The Epic of Captain Scott

This is a slim book, but a careful and accurate telling of Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova expedition, (officially known as the British Antarctic Expedition) 1910–1913, in which he perished with the others of the team who reached the pole. It is based on the diaries recovered from the men, and the stories the survivors have shared.

The expedition had scientific goals, but primarily they wanted to be the first to reach the geographic south pole. En route by ship, they received the news that a Norwegian team led by Roald Amundsen was headed for the pole, and had around a month's head start. While this news was unwelcome, it didn't change their plans.

Once landed and with the base established at Cape Evans, the priority was laying depots. For this the sixteen men who made up the party were divided into three teams - the motor team (motor sledges), the pony team (poly drawn ledges) and the dog team (dog sledges). With a staggered start the party set off for the pole. All three were used in combination to complete the depots.

After wintering over, the pole party set off. Two motor sledges remained, plus the pony team and the dog teams. Scott took a staged approach, and when the motor sledges broke down the men began manual hauling. As the ponies tired or became lame, they became fresh meat for the men, or food for the dogs. After an out of season blizzard delayed progress by three days, the dog teams were sent back to base (as planned), as the team had reached the Beardmore Glacier, where the dog sledges were unable to proceed.

The men were then reorganised into the three sledge teams of four men each. Scott, as leader was in the future the man required to decide when the third sledge would turn back, and eventually who the pole team would be, as only one sledge would be able to proceed. More depots were set with the food for the return trip. Remember at this stage the men had no idea if Amundsen was in front of them, and by how much. They were also still tracking Shackleton's route from his 1909 pole attempt, but would soon run down his furthest point.

In due course the team was reduced to the single sledge, but rather than proceeding with the 4 man team he made the call to take the extra man. This wasn't a planned move, and caused a few issues, especially for the team of three who, already exhausted had to make the long journey back to base a man down.

At this point the author pauses the story of the pole attempt and tells the story of the return journeys of sledge 3 and sledge 2. There were no issues with sledge 3 (Atkinson, Cherry-Garrard, Wright and Keohane), but sledge 2 (the longer journey with only three men - Edward Evans, Tom Crean, William Lashley) was very hard on the men. Evans eventually succumbed to scurvy, was unable to walk and began to pass out. With no way the two men could make it back to base with Evans incapacitated, Crean made a mercy dash back to base to get a rescue party. He covered nearly 35 miles in 18 hours without stopping, after a journey of three and a half months, the last part of which he was on short rations. This really was an incredible effort, and did result in the men being returned to base.

Most people know the story of Scott and his pole team (Edgar Evans, Edward Wilson, Lawrence Oates, Henry Bowers). As they neared the pole it became evident that Amundsen had indeed beaten them to the pole (by three days), and begun their return journey. Initially they made good distance, but it became evident that the decision to take 5 men brought with it some issues. Cooking for 5, for example took 30 minutes longer than cooking for 4. This meant 30 minutes less sleep each day, or 30 minutes less sledge hauling per day. This amount added up very quickly.

The depots proved to be hard to reach in the allotted times, due to the poor condition of the men. The gaps between depots had been planned on the distance the men were travelling on the way out, but hadn't taken into account the difficulties they would have from the continual exhaustion. As we know, these five men all perished. They were pretty heroic circumstances, and Scott was careful to record his thoughts to the last. In fact he spent some of his final hours writing letters to the loved ones of the men who were dying in the tent with him, recording the bravery and determination of the men. He wrote also to JM Barrie (of Peter Pan fame), who was the godfather of his son, asking him to give help to his widow and his son.

Finally Scott wrote his Message to the Public, primarily a vindication of the expedition's organisation and conduct in which the party's failure is attributed to weather and other misfortunes, but ending on an inspirational note:

We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of Providence, determined still to do our best to the last.Had we lived, I should have had a tale to tell of the hardihood, endurance, and courage of my companions which would have stirred the heart of every Englishman.