South: The Story of Shackleton's Last Expedition, 1914-1917
Stenhouse took the ship into position for winter moorings. He got three
steel hawsers out and made fast to the shore anchors. These hawsers
were hove tight, and the _Aurora_ rested then, with her stern to the
shore, in seven fathoms. Two more wires were taken ashore the next day.
Young ice was forming around the ship, and under the influence of wind
and tide this ice began early to put severe strains upon the moorings.
Stenhouse had the fires drawn and the boiler blown down on the 20th,
and the engineer reported at that time that the bunkers contained still
118 tons of coal.
The ice broke away between Cape Evans and Cape Barne on the 23rd, and
pressure around the ship shattered the bay ice and placed heavy strains
on the stern moorings. The young ice, about four inches thick, went out
eventually and left a lead along the shore. The ship had set in towards
the shore, owing to the pressure, and the stern was now in
four-and-a-half fathoms. Stenhouse tightened the moorings and ran out
an extra wire to the shore anchor. The nature of the ice movements is
illustrated by a few extracts from the log:
“_March_ 27, 5 p.m.—Ice broke away from shore and started to go out. 8
p.m.—Light southerly airs; fine; ice setting out to north-west; heavy
pressure of ice on starboard side and great strain on moorings. 10
p.m.—Ice clear of ship.
“_March_ 28.—New ice forming over bay. 3 a.m.—Ice which went out last
watch set in towards bay. 5 a.m.—Ice coming in and overriding newly
formed bay-ice; heavy pressure on port side of ship; wires frozen into
ice. 8 a.m.—Calm and fine; new ice setting out of bay. 5 p.m.—New ice
formed since morning cleared from bay except area on port side of ship
and stretching abeam and ahead for about 200 yds., which is held by
bights of wire; new ice forming.
“_March_ 29, 1.30 p.m.—New ice going out. 2 p.m.—Hands on floe on port
quarter clearing wires; stern in three fathoms; hauled wires tight,
bringing stern more to eastward and in four fathoms; hove in about one
fathom of starboard cable, which had dragged during recent pressure.
“_April_ 10, 1.30 p.m.—Ice breaking from shore under influence of
south-east wind. Two starboard quarter wires parted; all bights of
stern wires frozen in ice; chain taking weight. 2 p.m.—Ice opened,
leaving ice in bay in line from Cape to landward of glacier. 8
p.m.—Fresh wind; ship holding ice in bay; ice in Sound wind-driven to
north-west.
“_April_ 17, 1 am.—Pressure increased and wind shifted to north-west.
Ice continued to override and press into shore until 5 o’clock; during
this time pressure into bay was very heavy; movement of ice in straits
causing noise like heavy surf. Ship took ground gently at rudder-post
during pressure; bottom under stern shallows very quickly. 10
p.m.—Ice-moving out of bay to westward; heavy strain on after moorings
and cables, which are cutting the floe.”
Stenhouse continued to nurse his moorings against the onslaughts of the
ice during the rest of April and the early days of May. The break-away
from the shore came suddenly and unexpectedly on the evening of May 6:
“_May_ 6, 1915.—Fine morning with light breezes from
east-south-east.... 3.30 p.m.—Ice nearly finished. Sent hands ashore
for sledge-load. 4 p.m.—Wind freshening with blizzardy appearance of
sky. 8 p.m.—. . . Heavy strain on after-moorings. 9.45 p.m.—The ice
parted from the shore; all moorings parted. Most fascinating to listen
to waves and chain breaking. In the thick haze I saw the ice astern
breaking up and the shore receding. I called all hands and clapped
relieving tackles (4-in. Manila luff tackles) on to the cables on the
forepart of the windlass. The bos’n had rushed along with his hurricane
lamp, and shouted, ‘She’s away wi’ it!’ He is a good fellow and very
conscientious. I ordered steam on main engines, and the engine-room
staff, with Hooke and Ninnis, turned to. Grady, fireman, was laid up
with a broken rib. As the ship, in the solid floe, set to the
north-west, the cables rattled and tore at the hawse-pipes; luckily the
anchors, lying as they were on a strip-sloping bottom, came away
easily, without damage to windlass or hawse-pipes. Slowly as we
disappeared into Sound, the light in the hut died away. At 11.30 p.m.
the ice around us started to break up, the floes playing tattoo on the
ship’s sides. We were out in the Sound and catching the full force of
the wind. The moon broke through the clouds after midnight and showed
us the pack, stretching continuously to northward, and about one mile
to the south. As the pack from the southward came up and closed in on
the ship, the swell lessened and the banging of floes alongside eased a
little.
“_May_ 7, 8 a.m.—Wind east-south-east. Moderate gale with thick drift.
The ice around ship is packing up and forming ridges about two feet
high. The ship is lying with head to the eastward, Cape Bird showing to
north-east. When steam is raised I have hopes of getting back to the
fast ice near the Glacier Tongue. Since we have been in winter quarters
the ice has formed and, held by the islands and land at Cape Evans, has
remained north of the Tongue. If we can return we should be able now to
moor to the fast ice. The engineers are having great difficulty with
the sea connexions, which are frozen. The main bow-down cock, from
which the boiler is ‘run up,’ has been tapped and a screw plug put into
it to allow of a hot iron rod being inserted to thaw out the ice
between the cock and the ship’s side—about two feet of hard ice. 4.30
p.m.—The hot iron has been successful. Donolly (second engineer) had
the pleasure of stopping the first spurt of water through the pipe; he
got it in the eye. Fires were lit in furnaces, and water commenced to
blow in the boiler—the first blow in our defence against the terrific
forces of Nature in the Antarctic. 8 p.m.—The gale has freshened,
accompanied by thick drift.”
The _Aurora_ drifted helplessly throughout May 7. On the morning of May
8 the weather cleared a little and the Western Mountains became
indistinctly visible. Cape Bird could also be seen. The ship was moving
northwards with the ice. The daylight was no more than a short twilight
of about two hours’ duration. The boiler was being filled with ice,
which had to be lifted aboard, broken up, passed through a small
porthole to a man inside, and then carried to the manhole on top of the
boiler. Stenhouse had the wireless aerial rigged during the afternoon,
and at 5 p.m. was informed that the watering of the boiler was
complete. The wind freshened to a moderate southerly gale, with thick
drift, in the night, and this gale continued during the following day,
the 9th. The engineer reported at noon that he had 40-lb. pressure in
the boiler and was commencing the thawing of the auxiliary
sea-connexion pump by means of a steam-pipe.
“Cape Bird is the only land visible, bearing north-east true about
eight miles distant,” wrote, Stenhouse on the afternoon of the 9th. “So
this is the end of our attempt to winter in McMurdo Sound. Hard luck
after four months’ buffeting, for the last seven weeks of which we
nursed our moorings. Our present situation calls for increasing
vigilance. It is five weeks to the middle of winter. There is no sun,
the light is little and uncertain, and we may expect many blizzards. We
have no immediate water-supply, as only a small quantity of fresh ice
was aboard when we broke drift.
“The _Aurora_ is fast in the pack and drifting God knows where. Well,
there are prospects of a most interesting winter drift. We are all in
good health, except Grady, whose rib is mending rapidly; we have good
spirits and we will get through. But what of the poor beggars at Cape
Evans, and the Southern Party? It is a dismal prospect for them. There
are sufficient provisions at Cape Evans, Hut Point, and, I suppose,
Cape Royds, but we have the remaining Burberrys, clothing, etc., for
next year’s sledging still on board. I see little prospect of getting
back to Cape Evans or anywhere in the Sound. We are short of coal and
held firmly in the ice. I hope she drifts quickly to the north-east.
Then we can endeavour to push through the pack and make for New
Zealand, coal and return to the Barrier eastward of Cape Crozier. This
could be done, I think, in the early spring, September. We must get
back to aid the depot-laying next season.”
A violent blizzard raged on May 10 and 11. “I never remember such
wind-force,” said Stenhouse. “It was difficult to get along the deck.”
The weather moderated on the 12th, and a survey of the ship’s position
was possible. “We are lying in a field of ice with our anchors and
seventy-five fathoms of cable on each hanging at the bows. The
after-moorings were frozen into the ice astern of us at Cape Evans.
Previous to the date of our leaving our winter berth four small wires
had parted. When we broke away the chain two of the heavy (4-in.) wires
parted close to shore; the other wire went at the butts. The chain and
two wires are still fast in the ice and will have to be dug out. This
morning we cleared the ice around the cables, but had to abandon the
heaving-in, as the steam-froze in the return pipes from the windlass
exhaust, and the joints had to be broken and the pipe thawed out. Hooke
was ‘listening in’ from 8.30 p.m. to 12.30 a.m. for the Macquarie
Island wireless station (1340 miles away) or the Bluff (New Zealand)
station (1860 miles away), but had no luck.”
The anchors were hove in by dint of much effort on the 13th and 14th,
ice forming on the cable as it was hoisted through a hole cut in the
floe. Both anchors had broken, so the _Aurora_ had now one small
kedge-anchor left aboard. The ship’s position on May 14 was
approximately forty-five miles north, thirty-four west of Cape Evans.
“In one week we have drifted forty-five miles (geographical). Most of
this distance was covered during the first two days of the drift. We
appear to be nearly stationary. What movement there is in the ice seems
to be to the north-west towards the ice-bound coast. Hands who were
after penguins yesterday reported much noise in the ice about one mile
from the ship. I hope the floe around the ship is large enough to take
its own pressure. We cannot expect much pressure from the south, as
McMurdo Sound should soon be frozen over and the ice holding.
North-east winds would drive the pack in from the Ross Sea. I hope for
the best. Plans for future development are ready, but probably will be
checkmated again.... I took the anchors aboard. They are of no further
use as separate anchors, but they ornament the forecastle head, so we
put them in their places.... The supply of fresh water is a problem.
The engineer turned steam from the boiler into the main water-tank
(starboard) through a pipe leading from the main winch-pipe to the tank
top. The steam condenses before reaching the tank. I hope freezing does
not burst the tank. A large tabular iceberg, calved from the Barrier,
is silhouetted against the twilight glow in the sky about ten miles
away. The sight of millions of tons of fresh ice is most tantalizing.
It would be a week’s journey to the berg and back over pack and
pressure, and probably we could bring enough ice to last two days.”
The record of the early months of the _Aurora’s_ long drift in the Ross
Sea is not eventful. The galley condenser was rigged, but the supply of
fresh water remained a problem. The men collected fresh-fallen snow
when possible and hoped to get within reach of fresh ice. Hooke and
Ninnis worked hard at the wireless plant with the object of getting
into touch with Macquarie Island, and possibly sending news of the
ship’s movements to Cape Evans. They got the wireless motor running and
made many adjustments of the instruments and aerials, but their efforts