(Host) Commentator and Vermont Humanities Council executive director
Peter Gilbert tells us a true story of great suffering, disappointment,
and pathos that’s one hundred years old this month.
(Gilbert)
It’s rare that the story of the loser in a race is remembered more than
the winner, but that’s what happened with the race to the South Pole,
which was the great prize for glory-seeking explorers and nations after
the North Pole was claimed.
On January 17th , 1912, a hundred
years ago this month, Captain Robert Falcon Scott, an officer in the
British Navy, reached the South Pole with four other men – only to
discover that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen, had gotten there five weeks
earlier. Scott and his men had pulled their own sledges, Amundsen had
used dogs.
Scott wrote in his journal, "The worst has happened,
or nearly the worst. . . .The Pole. Yes, but under very different
circumstances from those expected. . . .All the day dreams must go; it
will be a wearisome return."
They took photos of themselves for
the record wearing heavy anoraks and overmitts, but no smiles. Scott
wrote, "Great God! This is an awful place."
The return trip was
more than wearisome; it was horrific. After a month, one of them died.
Another month later, Lawrence Oates, who could barely walk due to the
terrible condition of his feet, apparently felt he was slowing the party
down, and so, according to Scott’s journal, he left their tent for the
last time, telling his companions, "I am just going outside and may be
some time."
The three remaining men were just 11 miles from
their resupply depot when a blizzard kept them tent-bound for nine days.
To his last journal entry, Scott added a postscript: "For God’s sake
look after our people."
Scott also wrote letters to his wife and
mother, his companions’ mothers, and a number of prominent people. He
also left a "Message To The Public," in which he wrote that their
disaster had not been caused by "faulty organization, but [by]
misfortune in all risks which had to be undertaken."
In recent
decades, scholars have argued whether their deaths were in fact caused
by Scott’s poor leadership, planning, and execution, or, by among other
things, weather that was dramatically worse that year than Antarctica’s
typically horrific weather.
Scott’s message to the public ended with these words,
".
. . for my own sake I do not regret this journey, which has shown that
Englishmen can endure hardships, help one another, and meet death with
as great a fortitude as ever in the past. 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. These rough
notes and our dead bodies must tell the tale . . ."
When news of
his death reached England, Scott was lionized and idealized as the
heroic embodiment of England’s indomitable spirit.