SCOTT OF THE ANTARTIC

Last Sunday I saw a great documentary at Steve's house: a silent film documenting Scott's heartbreaking 1912 British expedition to the South Pole. 

The ship was the Terra Nova. Bad weather and unusually dense ice cost the expedition an extra 20 days during which significant amounts of coal and oil were lost.  

After landfall base camp #1 was established. The men took movies of themselves playing baseball with snowballs and chasing penguins. 

Land transport would be by dogsled, backed up by hardy Siberian ponies. Amundsen, a competing polar explorer, preferred to use dogs exclusively....a good choice, as it turned out.

The team had to wait for the weather to break before pushing inland.

Wilson, the expedition's artist, doctor, and zoologist, did this picture (above) of the setting sun.

A man was fell in a hole and was lost. Other holes and crevices devoured horses and dogs.

As they neared the Pole a second base camp was established and four men volunteered for the final push. There were no more dogs, They had to make it on foot, using nothing but their own strength to pull the sled. The weather turned hellish and every inch had to be fought for.

Eventually they made it, only to find Amundsen's Norwegian expedition had been there only a month before. Their disappointment as they gathered for this picture can only be imagined. Their faces are black from frost bite.

Was that when this picture (above) of Scott was taken?

The trip back to base camp was even more grueling than the trip to the Pole had been. A terrible blizzard made further movement impossible and a tent was pitched for the last time only eleven miles away from their target.

Captain Oates, feeling a bad leg made him a liability to the others, left the tent and was never seen again.

Eight months later, when the weather cleared, a party from the base camp found Scott and his remaining comrades dead in their tent. His journal lay beside him. Here's (above, abridged) the end of the final entry:

"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....It seems a pity but I do not think I can write more....For Gods Sake look after our people."

Scott and his men were buried under ice on the site of their tent.

After seeing the Scott film the following day I watched parts of Borman's film, "Excalibur." I was particularly moved by Wagner's funeral music, the image of the Lady of the Lake and of the Valkyries who stood watch over King Arthur's body on his trip to the afterlife.

I recalled the religious language used in adversity by some of Scott's men, and the thought occurred to me that religion is not a weak man's refuge, as Nietzsche believed....... It's the comfort of brave people who attempt very, very hard things.