1912 (8 page)

Favouring the idea that the North Geographic Pole was surrounded by sea ice, and recognising the direction that driftwood took across the Arctic, Nansen came up with an imaginative alternative: drive a boat into the sea ice on the Eurasian side of the Arctic and float over the North Geographic Pole. It was inspired thinking, but no vessel was known to be capable of surviving the pressure of being locked up like this for months on end. Nansen had the germ of an idea for a unique ship, and he worked hard to secure financial support from the Christiania Geographical Society in 1890, and later the Norwegian government and king.

No one had attempted to design a ship to be deliberately trapped in ice. Most earlier polar explorers had made do with converted sealing and whaling vessels. Nansen wanted his ship to be ‘round and slippery as an eel'. Rather than resisting the ice pressing in from the sides, the ship would lift above it: a rounded hull would avoid the grasp of the ice in ‘the way a cherry pip squeezed between thumb and forefinger pops into the air'. It was designed to be prodigiously strong; the living quarters were fully insulated with a combination of natural materials that included reindeer hair, felt and linoleum; there would even be a windmill to run a generator for electric lighting. The ship was christened
Fram
, Norwegian for ‘forward', by Nansen's wife, Eva, and launched in late 1892.

This plucky vessel, now housed in a dedicated museum in Oslo, would go on to play a major role in the events of 1912. At thirty-one metres in length, the rounded bilge of the
Fram
is reminiscent of an enormous cockleshell. Individual cabins and communal working spaces bathed in light from triple-glazed skylights make the vessel seem roomier than it really is; indeed, it is not hard to imagine using it for research today.

Though the
Fram
's design was conceptually brilliant, Nansen could not get his ship far enough along the Siberian coast before it became trapped in the ice. The ship did drift towards Greenland, but not over the North Pole. Realising they would fall short, Nansen, with a colleague, Hjalmar Johansen, decided to ski with sledges and dogs to the pole from the
Fram
at its furthest point north. The two men managed to get within 3° of the North Geographic Pole but were forced to work their way back when it became clear that they did not have enough supplies. Unable to find the
Fram
on their return, the Norwegians pushed on to the northern shore of Franz Josef Land, a collection of islands off the Siberian coast.

Overwintering in the northern darkness, Nansen and
Johansen stumbled across a British expedition based on the southern side of Franz Josef Land the following year. This was a serendipitous meeting, with implications for polar exploration in the south. The Jackson–Harmsworth Expedition was led by an eccentric British adventurer, Frederick George Jackson, who had applied to join Nansen's expedition and been rejected. Jackson then decided to launch his own expedition to the North Pole. Discovering that Franz Josef Land was an archipelago, Jackson realised he could not reach the pole. Instead, he spent his time exploring the islands, making scientific measurements and shooting the local wildlife—including more than one hundred polar bears—south of 81°N.

Before leaving, he had visited Nansen's brother in Norway, taking away with him a package of letters ‘soldered up in a zinc case on the chance of seeing something' of Nansen. Just as Stanley met Livingstone, so Jackson greeted Nansen. Once the Norwegian had asked after his wife and whether his country was at war with Sweden, Jackson handed over the letters.

Advice from Nansen and Jackson helped Ernest Shackleton in his preparations, for polar exploration was still far from an exact science. Practical experience was vital in planning, and the same people regularly turned up on different expeditions, sharing experiences and observations—sometimes at a cost. Albert Armitage, who became Robert Scott's second-in-command on the
Discovery
expedition, went north with Jackson. During the exploration of Franz Josef Land, Jackson had dogs and ponies to help transport the sledges of equipment and supplies. Two of the ponies died early on, and the expedition was forced to fall back on the one remaining beast for a large part of their haulage. The final pony later died while the accompanying dogs
survived—yet Jackson raved about the use of horses in polar exploration to anyone who would listen, and was dismissive of canine teams. His obsession rubbed off on Armitage, who took the idea south and shared it with Scott and Shackleton in 1901.

Shackleton had intended to use dogs. He had seen them used on the
Discovery
expedition: ‘I wish we had had about sixty or seventy,' he later wrote, ‘for then I think we could have reached the South Pole.' But Armitage had extolled the virtues of horses after his experiences in the Arctic. On returning to London from the
Discovery
expedition Shackleton had looked Jackson up, and the eccentric British adventurer had suggested the young leader change his plans. Shackleton was swayed by Jackson's arguments and, with characteristic gusto, decided to direct the British Antarctic Expedition's efforts towards horses in the attempt to reach the South Geographic Pole.

While on the ice—with no chance of restocking—the men needed to transport supplies as efficiently as possible and keep weight to a minimum. Nansen's designs for sledges and especially cookers would prove crucial for Shackleton. The ‘Nansen cooker' had an inner and outer container that made maximum use of the heat given off by the paraffin-fuelled Primus stove. In a tent it could cook food and melt ice for drinking at the same time, while also giving off valuable warmth. At the base a range of food was available, including tinned food, homemade bread, and local penguins and seals for fresh meat. On sledging journeys it was a different matter. Pemmican—a concentrated mix of protein and fat, made from ground mince and oil, that could be eaten warm or cold—was supplemented by biscuits, cheese, chocolate, cocoa, soluble milk protein, sugar, oats and tea. It was not always enough.

Clothing proved a tougher challenge. While indigenous peoples in the north wore furs and skins, many of the European exploring fraternity were reluctant to don such apparel.
Fur can be restrictive if not used correctly, trapping sweat close to the body, where it can freeze when activity ends—and during heavy work it can be unbearably hot. Instead, Shackleton opted for multiple layers of thin, warm clothing, with a windproof cover. The British and subsequent explorers of 1912 often relied on natural fibres, such as wool and cotton, for the inner layers of their clothing. Nansen favoured tight-fitting pure woollen garments in the Jaeger style, worn close to the skin so the air could be trapped and keep the individual warm—he was renowned for parading this clothing at home as well as in the field, despite it leaving little to the imagination.

For the windproof layer Shackleton used the best available material on the market, a tightly woven gabardine cloth made by Burberry. Jackson had sung the praises of this material, in spite of the apparel having no fixed hood, leaving the neck uncovered in the freezing conditions. To compensate, a scarf had to be wrapped around the neck, ears and head, finished off with a woollen hat—far from perfect, as the neck regularly became exposed, allowing precious warmth to escape. Because of wind gusts, the hat and heavy-duty fur mittens were tied together. Unfortunately, although the mittens helped keep hands warm, they were of no use in working with instruments or doing other work that required some dexterity: inner gloves had to be worn so the mittens could be taken off for short periods.

Accompanying this get-up was the Edwardian equivalent of sunglasses. In the Antarctic there is always the threat of snow blindness, photokeratitis, when the eyes are exposed to extreme levels of ultraviolet light brought about by the high reflectivity of the white surface. The often-blinding light meant Shackleton's men had to wear snow goggles with coloured lenses most of the time outside.

Not all ideas from the northern polar regions were ignored. Finnesko boots, usually made from reindeer stag heads, were
stuffed with sennegrass, a type of sedge found in the European Arctic. Borchgrevink wrote enthusiastically on his return from exploration: ‘I found that the Lapps' method of never using socks in their Finn boots answered well…if you get wet feet while wearing the grass in the “komager” (Finn boots) you will be warmer than ever, as the fresh grass will, by the moisture and the heat of your feet, in a way start to burn, or produce its own heat by spontaneous combustion.' By night, Shackleton found, the sennegrass could be pulled out and hung up, allowing the trapped moisture to freeze: ‘the greater part of it can be shaken away before the grass is replaced on the following morning.'

All this equipment required money from donors. Shackleton needed as many hooks as possible to excite possible supporters, and focused on taking the latest technology to tackle the icy continent. This enabled companies to show off their newest products in the most extreme of environments, and the newspapers loved it, raising the profile of the expedition yet further. Hoping the Great Ice Barrier surface would be solid enough, Shackleton took the first motorcar south, so it could be used to help transport stores on the snow and ice. His patron Beardmore had just taken over the bankrupt Arrol-Johnston manufacturers and was more than happy to provide a new vehicle, showcasing a company that was desperate for publicity. In anticipation of the freezing conditions, the expedition took special low-temperature oil and a cornucopia of wheels, along with wooden skis, that would hopefully be able to cope with the different surfaces.

As if that was not enough, Shackleton also planned to drag a light portable boat, the
Raymond
—named after his son—3200 kilometres to the other side of Antarctica, where he might rendezvous with the
Nimrod
. This ambitious plan was soon dropped.

Just after six o'clock on the morning of 16 January 1909, three men clad in polar gear wearily stepped out from a small green tent on an icy plateau of the eastern Antarctic, and fastened themselves to a laden sledge. For 103 days the men had hauled themselves and their supplies, the tent and a range of scientific equipment across sixteen hundred kilometres of wind-blasted ice, dodging the constant threat of crevasses. Buffeted by snowstorms and blizzards, they had battled hunger and extreme isolation. Now, finally, their objective was within reach. Hooked up, they pushed their aching bodies forward, pulling on the assorted harnesses and straps, and slowly the sledge followed.

Led by Edgeworth David, these three men from Ernest Shackleton's British Antarctic Expedition were proceeding north to the South Magnetic Pole. David's successful assault on Mount Erebus at the end of the past summer had not only provided valuable geological observations of the volcano but also familiarised the men with the equipment and sledging gear. By October 1908 the men had rested after the Antarctic winter and were ready to set out. Making excellent progress, David's team was more than thirteen hundred kilometres from Shackleton's simultaneous assault on the South Geographic Pole by mid-January the next year.

Seen from afar the 51-year-old David cut a diminutive figure. His age was beginning to tell, and he whispered encouraging words to himself while he pulled forward. Accompanying David was his protégé, the tall 26-year-old Douglas Mawson, and Alistair Mackay, a stout Scottish medic, aged thirty. It might sound like the beginning of a bad joke, but this Welshman, Englishman and Scotsman were setting out to do something extraordinary: to complete the journey Ross had started nearly seventy years earlier, and fulfil one of the great hopes of Shackleton's expedition.

The Arrol-Johnston car had promised much but delivered little. Although it looked impressive on the ice, the vehicle proved wholly inadequate for its new climes. As soon as it strayed off the ice the tyres sank. The gleaming metal casing and trappings were stripped off, leaving the driver to sit on the barest of frames above a single engine. The exposed engine had to be regularly defrosted, sometimes by the potentially explosive method of putting a small bowl of petrol under the carburettor and setting it alight; if stuck in the snow, the car would have to be pulled out and a different type of wheel tried.