Thomas Hans Orde-Lees (1877-1958)
- Biographical Notes
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Endurance
Personnel
Summary
Bakewell, William
Able Seaman
Blackborow, Percy
Steward (stowaway)
Cheetham, Alfred
Third Officer
Clark, Robert S.
Biologist
Crean, Thomas
Second
Officer
Green, Charles J.
Cook
Greenstreet, Lionel
First Officer
Holness, Ernest
Fireman
How, Walter E.
Able
Seaman
Hudson, Hubert T.
Navigator
Hurley, James F.
(Frank)
Official Photographer
Hussey, Leonard D. A.
Meteorologist
James, Reginald W.
Physicist
Kerr, A. J.
Second
Engineer
Macklin, Dr. Alexander
H.
Surgeon
Marston, George E.
Official Artist
McCarthy, Timothy
Able Seaman
McIlroy, Dr. James A.
Surgeon
McLeod, Thomas
Able
Seaman
McNish, Henry
Carpenter
Orde-Lees, Thomas
Motor Expert and Storekeeper
Rickinson, Lewis
First Engineer
Shackleton, Ernest
H.
Expedition Leader
Stephenson, William
Fireman
Vincent, John
Able
Seaman
Wild, Frank
Second in
Command
Wordie, James M.
Geologist
Worsley, Frank
Captain |
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Thomas Hans Orde-Lees
Motor expert / stores keeper
Endurance
1914-17
The Endurance Expedition
A complex and rather eccentric
character, Orde-Lees (also referred to as "Lees" in various
publications about the expedition) was a captain in the Royal Marines
at the time of joining the Endurance, he was responsible for the
motor-sledges including some of his own design, that it was hoped
would have helped carry Shackleton and his team across the continent.
Orde-Lees fulfilled the role of
a Royal Navy man whom Shackleton thought it wise to take along with
the expedition to gain political and military support he felt was
needed. It was only after approaching Winston Churchill that gained
permission for Orde-Lees to be released from his Navy Duty (bearing
in mind that the expedition was leaving England on the eve of the
First World War). He was a skier (at a time when this was very rare)
and a physical fitness expert.
A former public school boy, Orde-Lees
was generally disliked by the other expeditioners, though was an
effective and thorough store-keeper. He had a rather surly manner
and was fundamentally somewhat lazy, with no inclination to hide
the fact, simply avoiding pulling his weight if he was able to do
so. In such close conditions with other men, he was frequently ridiculed.
The men would take delight in antagonizing him if possible, when
Shackleton insisted on extra rations for instance and so over-rode
storekeeper Orde-Lees meagre distribution of foodstuffs.
He had taken a bicycle with him
on the Endurance and would often go out onto the pack ice and ride
it performing "tricks" around the randomly chaotic hummocks.
On one of these occasions near to midwinter, he became lost and
had be rescued by a search party, he was ordered not to leave the
ship alone again.
While in the lifeboat, the Dudley
Docker, on the journey to Elephant Island, a gale blew up, Orde-Lees
was malingering and not taking as much of a turn at the rowing with
the other men when Worsley, who was in charge of the boat ordered
- yelled - at him to join in as their survival may have depended
on it. Despite this and the fact that the rest of the men in the
boat joined in behind Worsley to get Orde-lees to row, he still
refused and crept onto the sleeping bags to rest (admittedly, he
was in a poor physical state due to the privations of the journey,
though no more so than many others and far less so than some who
nonetheless pulled their weight). He very rapidly began to bail
the boat out though as it began to be swamped and disaster became
an immediate possibility.
Biography
Thomas Orde-Lees was born at Aix-la-Chapelle
(Aachen) in Germany or Prussia, as it was then called during a holiday
his parents were taking. His father also called Thomas, was known
as something of an eccentric character, he was a Barrister at Law
(though not in practice) and Chief Constable of Northampton. Life
was comfortable and the family had a Butler, Cook, Nurse and Housemaid.
The young Orde-Lees was given an
education at Marlborough College, The Royal Naval School (Gosport)
and later at Sandhurst Military Academy, he gained a commission
in the Royal Marines becoming a Lieutenant Colonel. He was posted
to China at the time of the infamous "Boxer Rebellion".
In 1910 Orde-Lees applied to join
Scott's Terra Nova expedition, but was turned down.
On return to England after the
expedition, he served in the Balloon Service and saw action on the
Western front. With Shackleton's help, he joined the Royal Flying
Corps (R.F.C.) and was a pioneering figure in parachute jumping.
On one occasion, he jumped off the top of Tower Bridge into the
River Thames, only about 160 or so feet below to convince the British
Military of the usefulness of the parachute. Although this was just
a stunt, it seemed to do the trick and the R.F.C. formed a parachute
division with Orde-Lees in command.
As a result of his parachuting,
Orde-Lees went to Japan as a member of the British Naval Air Mission
where he taught the techniques to the Japanese Air Force. Staying
in Japan, he obtained a job as Tokyo correspondent with the London
Times Newspaper a post he held for 3 years. This led to an appointment
as an assistant at the British Embassy in Tokyo. His first wife
had died, leaving a daughter and he later married a local Japanese
woman.
He taught English at the Peers
School of Japan and for nearly 20 years also read the English news
on Japanese Radio right up until 1941 when Japan joined World War
II at which point he and his family were reluctantly evacuated to
New Zealand. The family had become quite wealthy living in a sumptuous
Tokyo house by this time with two servants, all of which had to
be left behind.
Upon arrival in New Zealand, the
family settled in Wellington and Orde-Lees accepted the rather lowly
position of Office Assistant with the New Zealand Correspondence
School, in effect nothing more than an office boy. Suggestions were
made that he was actually employed as a spy by the British Government,
in all events, he became well known around Wellington. He wrote
a regular travel column for children in The Southern Cross Newspaper.
Shortly before his death in 1958 he was involved in the organisation
of the 1955/58 Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition.
There is some dispute as to Orde-Lees
actual age when he died in 1958, the Karori cemetery in Wellington
show in their records that he was named Thomas Orde Hans Lees, Order
of the British Empire Air Force Cross and died aged 79. Other sources
show him as Thomas Hans Orde Lees and give an age at death of 81.
He died an ignominious death of senility in a mental hospital,
and lies in a neat, well attended plot in the servicemen's section
of the cemetery, just a hundred or so yards from the last resting
place of one Chippy (Henry) McNish.
References to Orde-Lees in Shackleton's book "South!"
buy USA
buy UK -
Shackleton refers to him as "Lees".
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The
celebration of Christmas was not forgotten. Grog was served
at midnight to all on deck. There was grog again at breakfast,
for the benefit of those who had been in their bunks at midnight.
Lees had decorated the wardroom
with flags and had a little Christmas present for each of us.
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Lees,
who was in charge of the food and responsible for its safe keeping,
wrote in his diary: "The shorter the provisions the more
there is to do in the commissariat department, contriving to
eke out our slender stores as the weeks pass by. No housewife
ever had more to do than we have in making a little go a long
way.
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By this time we had got into a bad tide-rip,
which, combined with the heavy, lumpy sea, made it almost impossible
to keep the Dudley Docker from swamping. As it was we
shipped several bad seas over the stern as well as abeam and
over the bows, although we were �on a wind.'
Lees, who owned himself
to be a rotten oarsman, made good here by strenuous baling,
in which he was well seconded by Cheetham.
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From Frank Worsley's account
"The temperature was 20° below freezing-point; fortunately, we were spared
the bitterly low temperature of the previous night.
Greenstreet's right foot got badly frost-bitten, but
Lees restored it by holding
it in his sweater against his stomach.
Biographical information
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