pains throughout the winter and became certain that the problem was related to damp.

  He had received many letters from home on Morning, but his father thought that he got the greatest pleasure from a letter from his contemporaries at St George’s, a remarkably Edwardian epistle signed by 158 signatories.

  Dear Wilson, the undersigned old friends and St George’s men gathered together at the annual dinner presided over by Sir Clifford Albutt, send you their heartiest greetings and wish you a continuance of success in your great enterprise, fair weather, a pleasant journey and safe return. We all look forward to the pleasure of seeing you after such an eventful absence.12

  He was pleased because there were Cambridge men amongst the signatories and the message showed that he was not forgotten. He would also have been pleased and perhaps surprised by comments about him in the letters being carried to New Zealand on Morning. The Edwardians were great letter writers and to receive these missives must have been a comfort to Oriana, who had already sailed to New Zealand, anticipating that Wilson would be back there in 1903. The letters showed her how her husband was appreciated. Scott wrote that it was not a kindness but a pleasure to write to Oriana about her husband. He said that they had some trying times on the southern journey but if ever he had a repeat experience, he hoped to have a man like Wilson with him. Oriana had not seen her husband for almost eighteen months and anticipating her disappointment that Wilson had not returned to New Zealand after the first season, Scott continued, ‘I feel confident he will get home safe and in better health than when he started and I trust it may comfort you in your disappointment to know how well he is and how we all esteem him’.13 Others wrote; Royds said:

  Your old husband is one of the best and I missed him awfully during the long journey south and was so awfully glad to get him back aboard again. All during the winter I used to do drawing every Sunday under his able supervision. Life on board would have been very different without your husband. I feel much better for having been with him and he has my greatest admiration and friendship.

  Barnes wrote:

  ‘Billy’ is the prime favourite on this ship there is no one who does not ‘go all the way with him’. I hope he sent you some of his charming little sketches they are such perfect little pictures and his sun-sets and sky effects are I should think, as near an approach to the real thing as it is possible for an artist to procure.

  Even Armitage, possibly the least contented of the officers, wrote ‘Of course he is a great favourite on board and his sketches charm us nearly as much as he does himself’.14 Hodgson wrote later that he had ‘never met with a man so universally admired and respected in every way’.15

  He had to consider his future after he returned to Britain. Clearly by now he thought that general practice, or any other conventional medical career was out of the frame. He wrote to Oriana:

  Medicine and Surgery form a work that one should either give one’s whole and undivided attention to from the first or leave strictly alone in practice: and I am afraid I have done neither for I have squandered my energies over various hobbies instead of making my profession my one object in life.16

  His friend from St George’s, Dr John Fraser, wrote later that if he had stayed in hospital work, research would have suited him best.17 But clearly his real talents and enthusiasms were for becoming a naturalist with ornithology as his particular passion. However openings offering regular employment in this field were few and although he had hopes of returning to New Zealand to record the wildlife and flora there, no offer of financial support was made. His mind strayed over other vaguer options: he wondered about translating German scientific works into English and lecturing in Swiss sanatoria in German and English on his experiences in the Antarctic.19 Both these options unsurprisingly came to nothing. At least by now he was slightly better off. The Antarctic Committee had increased his salary by £50 per year starting in March.19 This probably made more difference to Oriana than to him, but he must have been pleased that his contributions to expedition life were recognised.

  Avoiding scurvy remained a priority for the doctors. For the winter of 1903 the men harvested large supplies of seal meat and skua for the larder and occasionally fish was added to the breakfast menu. Food during the winter of 1903 was an improvement on the previous year The recalcitrant cook Brett, who had been carpeted by Armitage, had gone back to New Zealand on Morning. His replacement, a professional baker, produced tasty, appetising and (because of the predominance of seal and skua meat) healthier meals.

  Activities were important to keep up morale. This winter there were fewer concerts and The South Polar Times, edited now by Bernacchi, had lost some of its sparkle; Bernacchi did not equal Shackleton in editing ability and Scott thought the second year was not as good as the first. Lectures were given. Skelton gave a magic lantern sh
ow. The men played hockey at temperatures that dipped to minus 39°F, only stopping because of poor light. Wilson played cards and read. The sailors also passed the time by making models out of the sledges’ silver runners that had been discarded. Wilson was given a small model of a sledge and was delighted at ‘the very pretty souvenir’.20 Midwinter Day, the darkest day of the year, 22 June, with neither moon nor sun, was celebrated, but not as enthusiastically as in 1902. Wilson gave away the cigarettes sent to him on Morning. The ship was not decorated as there were no evergreens to cut, but they ate real turtle soup (also sent on Morning), large cakes (donated in New Zealand), halibut, a huge side of beef with artichokes, all topped off with devilled wing of skua as savoury and champagne. On 16 July, Wilson remembered his wedding anniversary, ‘Two years now since Ory and I were married and we have had three weeks of it together’.21 Oriana’s health was drunk in the mess. During the winter the sledges and fur sleeping bags were overhauled, as Royds kept everyone busy preparing for the forthcoming sledging season. Today, scientists with all the advantages of electricity and communications still complain about the monotony of Antarctic winter. Perhaps in 1903 expectations were lower; whatever the reason, the ship’s complement seem to have endured the long dark days without intolerable problems, on a ship lit by strictly rationed candles and variable acetylene light. But it must have been a relief when spring arrived in September.

  Plans for the season included explorations to the west and south-west, but the paramount goal was to free the ship by any means available. Scott had decided that there was to be no further attempt on the South Pole.

  From Wilson’s point of view, the important journeys were his two expeditions to the Cape Crozier rookery. The first expedition was from 7–17 September 1903. This was the time that he thought that ‘early’ eggs would be available and was the first expedition in the Antarctic spring. Six men set out on skis, pulling two sledges and carrying 110 lbs each. As low temperatures were expected the men used the three-man sleeping bags, marginally warmer than single bags but more uncomfortable because the men were jammed in so tightly that anyone’s movement inevitably disturbed his companions. Wilson wrote that he never got more than one hour’s uninterrupted sleep and his sleeping-bag partners thought that they had not slept at all ‘but from listening to the others snoring we knew that everyone else had’.22 He dreamed vivid dreams, ‘of home and warmth and England, far more vivid than any waking thoughts’.23 The daylight was so poor that work in the camp had to be done by candlelight. When the team reached Cape Crozier on 12 September, they found dramatic changes from the previous year: a chasm had opened up and ice blocks now blocked the path to the rookery. They returned to camp. On the following day Wilson and two companions set out again, roped together, wearing crampons on their finesco and carrying one ice axe and a long ski pole. After two hours of climbing, step cutting, and dropping into cracks and crevasses, they reached the huge colony. Wilson was surprised and disappointed to find that the birds had already hatched their chicks and were nursing babies that looked as advanced as those that Royds had brought back in October (five weeks later), the previous year. He could not get early eggs. This was a setback and calculations for incubation times and hatching would have to be rethought; but he did have the opportunity to study the birds close up, putting up with ‘vicious’ pecking and slaps from their wings in the process. He described the pot-bellied babies, their silky white and silver-grey coats and their clumsy big feet that looked as if they were made of rubber; the parents’ bulky flap of loose skin hanging down from the abdomen that protected their chicks; their leg-tied, shuffling gait as they carried their chicks on both feet; and the way they balanced on their hocks and tails when not moving.24 He was impressed by the birds’ intense brooding instincts; adults would try to incubate dead chicks, deserted putrid eggs, or even balls of ice rather than be without. If a chick wandered from its parents, other adults, desperate for ownership, pulled and jerked at it sometimes so strongly that it got killed adding to the already high mortality.25 He collected frozen eggs, dead chicks and two live chicks which the team somehow managed to keep alive in temperatures of less than minus 45°F by wrapping them in their sleeping jackets and feeding them on masticated seal-meat. When Wilson got back to Discovery, the chicks stayed in his cabin and caused great interest. The amount that they ate was enormous; they were like bottomless wells and the mess in the cabin can only be imagined. But they did not survive long though one kept them entertained for some weeks.26 The frozen eggs did not add to his knowledge either; they were stinking and one was full of putrid fluid.

  Two days after their return, there was an impromptu concert: Royds sang and played, Ferrar sang, the men sung and Bernacchi recited. The King’s health was toasted with whisky. Wilson did not try to entertain though he thought the event was quite a success. It was Oriana’s birthday, the third he had missed since they were married. ‘What a husband, poor girl’.27

  On 12 October Wilson was off again for the second expedition to Cape Crozier. He took with him two seamen: Cross, who had become his regular zoological assistant, and the stoker Thomas Whitfield. The outing lasted until 5 November 1903 and reinforced the men’s perception of the discipline needed to endure life in the Antarctic. Wilson aimed to get to Cape Crozier by 19 October, the date that Royds and Skelton had been there the previous year, and they just did this, having had to relay on the way. When they reached the rookery Wilson thought that although there were hundreds of birds, there were fewer chicks than in September and, based on Skelton’s report, than in 1902 and he estimated chick mortality at more than 70 per cent. He recorded again the penguin’s determination to brood over something, anything would do. Six adults fought over a chick that had fallen through a crack in the ice ‘though not one had the sense to help it out’.28 He took photos with his old click-box. The three went later to the Adéle penguin rookery, updated the mail cairn and collected rubble for Ferrar to analyse. Because the cold was so severe they again had finesco rather than boots on their feet and unsurprisingly their feet got badly bruised and blistered. They found the little Adéle birds nesting. He decided to return later when the eggs were laid, to have a ‘fresh egg feast’.29

  But bad weather dogged them. They were marooned in their tent, 100 feet above the bay, for nearly a week, Wilson passing the wet miserable days by reading Tennyson’s Maud, a favourite from his Cambridge days.30 Lack of oil and food, those old familiar worries, surfaced again; a delay of this length had not been anticipated, so they killed seals to make up for both deficiencies and looked forward to the Adéle eggs. When at last the storm cleared they went back went on their egg-collecting foray hoping for six eggs each, more for the men on the ship and some for Wilson’s collection. The Adéles were there, sitting tight on their nests, screeching and pecking furiously as the men pushed them off. But no matter how many nests they searched the men could not find a single egg. So they sat, eating dry cheese and biscuits watching as ‘the Adéles made love to each other and stole each others nesting stones and stood bolt upright with their heads in the air chortling to themselves as they slowly waggled their flippers’.31 They revenged themselves by taking three adults back for supper. ‘Stewed, they were delicious, but fried in butter, in blessed mouthfuls, they were heavenly’.32 As another storm held them up, they chipped bits off the remains of the frozen Adéle penguins with a geological hammer and fried the crumbs, which were excellent. Low on food and four days overdue, they finally got back to the ship on 5 November. Whitfield had a swollen and stiff leg which Wilson thought was due to scurvy, and his own feet were raw and bleeding.33 He wrote home, ‘Bird-nesting at −62°F is a somewhat novel experience. Those journeys to Cape Crozier were pretty average uncomfortable even for the Antarctic. It has been worth doing – I feel that, but I am not sure I could stand it all over again’.34 But he had achieved a great deal: apart from studying penguins he had collected rocks and made geological notes and diagrams, notes on the pressure ridges (those masses o
f ice forced up into lines and separated from each other by deep valleys) and notes on the ice-cliffs which changed from white at the top of the cliffs, to blue, grey and then dirty grey.35

  In this second season Wilson went on two other expeditions. With Hodgson and seaman Croucher, he went to the south coast of Ross Island on a ‘picnic trip’, making comprehensive sketches of the glaciations of the volcanoes Erebus and Terror and investigating the tide crack between the island of Erebus and the Barrier. This was an important investigation; the tide crack is the gap between land ice and floating ice and part of Discovery’s brief was to investigate whether the Barrier was afloat or grounded. Wilson seems to have thought that there was indeed a tide crack masked by pressure ridges, and the Barrier was therefore floating.36 This party returned to Discovery on 22 November in time for the usual Sunday breakfast of seal liver.37