It hasn’t helped that I am reading these books about Antarctic exploration out of chronological sequence! Consequently, when I come across a reference to someone or something which is familiar, I have to think for a moment which ‘appearance’ came first. Most often, this is made easy for me, as the context is already set in the book. And then, it sometimes sparks my curiosity, so that I put my book down, resort to Google, and do some exploration of my own. This is how I discovered a fascinating and poignant fact about two of the ships, which I will explain later.

So, the next instalment of my Cool Collaboration series is about the ships, and how a handful of them continually turned up during this early era of Antarctic exploration.

Sharing ships

Even today, the ships which venture to the high latitudes of the polar regions are special. It’s not just your every-day ship which can withstand the literally crushing force of ice. In the Age of Exploration, there was not the technology we have today to build the reinforcements into the structures of the ships which bear the extreme pressure. Nevertheless, they took measures, adding additional timber ribs and internal features designed to add strength and protection. The Fram, a Norwegian ship, also had a revolutionary shaped hull, designed to cause the ship to be raised onto the top of the ice, rather than stay sitting on the water and be crushed.

It was logical, therefore, that proven polar ships be sold and bought, from one expedition to the next.

The Discovery was commissioned for Scott, and launched in 1901. It was not to reappear in Antarctic history until much later, when it was lent to the British government to rescue some of  Shackleton’s team from Elephant Island, after the Endurance was crushed in ice and sank in the Weddell Sea.

The Aurora was another ship with a long Antarctic history. The Aurora was built in 1876 for use as a whaling vessel in the northern seas. Her reinforced hull, made her the ideal choice for Antarctic exploration, and in 1910 she was purchased by Sir Douglas Mawson for his Australasian Antarctic Expedition.

The use of a ship for an expedition such as this, however, doesn’t involve a straight forward journey south, and then a journey home. There is usually (always?) this intense game of odds, which is played out between ship, captain and nature. And it is not always certain who will win. When you add in the fate of the land parties, whose safe return home is entirely dependent on which is the victor, then you have some idea of how important the strength of the captain and the ship is.

So, between 1911 and 1914, the Aurora sailed to Antarctica to drop off Mawson’s teams, returning to collect the “Western party”. Then, since Mawson had not returned from his journey, Captain Davis returned the next summer to collect Mawson and a small team which Davis had left at the camp.

After her return in 1914, Mawson sold the Aurora to Shackleton, to take his support party to the Ross Sea Region, while Shackleton himself sailed to the Weddell Sea (in the Endurance). This episode in the Aurora’s history is an example of when nature gained the upper hand, in the game being played between her and captain+ship. Before the unloading of supplies for the shore party had been completed, the Aurora was forced to retreat from the area, leaving the shore party with scant supplies. This placed them in a terrible predicament, as their objective was to lay depots for Shackleton’s crossing of the continent; the “depot party” barely had enough for themselves, let alone for the depots. But that is another story. Suffice to say, despite the fact that the depot party believed that the sudden disappearance of the ship during the night meant that she had gone down with all hands, the Aurora returned to collect the team in 1917.

Meanwhile, Shackleton’s ship, Endurance, had a different story, as it was originally built for another explorer, Adrien de Gerlache. Unfortunately, however, de Gerlache’s expedition plans failed, and he sold the ship to Shackleton.

Actually, the ship was called Polaris at the time, and Shackleton re-named it Endurance. When I read this, I did wonder whether Shackleton brought the bad luck upon himself in doing this, as the Endurance was fated to be crushed in ice and sink in the Weddell Sea.  (Seafaring readers will know about the superstition around changing the name of a ship, without the required ceremony)

Back to the Antarctic ships.

There are two ships, which have caught my interest, and which encapsulate the essence of the roles of the ships in the successes and failures of polar exploration. These are the Erebus and Terror.

I must confess that I was always somewhat bemused about these names; a little sombre to be shepherding an expedition into unknown waters! But then it makes sense when you know why the ships were built in the first place. You see, they were both “bomb vessels”; that is, they were built to carry bombs during war. Not just canons, but mortars, for naval bombardment of shore targets. So, they were constructed with extremely strong hulls, to withstand the recoil from mortar activity. (The choice to re-purpose them for high altitude exploration made sense). And they had names which fitted in with their explosive and somewhat ominous purpose. Erebus comes from Greek mythology, and refers to the dark regions of the underworld. Terror presumably refers to the emotion its appearance would strike into those it met during war!? Other “bombs” of the time were sometimes named after volcanoes, which makes it absolutely logical that Ross should go on to name the two Antarctic volcanoes in the Ross Sea Region after his ships. Mount Erebus and Mount Terror went on to become symbols of homecoming and safety for the Antarctic explorers, as they would catch a glimpse of these imposing features (Mount Erebus is still active), and know that they were finally approaching their base camp.

But this is not why I’m particularly distracted by these two ships. You see, there is a prologue to their story in the Antarctic.

When Captain Ross was heading south on his first voyage in 1840, he stopped off in Hobart to re-provision, carry out final repairs, and to establish a magnetic station there (part of the scientific objectives of the voyage). The then governor, Sir John Franklin, provided an immense amount of assistance. I loved the way that Ross explained the scene of their departure from “Hobart Town”;

“Sir John Franklin and some other friends came on board to accompany us as far as the mouth of the river, and the government tender followed. Soon after noon we passed the lighthouse on the east point of the entrance of the river, and being fairly out to sea by 1.30 pm, our warm-hearted friends took leave of us, giving us three cheers at parting, which were most cordially returned from our ships, as we stood out of Storm Bay. If the deep-felt gratitude of thankful hearts be any gratification to our excellent friend Sir John Franklin, who not only evinced the most anxious desire, but sought every opportunity of promoting the objects of our enterprise, and contributing to the comfort and happiness of all embarked in it. I am sure there is not an individual in either of our ships who would not most heartily wish to express those sentiments towards him, and also to every member of his family, for their great kindness to us during our prolonged stay at Hobart-town.”

Part of the reason why Franklin was so supportive would have been that he was an Arctic explorer himself. He had earlier conducted expeditions to discover a North West Passage, a navigable route through the ice of the arctic region, to open up trade routes. After completing his time in Tasmania, the British government decided in 1845 to mount another expedition to find this elusive route. The command of the expedition was offered to Captain Ross, who declined. This was Franklin’s opportunity to get back to ‘active service’ after his stint in Hobart-town. He was 59. And he took the Erebus and Terror. Franklin commanded the Erebus, while Crozier commanded the Terror, the same man who commanded the Terror during Ross’s Antarctic expedition.

Both ships were lost, and all the men who travelled in them.

Literally.

It would be years before they pieced together the details of what happened, and even then, there are some gaps. In fact, the wreck of the Terror was not discovered until 2016; the Erebus had been discovered only the year before.

All the time while reading Ross’s account of his voyage in 1839-1840, and the obvious respect he had of Crozier, I couldn’t forget that within 10 years, Crozier would be playing out a devastating tragedy at the other end of the world, in the same ship.