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".
