1912 (36 page)

While scientific observations continued through the winter months of 1912, Mawson mapped out the research program for the approaching summer. Leaving behind a small group at the Winter Quarters, parties of men were to be sent out east, south and west to tackle all manner of scientific and geographical questions.

In the meantime there was no escaping the daily domestic chores, and not everyone lived up to Mawson's expectations. The Australian leader and Leslie Whetter, a New Zealand doctor on the team, had one of the more extreme run-ins. After a particularly disappointing attempt at cooking by Whetter, Mawson scribbled on a piece of paper: ‘at dinner, the soup was badly burnt…not fit to eat, no bread and the pudding tapioca a damned disgrace, only tapioca and butter—and nothing else.' Then the New Zealander failed to dig the snow out from around the hut. Mawson challenged him—why had he joined the expedition?

Whetter: ‘Not to do such kind of work!'

Mawson: ‘You're a bloody fool to come on the expedition if that was the case.'

Whetter: ‘Bloody fool yourself! I won't be caught on another.'

Mawson later wrote, ‘According to his own words he came
on the expedition so as to have a quiet time for study—I believe he came also for his health. This is a criminal matter.' Luckily, things calmed down soon after.

The growing sense of isolation through the winter was only exacerbated by the disappointing wireless results. Hopes had been high that the wireless stations would allow the bases to communicate, while also liaising with the
Aurora
over future needs and allowing weather reports to be broadcast to the Meteorological Office at Hobart. But the radio mast at Cape Denison was so badly battered by the strong winds that it was unclear whether any messages were getting out at all. Kites, tins and even one of the plane's propellers were used as alternative ways to keep the aerial in the air, but without much success.

The occasional message from Antarctica did reach Macquarie Island. One sent in May was particularly enigmatic: ‘We are sorry for poor Laseron.' Spirits must have been high at Cape Denison and the message was most probably sent as a prank, its sender not believing it would get through. But it was one of the few that did and its receiver, thinking the message was reporting Laseron's death, diligently sent it on to Tasmania. Fortunately, nothing was announced until its content could be confirmed and, when enquiries duly came, the biologist was at a loss to know what the fuss was about.

With the arrival of the summer sun in July there was a noticeable improvement in morale. It was a welcome relief to the men to know that they would shortly be getting away from Cape Denison and into a landscape they had only briefly explored. Mawson was excited, but he was also keenly aware the wind would be a constant companion on the ice and feared what it might do to his teams. The expeditionary groups readied
themselves: clothing was checked and double-checked, and sails were devised for the sledges to make travelling easier.

Mawson was leading the Far Eastern Party, journeying over the plateau towards Victoria Land with the aim of connecting Cape Denison to the western discoveries of Borchgrevink, Scott and Shackleton. Accompanying Mawson was Xavier Mertz, a Swiss champion ski runner, and Belgrave Ninnis, a young British Royal Fusilier officer who had originally been hired by Shackleton. Strikingly young-looking for his twenty-three years, Ninnis soon earned the nickname Cherub. In contrast, Mertz's first name caused problems for his English-speaking colleagues, who ended up calling him the ominous-sounding X, though he was a favourite in the hut. To cover the distances involved the expedition's dogs would be essential, and Mertz and Ninnis had looked after them since London, making the two men obvious companions for Mawson.

The Far Eastern party set out on 10 November 1912, initially making great progress. The dogs covered the ground quickly, and the team collected geological samples, noted the weather and mapped the route. But on 13 December, Mertz considered they were in a dangerous place: ‘At 4 pm we entered a height with crevasses…after there was a nice flat area ahead on which we walked until 12 pm. At 8 pm it cracked a few times underneath us. The snow masses must have broken their vaulting. The noise was like distant cannon fire. My comrades were frightened because they have never heard avalanches going off.'

The next day tragedy struck. Mertz, who was leading the three men, turned to find Ninnis was no longer bringing up the rear. Searching along the way they had come Mawson made a shocking discovery: an enormous crack had opened up across their path, and the British officer had disappeared down it. That evening Mertz wrote, ‘Dear old Ninnis, he is dead. This change was so rapid I almost can't believe it…150 feet [forty-five metres]
down in a crevasse we could see the back part of Ninnis' sledge. [They could hear a dog whining.] No other noise was recognisable…Ninnis must have died immediately…We lowered a rope with a weight and it struck the dog we could see but this one did not move anymore so it was obviously also dead.'

Ninnis's death might have been avoided. Had the Briton worn skis instead of finnesko boots, his weight would have been more evenly distributed and the snow bridge covering the crevasse would most probably have held.

They had a ‘bare one a half week's man food' and it had taken them thirty-five days to reach their current location. Mawson ruefully reflected that Mertz had ‘suffered the loss of his Burberry trousers: as a substitute he used henceforth an extra pair of woollen under trousers that happened to be saved. The six dogs remaining were the poorest of the pack, for the best preserved animals had been drafted into the rear team, as it was thought that the risk lay in front.' Now, more than five hundred kilometres out from base and not expected back for a month, the two explorers turned their backs on the icy grave and looked to home. There seemed little prospect of rescue.

The lack of supplies meant the men were forced to eat their way through the few remaining dogs. Mertz was a vegetarian and the tough, smelly dog meat was particularly repulsive to him. On 29 December he wrote, ‘Ginger, the last beloved dog, was killed and the meat was sliced. We cooked a part of it. In the tent it started to rain if the Primus was used for more than an hour….The tent is too small, only one person can move, the other one has to sit huddled in one corner…This morning I rose one hour early to cook the dog meat because if you don't do this it is uneatable.'

As they trudged on, both men suffered from constant lethargy and dizziness. Mawson's companion was deteriorating more quickly, with bouts of dysentry, loss of skin, depression
and, finally, insanity. The cause of this rapid decline appears to have been vitamin A poisoning, most probably brought on from eating dog livers, which contain toxic levels of the vitamin. The last line in Mertz's diary reads: ‘The dog meat does not seem to agree with me because yesterday I was feeling a little bit queasy.' In a final bout of madness the poor man bit one of his fingers off and then fell asleep, never to wake up.

The loss hit Mawson hard and, because of an ever-strengthening wind, the Australian was forced to stay by the grave for three days. During this time he fell into despair. ‘As there is little chance of my reaching human aid alive I greatly regret my inability to set out the coast line as surveyed for the 300 miles we travelled and the notes on glaciers and ice formations, etc.—the most of which latter is of course committed to my head.' He was a scientist to the core. Two days later Mawson pulled himself together and pushed on, wanting to do the ‘utmost to the last for Paquita's and supporters' and members of expedition's sakes'.

Mawson gave the position of Mertz's resting place in his diary. If he died, too, at least both men might be found and receive a proper burial. There has been a suggestion that the Australian may have turned to cannibalism, but this seems highly unlikely, given the effort he made to advertise what would have been a dreadfully macabre scene. Mawson trimmed back the amount he was dragging: the sledge was cut in half; photographs were left behind; and the last of the dog meat was cooked, saving precious weight in kerosene. Drinking water would now be obtained from snow left in a container to melt on the sledge top.

Over the next two weeks Mawson steered his way back to base using navigation pages ripped out of
Hints to Travellers
and the
Nautical Almanac
. Physically and mentally exhausted, he reflected in his diary that his body was rotting but ‘Providence'—God—was with him. On 17 January, halfway across
the southern end of what became known as the Mertz Glacier, Mawson fell five metres down a crevasse. Fortunately, he was connected by a rope to the sledge, now wedged in the opposing wall of ice.

Expecting the sledge to follow him at any moment, he ‘thought of the food left uneaten in the sledge—and, as the sledge stopped without coming down, I thought of Providence again giving me a chance. The chance looked very small as the rope had sawed into the overhanging lid, my finger ends all damaged, myself weak…With the feeling that Providence was helping me I made a great struggle, half getting out, then slipping back again several times, but at last just did it. Then I felt grateful to Providence…who has so many times already helped me.' Mawson considered suicide during the ordeal, but worried he would ‘fall on some ledge and linger in misery'. The climb back to the surface took four and a half hours.

Mawson struggled on, but not before he constructed a rope ladder to haul himself out of future crevasses. He was suffering various maladies, brought on by physical exertion, lack of food and acute vitamin A poisoning from the dog livers, and—the most jaw-dropping complaint of all—he was regularly strapping the soles of his feet back on with lanolin cream. His diary entries at this time are shocking but restrained: ‘Both my hands have shed the skin in large sheets, very tender and it is a great nuisance.' Others hint at a dark humour: ‘For the last 2 days my hair has been falling out in handfuls and rivals the reindeer hair from the moulting bag for nuisance in all food preparations.'

He continued, despite his afflictions, to keep weather records. Every day he noted the wind strength and direction, sometimes interpreting what this meant for the local landscape. Just a day after falling—again—into a crevasse that nearly claimed his life, he commented: ‘The wind died down as the morning advanced…It is quite apparent now that the direction
of the wind is affected by the glacier valley. Here in the centre of the valley a night wind flows down it and on each side the winds are deflected into it.' No doubt the routine helped him cope.

Two weeks late and forty-seven kilometres from base camp, Mawson stumbled upon a small snow cairn that had been erected just a few hours earlier by a team of three—led by Archibald McLean, the chief expedition doctor—out from Cape Denison. In it he found supplies and a note dated 29 January 1913 giving the location, and news of the safe return of all parties and the arrival of the
Aurora
a fortnight before. It was a remarkable stroke of good fortune—a link to home, a promise of life, an affirmation of hope. He scanned the horizon: no one was in sight.

Mawson was terribly weak by now. Hope was one thing, but he had little energy in reserve to catch up with the three men. His diary entry for the day is a classic understatement: ‘What a pity I did not catch McLean's party this morning.' With renewed vigour, however, Mawson pushed on and three days later reached the depot known as Aladdin's Cave, an ice cave at the top of the glacier overlooking Cape Denison. Inside was a wealth of supplies, including oranges and a pineapple—quite a sight for someone who had not eaten fresh fruit for a year.

Resting overnight and then preparing crampons for a safe descent, he was hit by a week-long storm. When the wind finally eased a little Mawson decided to risk an attempt. He staggered down to Cape Denison, three months after his departure, and was greeted by smoke on the horizon. The
Aurora
had sailed that morning.