|
Leaving Hobart
The Aurora in pack ice |
Aurora /
Mawson 1911-1914
Bert Lincoln
was an Able Bodied ordinary seaman on board the SY Aurora during a trip
lasting just under three months from Hobart to Commonwealth Bay Antarctica
and back again to relieve Mawson's expedition during its second summer,
the middle of a three summer and two winter expedition. What follows is Bert's diary
of the voyage.
It is typed it as it is written.
There is an occasional word or letters that I have not been able to
interpret, at these points I have written a row of dashes ----- or
wrapped question
marks around the word where I have ?guessed?
This page - Page 2 - in Antarctica
Sunday Jan 12th
The sun has just
risen clear of the horizon and just alongside a big berg. the time
of sunrise is 1.45 and it set at about eleven o'clock so was out of
sight for about 2 1/2 hours but we have had no darkness for three or
four days. It seems strange to come on deck at midnight and find it
very nearly as bright as midday sunshine and able to read or sew.
anywhere --- if you can see your fingers & a needle with mitts on
your hands. We sighted many large icebergs this morning and a great
number of whales both Blue whales and fin -backs. We took a sounding
at 3.50am and got a rock bottom at 350 fathoms and at 6 a.m. we took
another sounding and got depth of 180 fathoms & at 8 o'clock we got
224 fathoms & at 9 o'clock we came into drift ice and at 9.30 we
were only 30 miles north of the Antarctic Circle. It is a fine
morning & the temperature is 30º. We took a sounding again at 10.30
& got 230 fathoms we are now 80 miles off our main base in Adelie
Land. There are scores of blue whales, finbacks & killers around us.
We passed close to an iceberg about 3 miles long but have seen some
away on the horizon which are 30 or 40 miles long quite big islands
of ice. At 7.15 p.m. a heavy S.E. wind is raging and sprays are
sweeping the bridge and funnel. The temp is now 29º which is 3º of
frost. and there are little icicles hanging all over the ship. We
must now be very careful as we are surrounded by drift ice &
icebergs and the weather is getting very thick. We are now in Lat
67º S. and the main base in Commonwealth Bay Adelie land was sighted
at about 9.30 p.m. and there is a large ice barrier on our port
beam. The wind is howling a treat and the cold cuts like a whip but
we crept to our anchorage about 1.30 a.m. All hands on deck getting
anchors out and the motor launch ready to put in the water. Came to
anchor at 2 a.m. and after putting tackle on fore part of windlass
(to help bear strain) a watchman was appointed & rest of crew turned
in at 2.30 a.m.
Monday Jan 13th
At 6 a.m. we were all woke up with a rush as the strop
securing the above mentioned tackle had carried away during a heavy
squall and the windlass brake was not sufficiently screwed down and
the cable chain was rushing out at the rate of knots and before
anyone could get to the brake the whole lot of cable disappeared
overboard, and is now on the bottom of sea, a loss of one anchor &
125 fathoms of new heavy Navy cable. We will no doubt dredge for it
as it is valuable and might mean the loss of the ship. We of course
steamed to position again and dropped our port anchor and you can
guess we have plenty of safety tackle on also a devils claw and if
this goes it will take the ships bows with it. The wind sometimes
blows here at a velocity of 300 miles an hour. We are anchored in 15
fathoms of water and about 50 yards from shore which is about 3 feet
of rock with 125 feet of ice above it in the shape of a cliff with
perpendicular sides at the water's edge and sloping away back to a
hill of ice & snow 250 ft high. This glacier is like nothing you can
imagine but at the face it shows the ice in all shades of blue from
sky blue back to pure white and a laying of frozen snow covering
all. There are numerous big crevasses intersecting the hill and at
the water's edge these are continually splitting down and hundreds
of tons of ice in the form of small bergs go thundering into the sea
making the old ship pitch and strain at her anchor. At 2 o'clock
this afternoon the motor launch went ashore to Dr. Mawson's camp and
brought aboard one of his men and some scientific specimens which
have been collected. but Mawson is not expected back for 2 or 3 days
he has taken a a party to the Magnetic Pole. he left on 15th
December. The men at the base now have only been back from and
exploring trip 2 days . The motor launch made 3 trips ashore before
9 o'clock tonight, and are now ashore for ice for fresh water. we
melt the ice in our snow tanks which are heated with steam pipes.
Our water has been getting very brackish lately, so we are glad to
get ice-water.
Tuesday Jan 14th 1912
This morning we had to take the motor launch to davits
and hoist it just clear of the water as the weather was getting
boisterous. We have been working all day and turn in all night but
we are to go watch & water as at sea, shortly, so that the work of
shipping spare stores and specimens from the camp ashore, can go on
by night and day. The temperature to day has been 31º. Early this
morning whilst the watchman was in the galley on deck, one of the
men woke up and was having a smoke when he noticed live coals
dropping on the forecastle floor from the deck overhead and on
investigating found that the bogey & its chimney were red hot and
had set the place afire & it was blazing furiously although confined
to a small place. By shutting off draught from it and a liberal use
of water they succeeded in extinguishing it after half an hours
work. They had to reach into the fire from a small opening and throw
water on with a pannikin. It burnt a hole through the main deck
under the forecastle head.
Wednesday
Jan 14th
At 4 o'clock this morning the wind was
piping, and the ship was straining at her anchor, and the anchor and
cable we have left is smaller a good deal than the one
we lost the other morning so we were very anxious, especially as the
wind was blowing at a velocity of 90 miles an hour by the wind gauge
ashore. but the windlass with the help of a big
tackle and a devil's claw and a
large mooring wire which were all
arranged to take the strain together held safely and we were not
sorry either as if the cable went we would have nothing much good to
put on our spare anchor and would always have to keep on dodging
about till we finished here and then go to the other base which is
1300 miles away and do the same there and I the meantime being
without anchoring gear stood a tremendous risk of losing the ship.
The wind here sometimes blows at a velocity of 300 miles an hour and
for the twelve months the parties have been here
the wind has averaged 55 miles an hour for
everyday. This seems to be by far the worst spot in
Antarctica for cyclones blizzards etc. As it is much better at the
other base which is named Gosberge.
This morning at 4 o'clock the
temper was down to 23º and wherever the seawater touched the ships
sides or the bottom of the motor launch as it hung in the davits it
instantly froze but still we did not feel the cold any more than in
winter time in Australia. I had one pair of underpants and a pair of
navy blue ship's uniform trousers and a flannel (navy) my green and
white football jersey (which is about worn out) and the blue coat
which ?Frededinold? made me three years ago and a muffler & my
Happy Hooley hood, One pair of cashmere
socks and my seaboots. At this rate I will be able to wear out my
old clothes and save my good new ones which the ship issued to me. I
have now about five times as many clothes as ever I had in my life
before and also 5 pairs of boots and two (2) pairs of sea-boots
making 7 pairs in all. I will need a wagon to shift my clothes from
the ship when I pay off. But I expect when we are homeward bound
I will dump those that have been in service the longest.
Thursday Jan 15th
Dr. Mawson is not back with his party yet and in fact the men here
were divided in 4 parties one of them to be relief party and
establish food depots on the lines of march of the other three
parties and only the relief party are home again the rest are all
overdue and some of the relief party came in snowblind and
altogether they had a hard time of it. what with shortage of food
and blizzards etc. and sometimes for a whole week would not be able
to over more than 12 miles or an average of about 2 miles a day.
About half of our Esquimaux dogs were taken ashore last night for a
run on the ice and snow and when a couple of them were passed down
with there chains the rest were all anxiously scrambling to get in
the front line so they would get taken that trip but only half were
taken and when the launch returned the wind was getting to strong so
we hoisted the launch clear of the water and knocked off for the
night only keeping time during our watch on deck.
Friday Jan 16th 1912
The weather is still fairly fine which is a good job for us
while we have only one anchor. We got our spare anchor from below
into the fore hatchway but found that the stopper was too big by
about a quarter of an inch so the engineers and donkeyman have been
chiselling it down smaller to fit. When it is ready it will be
useless as we have no spare cable to shackle it to. No more men have
come in from the exploring parties ashore and the men ashore are
getting anxious for their safety as their food was only supposed to
last till yesterday although I suppose in case of emergency they
would eat some of their dogs. The rest of our
dogs were taken ashore this morning so if a search party has to go
out for the missing two parties they will have dogs for their
sledges.
The most anxiety is felt for the men with the
motor-sledge their leader's name is Vickerson.
The
temperature today is 26º above zero or 6º (6 degrees) of frost.
Freezing point is 32º.
The weather is nice and warm as long as it
is calm but the cold bites a little when the wind is blowing hard. I
notice that the Australians (including New Zealander's) stand the
cold quite as well as the men who hail from cold countries. I
suppose we will soon be fishing today and recover our lost Anchor
cable as the Chief mate & Chief engineer are busy making a grappling
iron. They think they are journeymen blacksmiths I can tell you.
Saturday Jan 17th
Early this morning in fact at exactly 2 bells (1 o'clock) one of
the AB's came into the fo'c'sle and said there is a party on sight
coming over the ice-mountain. Of course there was a stampede for the
deck some of the watch below coming straight out of their bunks with
only singlets and underpants on. The firemen came up next then the
sailmakers and boatswain. There were three men, it turned out
afterwards to be Vickerson and his party with the motor sledge one
man on the sledge breaking the ice so we could not see him but the
three men walking behind made us think it was Mawson as his party
consisted three. We waved to the party from our forecastle head and
they waved back. They had no food left, not an atom so they just got
back to camp in time. One of the men a man named Murphy and next in
command here to Dr. Mawson told us that he made one trip in the
spring and he averaged 2 miles a day for a week making 12 to 14
miles in a week but he made the return in one day. so it shows how
crevasses hinder them till they know where they are. Huge pieces of
ice were thundering down the face of the glacier into the sea all
last night and one tremendous lump came down the swell from which
made the ship rock and roll and tug at her cable. Some pieces are
drifting out so we might be able to catch some and water ship as at
present they bring off a couple of basketfuls in the launch whenever
they are coming from shore without a cargo.
The men on shore who
are scientists cannot rig up their wireless telegraph masts which
were blown down in a blizzard since the ship was here last year so
our crew have to do it for them and to-day we, the A.B's have
been splicing wire for stays while our chief mate and two of
our chaps were ashore all day setting the stays up tight. Handling
the wire was not a nice job especially in the cold and at such a job
we could not wear mitts as it would be too awkward. The men ashore
had to stay the lower mast well then send up the topmast and set the
topmast stays tight, and now a top-gallant mast has to be sent up
and its stays set up tight, then the wireless operators want a royal
mast sent up above that again but whether the royal mast will be
sent up, for them or not is doubtful yet. The lower mast and
topmasts reach to a height of 130 feet above waterline while the
fore-top-gallant mast of the "Aurora" is only 85 feet (above
water-line) at the truck. so by the time the top-gallant mast is set
up on shore I think the operators ought to be satisfied although the
higher the masts the further the messages will reach.
When the
men were tightening the stays up on the topmast a lanyard carried
away and the stays which were already tightened pulled the mast over
to such an angle that the mast was on the point of falling when they
caught and held on to the broken end of the lanyard and their weight
was just enough to right the mast then one man let go and put on a
new lanyard and they then finished the job without mishap.
To-night after six o'clock the launch came back to the ship from
shore with our men and a couple of baskets of ice and after getting
two more baskets of ice the launch put off from the ship to drag for
our lost anchor and cable, and after dragging for 3 1/2 hours till
about half past ten their grappling iron caught on the cable, but of
course all they could do was to place a buoy on the end of the
grappling line and leave it so that if it is fine weather to-morrow
(Sunday) we can fish it up and get the anchor aboard. but the
sailors are all wishing a gale of wind to blow to-morrow to prevent
them from working us so that we will have Sunday without work just
by way of a change. In every ship on Sundays a man always has to be
at the wheel steering and at night a man on lookout but other than
those duties there is no work on Sundays unless anything
should suddenly go wrong, and the crew have to work to save the ship
from damage, but in this ship all the most needful work is left for
Sundays on purpose, so much so in fact that of the nine months I've
been in her I have had only about three Sundays without working all
my watch on deck when at sea. When we are in civilised port of
course we have our Sunday as the authorities would come down on the
skipper. While the "Aurora" was in dock at Williams town undergoing
repairs, the officers were hard put to it sometimes to find us
enough hard work to keep us busy for we were there for three months,
and we sailed out on a Saturday dinner time and of course worked
Saturday afternoon, and on Sunday we were working aloft all day
bending the sails on to the yards in a drizzling rain, The vessel
was bound to Port Kembla N.S. for coal and from there to Hobart from
Hobart to MacQuarrie Is. and back to Hobart to get ready for trip to
Antarctica, and the sails were not used for some days after they
were bent and in fact very little were they used on the voyage to
MacQuarrie and back even with a dead-fair wind, and we sailors
naturally thought it a dirty trick when the sails could have been
bent on whilst in dock a lot easier than when at sea with the vessel
rolling.
I used to be a great believer in everything British but
"live and learn" I will have to be hard up to sail again under an
English flag. From now onwards I will go first under my own flag
Australian failing that I will go under a foreign flag preferably
Scandinavian, S.American or French.
The "Aurora" flies. The
English blue ensign, and as a house-flag the Royal Thames Yacht
Clubs flag. I don't mind hard work and plenty of it but I hate so
much overtime for nothing, when on low-wage.
Sunday Jan 19th
Our watch came on
deck at 4 o'clock this morning and found it fairly cold, the
thermometer registering 20º above zero which is 12º of frost. A
strong wind was blowing and the launch which was moored alongside
was taking sprays over herself and as the spots of water hit her
they immediately turned to ice so that she was quite dry but had a
thick coating of ice over every exposed part. It seems strange to
put a lump of ice down on deck and come and lift it after a couple
of hours and find it still the same size and the deck quite dry
underneath it. The ice seems more like great lumps of alum than like
ice. The other watch, which went below at 4 o'clock this morning and
turned in, were called out at 5.30 to help hoist the motor launch as
the water was getting rough. They then went off duty again until 8
o'clock. This was a job that ought to have been done at 4 o'clock, 8
bells when both watches were dressed and awake instead of
waking men up in their watch, off duty and making them get dressed
for ten minutes work. but that is the officers' style aboard here.
The other watch were due on deck again at 8 o'clock and were
supposed to have their breakfast before that to do which they must
turn out at 7.20. but it being blowing hard & Sunday they would not
then turn out till 8 o'clock when we came below.
At 10.20 the
wind fell dead calm and the other watch had to start trying to fish
up our lost anchor & cable. I think our watch were wanted too but as
there were only two of us keeping the watch we would not turn out
till our proper time, 12 o'clock noon. At noon the others watch
should have gone off duty, but all hands
were kept at work and the other watch went below for dinner at about
2.30 or 3 o'clock and were called out again twenty minutes later.
We, of both watches had quarter of an hour for tea at a quarter to
six and then had to work on till a quarter past ten at night.
Then our watch, whose watch below it was by rights from 8 till 12
(midnight) were sent below about half past ten and had to turn out
at twelve (midnight) and keep the 12 till 4 watch in the morning.
The other watch had the worst of it this time for a change. Two men,
one from each watch went ashore with the chief mate this morning and
have been working at the wireless masts all day. Our port anchor was
heaved in and dropped again three times during the day and as the
cable does not fit the windlass and so slips badly it means a lot of
heavy hauling for us with tackles to prevent it jumping out of the slots
in the windlass to say nothing of the terrible risk we run when
handling it. After all the bullocking today e smashed up a grappling
iron and then a small kedge anchor which was used for dragging and
we never got our anchor & cable, so we will have to get it replaced
in Australia when we return.
When we were up to these capers
today the officers of course only stand by and give orders, and when
their watch is up they get relieved & go
off duty but we must keep going and some of the officers are so
mutton-headed that they give us double the amount of work that is
necessary on account of this ignorance, and in fact it was the fault
of the chief mate that we lost the anchor and cable for he left the
brake of the windlass unsecured, and put a rotten strop to hold the
preventer tackle on the fore part of the cable and when the strop
carried away the cable just ran out over the windlass gathering
speed as it went till it all disappeared. Thus ends our first Sunday
in Adelia Land. and this job has been saved for us until Sunday
instead of being done on the one or two calm days during the week,
never mind. "All the nice girls love a sailor, ha! ha!
Monday Jan 20th 1913
The motor launch which went ashore last night after we stopped
work with some of the shore men, and was supposed to come off at six
o'clock this morning to take the mate and two men ashore to work at
the wireless masts, did not come until two o'clock this afternoon,
but in the morning our watch, the boatswain and the mate and his
gang of two were all working at the windlass getting the starboard
barrel off as the bearing on the port side of it which got smashed
yesterday, had to be taken off. It was a difficult thing to
accomplish but was done by one o'clock. The mate and his two went
ashore at two o'clock and the was on deck were busy reeving new
braces on some of the yards, a thing which was badly needed in one
or two instances. The tide was exceedingly low here to-day which was
the cause of the motor launch being so late, for she was high
and dry aground this morning when the men of the shore party woke
up, and they could not drag her into the water as she was too heavy.
The mate and his two men have been working at the top-gallant mast
ashore to-day which will reach to a height of 170 feet when set up,
or about twice the height of the fore truck of the "Aurora".
This
morning at about half past twelve a party left the hut ashore to go
and look for the motor sledge which was abandoned about eleven miles
away on the ice, the motor sledging party having had a hand sledge
with them when they returned the other day and not the motor as they
had run-out of spirits to drive her with and she was too heavy to
drag when they were so hungry. If this last party see any signs of
Mawson they will let us know by smoke signals so they say. I hope
Mawson comes in soon as we are supposed to leave here on the
twenty-fifth for Gosberge, which is the base of the party under Mr.
Wild's leadership. If we have to leave here without getting Mawson,
the "Aurora" will either have to come back and freeze in over the
winter or else go home to Australia and return here next summer as
by the time we pick up the eight men at Gosberge it will be too late
to return here, and then escape wintering here and they are doubtful
as to whether the ship can stand the pressure of the ice during the
winter as she is getting old now being in her thirty-seventh year
and having had a hard life of it, always among ice in the arctic
ocean, when whaling. It is now eight o'clock in the evening and the
motor launch has just brought us two baskets of ice and returned to
the shore for the mate and his men. The ice is melted by steam in
the snow tank and run off into the ship's water tanks. The launch
returned about ten o'clock without the mate as they stayed ashore
to-night to finish off setting up the top-gallant stays on the mast
ashore as it was unsafe to leave the top-gallant mast which they
erected that evening, without proper stays. The party who were out
to get the motor-sledge to day returned with it about ten o'clock,
but they saw nothing of Dr. Mawson and his party, so it is very
likely that a search party will have to start out to find him and
take food etc. as he may be in a bad way.
Tuesday Jan 21st 1913
The weather
is still fairly fine. the party ashore are still anxiously looking
for Mawson's return. The motor launch is still kept plying between
the ship and the shore, and every night she brings off four basket
of ice for water. The mate and his two men have been ashore again
today finishing off their job, and now it is finished they find that
they want another separate mast erected, so a mast, that had
formerly belonged to a vessel called the "Clyde"- which was wrecked
at MacQuarrie Is and is stowed down in our tween decks has to be dug
out of the coal to-morrow and floated ashore and there to be
erected.
Wednesday Jan 22nd 1913
This morning we have been getting the "Clyde's" topmast up from
below, and it was towed ashore this afternoon but the launch.
We
are having better times this week, as now there is not much to be
done and the mate is ashore all day so he is not running round the
deck getting excited in his endeavours to find a job for us, we are
just doing necessary work and keeping the decks a bit tidy.
The
motor-launch came off at six o'clock this evening with some cases
and 2 baskets of ice and I went ashore in her for a look round.
The men here have got a pretty comfortable hut. Their beds are
arranged round the sides as the bunks in a ship's forecastle, and
all have a lot of heavy clothes hanging up around their bunks. They
take it in turns to be cook and sculleryman etc. The stove is a nice
looking one, and they have been blackleading it.
I went and
remembered myself to the dogs which we brought down this trip and
when I left them they did set up a howling. I got some small stones
and brought off in remembrance of Adelie Land, Antarctica, and I had
a look at the motor sledge. It is made from an aeroplane. The planes
are taken off and a pair of steel rails bent up-wards at the fore
ends are fastened underneath the machine as runners, The
propeller works it as it would the aeroplane by drawing it forwards
and the same steering gear works the sledge as when it was an
aeroplane, and although it looks rather a clumsy contrivance for a
sledge the men here say it travelled up the hill behind their hut at
a rate of forty miles per hour. The temperature tonight is 27º that
means 5º of frost.
Thursday Jan 23rd
1913
The wind was blowing pretty strongly today and
the launch did not go ashore till 4.30 this afternoon and the tide
was very low it could not get alongside to take any ice, Tonight it
is taking barrels of dried barcouta ashore for the dogs. This
afternoon our watch was busy in the chain lockers taking turns out
of the port cable which got terribly kinked & turned when we were
manoeuvring with it on Sunday, this job was pretty tough work as the
cable is fairly heavy and the turns were very numerous. A search
party of three men set out today in search of Dr. Mawson. They left
the camp about midday. I hope Mawson gets back safe and decides to
go back home to Australia this summer and not, as many here seem to
expect, stay here until next summer, when the ship would of course
have to proceed to Adelie Land again. It has been fairly cold today
the thermometer registering 30º. A big fall of ice from the glacier
occurred about six o'clock this evening causing a veritable
ice-field around the ship and one miniature iceberg with about 9ft
of ice showing above the water drifted fairly on to our stern and
pulverised itself into small lumps like an ice cart delivers round
in Australia, and we in the forecastle could here the crunching and
grinding going on and only separated from our heads by four or five
feet of wood, but we take such matters without concern although such
usage would send an iron or steel ship to the bottom very quickly.
Next
Page 3 - in Antarctica 2
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