Shackleton’s Forgotten Expedition

by Beau Riffenburgh

  On one side the civilised European in an English check suit and high rubber waterboots, well shaved, well groomed, bringing with him a perfume of scented soap . . . on the other side the wild man, clad in dirty rags, black with oil and soot, with long, uncombed hair and shaggy beard, black with smoke, with a face [with a] thick layer of fat and soot which a winter's endeavours with warm water, moss, rags, and at last a knife had sought in vain to remove.

  They chatted for a few moments, and the other man said, 'Aren't you Nansen?' 'Yes, I am Nansen,' he replied. 'By Jove,' exclaimed Frederick Jackson, 'I am devilish glad to see you.'

  Nansen remained with the leader of the Jackson-Harmsworth Expedition for more than a month before returning to Norway on Jackson's ship. In that time, Jackson proved himself to be a great British archetype of the time - the sportsman, a man who always took a massive armament with him in order to kill as many animals as possible. He revelled in the story of shooting hand-reared pheasants still in their covert, while he was only eight. And he took pride in that on his second day in Australia he killed numerous kangaroos, simply because they were the largest game available.

  If there was anything in the world as important to Jackson as a gun, it was a horse. He dreamed as a youngster of soaring over five-bar gates when he was big enough to ride to hounds. He claimed to have introduced polo to Queensland. And he wrote that he had taken horses with him to Franz Josef Land to prove that they could be used effectively in the high Arctic. It was on a journey around the White Sea, Jackson wrote, that he 'fell in love with the hardy Russian ponies which did us such sovereign service . . . Ponies can be used to very great advantage in Arctic exploration.'

  In fact, Jackson's horses suffered from numerous problems in Franz Josef Land. The pressure from their hooves broke holes in ice, hard-crusted snow, and, most dangerously, the snow bridges over glacier crevasses. They required massive amounts of fodder, but never the less regularly had digestive complaints. And grooming them away from camp was virtually impossible. Regardless, Jackson was 'thoroughly satisfied with my experiment . . . Horses . . . proved to be an unqualified success.'

  The horses, many of which died, might not have agreed, but, remarkably, Shackleton did. He had discussed the advantages of horses with Armitage -Jackson's second-in-command - while in the Antarctic, and he held high hopes for their use. Now, after consulting Jackson, he was convinced.

  Nansen must have been bewildered. Not only had he proven dogs successful, so had Sverdrup, Amundsen, Peary and the Italian Duke of the Abruzzi. They had not been as effective on Discovery, but was that not, he would have thought, blaming the dogs for the faults of their masters? Even Shackleton had once seemed to understand this, writing in Pearson's Magazine that 'I wish we had had about sixty or seventy [dogs], for then I think we could have reached the Pole.' Somehow, Jackson had swayed Shackleton, and, try as he might, Nansen could not convince him otherwise.

  Equally as bizarre was Shackleton's reluctance to take skis, the very instruments that had brought him back alive from the farthest south. Inexplicably, Shackleton had already decided that if motor-car and horses should fail, he would follow the programme that Markham had passed down to Scott: man-hauling. This was, after all, a truly British method of operation, and Shackleton was no different from most of his contemporaries throughout the Empire, believing what was British was best.

  One can only assume that in addition to this peculiarly British chauvinism, much of Shackleton's reluctance to follow Nansen's recommendations on these two fronts was due to his own lack of success with skiing and dog-driving. To attain a high level of efficiency in these required a patience that Shackleton simply did not have. But anybody, he most likely thought, can lead a horse. As a result, after his meeting with Nansen he contacted the London manager of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, through whom he ordered fifteen Manchurian ponies; it was more than the number of pairs of skis that he took.

  Shackleton could not, however, ignore Norwegian experience altogether. Norwegian companies were the world's premier producers of polar equipment, so in late April he and Reid travelled to Christiania to place orders. They were immediately confronted with the problem that certain items required months or even a year to produce, and it took all of Shackleton's charm - and no little part of his finance - to ensure that these could be delivered to London by June.

  To his consternation, immediately upon arriving in Christiania Shackleton found that the man who had made the sledges for the Discovery Expedition was in the United States. At the recommendation of Sigurd Scott-Hansen, the former meteorologist on Fram, he turned instead to L.H. Hagen, one of the first mass producers of skis. Shackleton ordered thirty sledges of seasoned ash and American hickory: ten that were twelve feet long for use with the ponies, eighteen that were eleven feet long for man-hauling, and a pair of seven-footers for short trips.

  Shackleton next visited W.C. Moller in Drammen, Norway, in order to obtain the necessary furs. The order was not large, as Shackleton had decided to use furs only for sleeping bags, gloves and footwear, but it was never the less critical. The company agreed to produce the items in a fraction of the time normally required, but this ultimately meant that it was unable to make all of the finnesko of the quality Shackleton wanted. These were an ancient Lapp item - soft boots made of reindeer fur, which were filled with sennegrass, a plant that absorbs moisture and provides insulation. The hardest wearing were made from the fur taken from the leg of the reindeer, but Shackleton was able to obtain only a dozen such pairs, and had to settle for another eighty pairs from other reindeer fur. He also ordered three three-man sleeping bags and a dozen one-man bags of reindeer fur. The final part of the order was sixty pairs of wolfskin and dogskin mittens, which were to be worn over wool gloves.

  Shackleton's final major stop in Norway was at Sandefjord, where Adrien de Gerlache, the former commander of Belgica, had found a ship that he felt appropriate for the British Antarctic Expedition. Named Bjorn (Bear), she was a beauty: a three-year-old sealer built specifically for polar work. At some 700 tons she had berths for fifty men, vast storage space and powerful triple-expansion engines. She would easily be able to fight the ice near King Edward VII Land, and Shackleton wanted her immediately. The only problem was her cost: £11,000. He returned home to investigate the money that he had counted on from Douglas Steuart. It did not, in fact, exist.

  During the past century and more, the popular press has, in many ways, not changed greatly. Items of significance seem only to be news if the media say so, and they frequently suffer in comparison to 'intriguing bits of nothing'. Such was now the case. As Shackleton ordered a specially designed hut and purchased clothing, travel equipment, and food he hoped would ward off scurvy, what appealed to the press was something that would not play a significant role in the expedition: the motor-car.

  The motor-car was, ultimately, more a public relations exercise than anything else. Beardmore had recently taken over the only Scottish motor-car manufacturer, the Arrol-Johnston company of Paisley. In hopes of turning around a business that had faced bankruptcy, he ordered a specially designed automobile for Shackleton, accompanied by as much publicity as possible. 'Designed to withstand extreme cold', it included a chassis specially treated for low temperatures, an air-cooled engine capable of propelling it sixteen miles per hour, and an exhaust system utilised for warming purposes. It could be operated by a spirit designed to work in low temperatures, and it had two fuel tanks, one fed by gravity, the other by pressure. It also had three different sets of wheels for surfaces of varying hardness.

  This was all very well, but Shackleton would much rather Beardmore had given him a ship. As it was, once he learned that he had less money than he had believed - and had made his supporters believe - he realised Bjorn was a dream. He looked instead for something he could afford. This turned out to be a grimy, mean little sealer sailing off of Newfoundland, which he could purchase for £5,000. Her name was Nimrod.

  Built in Dundee in 1866 of
oak, green heart and ironbark, by the firm A. Stephens & Son, Nimrod was a schooner of 334 gross tons and 136 feet. Her boiler and compound engines had been replaced in 1889, but she was under-powered and it was uncertain if she would be able to withstand the pounding fury and incessant storms of the Southern Ocean, not to mention the heavy ice in the Ross Sea. Never the less, Shackleton received a satisfactory inspection report, and bought her in early May.

  Before he had even seen his new ship, Shackleton determined to rename her. 'Nimrod' had been appropriate for a seal hunter, coming as it did from the Book of Genesis, where Nimrod, the grandson of Ham and great-grandson of Noah, was 'the first on earth to be a mighty man. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord.' However, Shackleton confided to Beardmore's wife Elspeth, 'I am going to change her name to "Endurance"'. This name was one Shackleton had long fancied, coming as it did from his family motto 'Fortitudine Vincimus,' or 'By endurance we conquer'. For reasons not known, Shackleton did not ultimately make the change, saving 'Endurance' for a later ship.

  On 15 June Nimrod arrived in the Thames, and Shackleton was horrified. His new ship appeared even smaller than her measurements had made her sound, she was extremely dilapidated, her masts were rotten, and from top to bottom she was filthy and stank of the seal oil that had for decades filled her holds. Shackleton immediately turned her over to the shipyard of R. and H. Green in Blackwall, and work commenced to make her sea-worthy for some of the roughest conditions in the world. The hull was thoroughly caulked, the holds scraped and cleaned, and the masts and rigging were pulled down. In the ensuing weeks she was turned from a schooner to a barquentine, with square sails on the foremast and gaff-headed fore and aft sails on the main and mizzen. New quarters for the crew were constructed forward, temporary accommodation for the shore party was built in the aft hold, damage from former battles with ice was repaired, and new engines with sixty nominal horsepower were installed. By July, when the work was done, she could sail at eight-and-a-half knots and could make six knots under steam, using four tons of coal a day in smooth water.

  The process of loading now had to begin. There were tons of stores at the expedition office, where equipment had officially been left on show, as Shackleton attempted to subsidise his enterprise by charging the public to view it. It was through this small commercial effort that he managed to meet John King Davis.

  While on leave in London from his merchant ship, Davis, then only twenty-three, happened to meet a reporter friend who was on his way to interview Alfred Reid. With nothing better to do, Davis accompanied him to the expedition office, although, as he wrote, 'at that particular moment few places on the earth's surface were of less interest to me than the South Pole.' While looking over the exhibition of polar gear, Davis heard Reid indicate that the expedition was having a hard time finding a chief officer. With absolutely no forethought, Davis broke into the conversation, and within moments found himself ushered into Shackleton's office, where 'a young man dressed in a blue suit sat writing at a table. He had thick black hair carefully brushed down and parted in the middle, heavy eyebrows, a piercing glance and a cleanshaven jaw of the variety known as "bulldog". There was about him the unmistakable look of a deep-water sailor.'

  After a brief exchange, Shackleton sent Davis to Nimrod to speak to her master, Captain Rupert England. Davis's enthusiasm was knocked back a bit, however, when he saw the ship. 'My experience had been in deep-water sailing-ships which, though small by modern standards, seemed quite huge in comparison with this tiny vessel. Stripped for her refit and conversion, without masts, rigging or funnel, the little Nimrod looked little larger than a Thames barge.' England was not encouraging, and told Davis to come back a week later. When the congenial red-head showed up again, England gleefully told him that he had hired a man with 'transcendent qualifications' and wished him goodbye. Ten days later, on his way to his regular ship to sign on, Davis passed Nimrod. Coincidentally, England was at the gangway and asked him if he had another ship. When Davis answered in the negative, England told him the other man had not proved suitable after all and offered him the job. Davis immediately joined what would be the first of his seven major Antarctic voyages.

  Just as Davis had not been immediately selected as first mate, England had not been Shackleton's top choice for captain. The man he originally had in mind was William Colbeck, who had been master of Morning, after having wintered at Cape Adare with Borchgrevink. Colbeck, however, had no interest, so he recommended England, his first mate on Morning, who was currently employed making a run along the coast of West Africa. The thirty-one-year-old England was to prove an unfortunate choice. Shackleton's selections for his shore party would - despite his seemingly random, helter-skelter methods of determining them - prove much better.

  Shackleton's early attempts at gaining commitments from other members of Scott's expedition had all ended in failure. That did not finish his association with the former occupants of Discovery, however. Soon after he had opened the expedition office - if a story told years later is true - a most remarkable meeting occurred. One day he was looking out the window when an open-topped bus passed by. Sitting on the top deck was Ernest Joyce, a former AB on Discovery who had made several sledging trips with Shackleton and had later been promoted to petty officer. Shackleton immediately sent his secretary to find him, and, upon them returning, Joyce was offered the job of looking after the general stores, sledges and the few dogs they were to take. Shortly thereafter Joyce bought his release from the Royal Navy. In later years he would claim that Shackleton had promised to 'recompense me for so doing' but had not lived up to his word. However, there is no firm evidence of this.

  Another Discovery rating who had made the step up to petty officer was Shackleton's old friend Frank Wild. In fact, Scott had recommended to the Admiralty that Wild be promoted to chief petty officer, but he had not been allowed to make such an uncommon jump. In the summer of 1907 Wild was serving on HMS Wildfire when Shackleton asked him if he would join the expedition. Wild immediately jumped at the opportunity and, like Joyce, attempted to purchase his release. He was refused, but in a surprising move the Admiralty agreed to assign him officially to HMS President, the London headquarters for the Royal Navy, and recorded that he was 'lent to British Antarctic Expedition 1907 and to be borne on books of HMS President for time only during period of service'. Shackleton put Wild in charge of provisions.

  Wild and Joyce would spend much of their lives rootless and wandering. Both had found stability - but not happiness - in the Royal Navy, and now both were drawn back to Antarctica by a curious combination of affection and antipathy. They were never attracted by its natural splendours, and they did not record any particular excitement about being there, but they seemingly could not be actively happy elsewhere for long. They were both like addicts; once they had committed themselves to the hazards, difficulties and challenges of life in the far south, they felt impelled to return again and again.

  But Wild and Joyce were the exception. It soon became apparent that none of the other men in the shore party would have previous Antarctic experience. This was subconsciously - or perhaps consciously - the way Shackleton wanted it. He had never been a leader before, and he could well have realised that the Antarctic was not the place for anything whether comparable experience or force of personality - that could bring a challenge to his leadership. He therefore began to walk a fine line in his personnel decisions, attempting to find men with the skills and worldly experience that would make them successful in the south without giving them the status or ability to be independent. It was for such men that Shackleton now searched as he began to consider the more than 400 applications he had received after the announcement of the expedition had appeared in the press.

  One of the easiest decisions was the appointment of the biologist. The former leader of the Scottish National Antarctic Expedition, William Speirs Bruce, introduced to him the forty-one-year-old James Murray, who also had a strong recommendation from Antarctic scholar Sir Joh
n Murray (to whom he was unrelated). It would have been a foolish man indeed who ignored such testimonials. The son of a grocer, Murray had a sporadic early education before leaving Glasgow's School of Art with a training in sculpture. However in the 1890s he became fascinated with natural history and particularly the study of microscopic creatures then just being discovered. Although virtually self-taught, Murray soon became an international expert, first studying tardigrades, of which he ultimately discovered more than sixty new varieties, and then turning his microscope to rotifers, describing more than one hundred new species or varieties. In 1902 he was engaged as assistant zoologist on Sir John's bathymetrical survey of the Scottish lochs. Unfortunately, this intensive programme contributed to a physical breakdown, causing Murray to note, 'I was just a little uneasy in my mind foisting upon Shackleton such a wreck of humanity.' Never the less, it was apparent from the start that he would make a strong scientific contribution.

  The opposite in virtually every way from Murray - age, background, health and reasons for going south - was Sir Philip Brocklehurst, at twenty the expedition's youngest member. A baronet from Swythamley Park in Staffordshire, Brocklehurst was a tall, strapping Old Etonian currently at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, when he met Shackleton. He had received a Half Blue for boxing and spent a great deal of energy pursuing that pastime at the National Sporting Club in London. On one such trip to the City in March 1906 he was introduced to Shackleton over tea at the Brompton home of a friend. The young man was instantly impressed by the explorer, and wrote directly after their meeting, volunteering to go south.

  The positive response was mutual, there being a spark that set off a life-long comradeship (Shackleton was Brocklehurst's best man in 1913). Sir Philip had good social connections, but more importantly - from a strictly mercenary standpoint - he had serious money, and he offered to contribute funds to the expedition. Shackleton wasted little time following up this financial avenue and visited Brocklehurst's mother, who, as her son was still a minor, controlled the purse strings. He quickly charmed her and left promising to remember her son's interest in joining the expedition. With the money he hoped might be forthcoming, he was unlikely to forget.