excerpts from the journals of Sir Ernest Shackleton, Endurance expedition
December 5, 1914
We are underway. "I cannot rest from travel; I will drink/ life to the lees." The King asked whether I feel fear on the cusp of an adventure such as this: what man could do otherwise, with so many souls under his keeping in so treacherous a place? But my excitement far outweighs it. Whatever we have forgotten, we shall have to do without; whatever we have failed to plan for, we shall have to face with our wits and our courage alone.
Last night before we sailed I wrote to Emily. I tried to explain that when I am there my heart is half-here, facing the cold spray and the ice. And, of course, when I am here, some part of my heart is there. It is no excuse for my dalliance with Rosalind, of course; there can be none. I wish I believed that Emily would understand. Sometimes I think I am no good at anything but being away in the wilds just with men. The South marks us, makes us unfit to live in civilization. The longing to return is our blessing and our curse.
And now I am returning. Ready or not, we are on our way. The relief is almost unbearable.
...
December 14
This afternoon a platform was rigged under the jibboom in order that Hurley might secure some kinematograph pictures of the ship breaking through the ice. He hardly seemed to notice how his nest swung to and fro, so excited was he by the churning below his lens!For my part, I am troubled, though it will not do to show the men so. There is more ice than I had expected to see, this far north, and I fear what we will find as we steam south.
December 15
As though summoned by the inscription of his name, the Prince himself knocked as I placed the period on that last sentence. He thanked me again for the voyage, for his photography rights, for the opportunity of being here, and asked whether I knew how beautiful all of this was. I replied that I did indeed.
We spent a long minute in silence, which he broke by clasping his hands behind his back and indicating that he is at my disposal. I felt a moment's unease before deciding upon directness, and asked whether he were aware what he appeared to be offering; he said he should hope so.
It angered me, for a moment, that he presumed my interest. (That his presumption was not incorrect only added to my frustration.) As quietly as I could, I reminded him that such fraternization is illegal at best and immoral at worst, and that he risked a tremendous amount by broaching it in so cavalier a manner.
He merely shrugged, and made the impudent observaton that given the way we routinely risk life and limb in the wildness of the ice, this danger seemed unremarkable. He reckoned I was the kind of man who understood how risk could yield reward.
Had I been I truly horrified by his proposition I would have thrown him out on his ear in an instant, and he knew it. He kept my gaze until I made up my mind, and when I nodded he graced me with a smile so incandescent it rivalled the everpresent sun.
It is one in the morning; he has returned to his quarters; and I am feeling considerably jauntier than before. Damn the ice; we shall push our way through.
...
December 24
Christmas Eve was a merry affair, complete with all the accoutrements one expects: crackers and rhymes, puddings and silly hats. We drank the weekly toast to "sweethearts and wives (may they never meet)." How many of us, I wonder, had both in mind as we downed our grog? And how many of us felt the stab of guilt for mingling our sorrow at distance from them with relief at the comfortable cameraderie of our enterprise?
The ice continues to plague us, but I will not give up hope. We shall soldier on.
...
February 24, 1915
Today we ceased to observe ship routine, and the Endurance became a winter station. I have taken care to conceal the not-inconsiderable frustration this engenders in me. Maintaining good morale is critical if we are to weather the winter with optimism intact. Whether and how the ship will survive the pressures of the ice is not within my control; I must concern myself instead with whether and how the crew survive the pressures of incessant togetherness, impending darkness, and thwarted ambition.
Hurley has begun storing his glass negatives in a crate in my cabin, as the temperature here is equable for their maintenance. This gives him a ready excuse to come and go with regularity, to which I find I cannot object.
He is arrogant, difficult, and stubborn—no doubt we are alike in these. He is fearless and I believe he truly loves the ice. This morning he was enraptured over a lead newly-crusted with snow flowers, lit by the slanting rays of sun to appear a field of pink chrysanthemums.
To call him to my cabin would imply need; I do not call. He comes perhaps thrice a week of his own accord. We play chess. Sometimes we talk. In his ministrations I find more solace than I care to admit. I had forgotten how sweetly, and with what intuition, a man can satisfy the cravings of a body so like his own. For my part, practice makes perfect and the Prince proves a willing subject for experiment.
Until such time as he returns to his quarters I can almost forget how desperately I miss the thrum of the engine and its message, however illusory, of progress.
...
May 1
One feels our helplessness as the long winter night closes upon us. Still, there is a palpable determination to resist the brooding and apathy with which the polar night affects the heart. To-night a concert in the Ritz, songs plucked on the banjo and much clapping and boot-stomping, surreal against the forbidding silence of the dark Antarctic sky.
...
May 27
Tonight there was whiskey, and singing, and then the shaving of heads. I joined the men in this, and there was much hilarity; Hurley immortalized the moment with a photograph, which I have sworn to obligate him to destroy!
Who among our acquaintances at home could comprehend this ribald burlesquery—the vital necessity of maintaining laughter in this unforgiving world of darkness and snow?
And who could condone the liaisons that form, so far from the comforts of house and hearth? Surely this can be understood only by lifelong sailors. Perhaps also by soldiers, isolated by distance and the horrors of the front.
I wonder whether the War is over, and what suffering our countrymen have known. Surely they would envy even our deprivations: our only enemy the cold and the sea which roils beneath the ice.
This is too dark a thought to continue, though I find it hard effort to turn my mind to happier things. My shorn scalp makes a fine barometer, sensitive to draughts: I think I shall not remove my woolen hat until the insulation of hair has returned. I wonder whether Hurley has noticed how skin newly-shaven tingles at the lightest touch.
...
June 22
Midwinter's Day: almost six hours of twilight, a blessing indeed. At noon the moon gave good light, and a northern glow with wisps of pink along the horizon. We observed the day as a holiday, necessary work only being undertaken, and after supper all hands gathered for toasts and speeches and songs. At midnight we sang "God Save the King" and retired to bed.
Hurley caught my eye during the singing. His face was flushed from drink and as he licked his lips I felt my own face heating. He will be here within the half-hour, I wager, and there will be no chess nor conversation for us tonight.
...
July 21
One can hear the grinding and crashing of floes to the south-west, a constant dull roar like automobiles smashing one into the other at a distance. Standing on the stirring ice one can imagine it is disturbed by the breathing and tossing of a mighty giant below. What these forces are doing to our ship I shudder to imagine.
...
October 27
After long months of ceaseless anxiety and strain, after times when hope beat high and times when the outlook was black indeed, the end of the Endurance has come... It is hard to write what I feel.
Hurley rigged his kinematograph-camera to capture the Endurance in her death-throes. While he was engaged thus, the ice, driving against the standing rigging and the fore-, main- and mizzen-masts, snapped the shrouds. The foretop and t'gallant-mast came down with a run and hung in wreckage on the fore-mast, with the fore-yard vertical. The crow's-nest fell within 10 feet of where Hurley stood turning the handle of his camera, but he did not stop the machine, and so secured a unique, though sad, picture.
We shall be tentmates, along with James and Hudson. Three misfits and their master.
Of course the loss of the ship means an end to the comfort, however fleeting, I have found in Hurley's arms. Strangely, I find his glance still warms me; though our assignations must be over, it seems we have woven a cord of trust that outlasts them. It is a surprise, but a pleasant one, and those are in far too short supply.
...
November 8
He is a fool. Hurley deliberately disobeyed my order not to take undue risk in his return to the ship, and, having stripped to the waist, dove beneath four feet of icy water to retrieve his negatives. McNish tells me they feared his heart had stopped when at last they pulled him from the freezing deep.
I could have murdered him for so risking his life, though now that we have the negatives I cannot deny their value. He gave an impassioned speech through blue lips, reminding me that his images will tell the world what we have suffered—what we hope to survive, though if we do not, these photographs and films will be all that remains to tell our tale. And our diaries, of course, though I'll burn a third of these pages before death or rescue, and in any event words can only go so far.
Tomorrow we shall sort through them together. Tonight as we huddle together for warmth there will be especial fervour in my clinging, though James and Hudson will not know why.
...
November 21
At 5 p.m. she went down by the head: the stern, the cause of all the trouble, was the last to go under water. I cannot write about it.
...
January 14, 1916
To-day we have had to shoot the dogs. Their "dog pemmican" will be a valuable staple of our diet, and we can no longer afford to retain them. I cannot allow sentimentality to risk the lives of my men. All understood the need—though McNish took it as an opportunity to grumble again about Mrs. Chippy, whose loss still seems to pain him as would the loss of a child or lover—and it was wretchedly difficult for Wild. No one can muster anything like cheer.
...
February 29
Leap Year Day. We have toasted the escape of our bachelors from the Fair Sex with what felt like a feast, though in truth it was no more than seal meat and bannock—just more than we've grown used to. It does me good to see the men in reasonable spirits. Hurley gave me a wink as we raised our cups, a slim reminder of how we might once have laughed over the toast, having returned to my cabin to lose an hour in one another. It seems like a former life, almost as far away as Rosalind's flat or my beloved wife's dinner table.
...
April 10
Into the boats at last. My rejoicing at being off the ice congealed quickly into horror at the conditions on the sea: winds a-squall, heavy swell and hummocky brash ice, truly miserable for rowing.
Constant rain and snow blotted out the stars and soaked us through. Occasionally the ghostly shadows of silver, snow, and fulmar petrels flashed close to us, and all around we could hear the killers blowing, their short, sharp hisses sounding like sudden escapes of steam.
"Death closes all; but something ere the end,/ Some work of noble note, may yet be done."
...
April 22
Tomorrow I set off for South Georgia. I am taking with me the skipper, Crean, McCarthy, Vincent, and McNish, who has done all he can to make the Caird seaworthy. In truth there is almost no chance of our succeeding, but almost no chance is better than none at all: we shall take it, and shall put every ounce of our strength and determination toward reaching our goal. By God's grace we have made it thus far; I am determined not to lose a man.
Wild shall be in charge of the party which remains here on Elephant Island. Just now I walked a while with Hurley and broke the news that I will not risk him on this journey. He is the expedition photographer; he must remain with the expedition. He took the news better than I had feared. In truth, he knows our odds; the same impulse that led him into the belly of our frozen and waterlogged ship must keep him here, husbanding his supply of film and chronicling whatever story remains to be told.
We embraced for a long moment on that windswept beach. I barely remember the ardor of our earliest touch; the nights in my cabin on the Endurance seem so long ago that we might have been entirely different men. But when we released one another, there were tears in our eyes that neither of us ventured to explain.
When he asserted that he would see me again his voice was rough. I am not sure which one of us he intended to convince, but the words rang in my ears like a benediction. May it be so, for if we meet again I shall be on the deck of a rescue vessel and the men I have labored so to husband and protect will be on their way to safety. To a world I can no longer imagine, but labor to rejoin nonetheless.
It pains me to leave such a pitiful assemblage, but I know this voyage, however fraught, is their best chance at survival. And to have made it this far and then succumb to starvation on this damnable island...! I will not tolerate it.
I have spent the last two years with Browning, but in the end it is Tennyson's Ulysses which rings in my ears. May it be our rallying-cry as we undertake this last desperate journey:
"...though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are --
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."
The End