Shackleton’s Epic: Recreating the World’s Greatest Journey of Survival - Tim Jarvis

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On such boats, the eight to ten men on board would then row the whale to shore or to a bigger whaling ship, the harpoon trace tied around the sternpost. It seemed fitting that the James Caird should take Shackleton’s men to South Georgia, the home of Antarctic whaling, like a homing pigeon returning to the roost.

      The James Caird was built in July 1914 by W. & J. Leslie, boatbuilders of Coldharbour Lane, near West India Docks in London. Commissioned by Frank Worsley, her skipper, and completed to his exact specifications, she was a double-ended whaler, with carvel planking of Baltic pine. This created a flush outer surface as opposed to clinker planking, where the planks overlap. Her stem and sternposts were English oak.

      However, she really only became the James Caird we know from Shackleton’s journey after the phenomenal efforts of Henry “Chippy” McNeish, carpenter on the Endurance and “a splendid shipwright.” Helped by others among the crew after Shackleton and his men took to the ice, McNeish raised her gunwales by some thirty-five centimeters, using wood salvaged from the Endurance’s by-then defunct motorboat and nails from the Endurance herself. Shackleton knew very early on that they would have to undertake a sea voyage at some point, so he had McNeish construct whalebacks at each end and fit a pump made by photographer Frank Hurley from the casing of the ship’s compass. It was something that would prove invaluable in the journey ahead.

      The same scene viewed by the team standing safely outside.

      Courtesy of Tim Jarvis

      Because the James Caird was lightly built so as to remain “springy and buoyant” as specified by Worsley, Chippy McNeish knew he had to strengthen her spine to prevent the middle of the boat from bending up and down with the full force of the Southern Ocean, movement that could snap her in half and sink her. To do this he removed the main mast from one of the other lifeboats, the Dudley Docker, and bolted it to the keel of the James Caird to prevent her hull from “hogging and sagging” at sea. Revealing his concerns about the structural integrity of the whaler, McNeish wrote in his diary, “I am putting chafing battens on the bow of the James Caird to keep the young ice from cutting through as she is build of white pine which wont last long in the ice [sic].” All seams were caulked with lamp wick and “paid” with seal blood and artist’s oil paint donated by expedition artist George Marston. This was the first recorded use of artist’s paints as a form of caulk for boat seams.

      At Elephant Island, Alf Cheetham and Tim McCarthy created a deck over the boat by stretching canvas over a lattice frame made by McNeish from four sledge runners and packing-case lids nailed together. Worsley recalled how, “frozen like a board and caked with ice, the canvas was sewn, in painful circumstances” by the two men whom he admiringly described as “two cheery optimists.” The bow of the boat had the strongest and most watertight section of deck created by McNeish’s “whaleback,” which extended as far as the main mast. It was masterful work by the carpenter and regardless of his curmudgeonly nature, everyone knew what a fantastic job he had done and how indebted they were to him. Even those who found him most objectionable admitted he had worked “like a Trojan.”

      Incredibly, we were not the first to try to take a replica of this twenty-three-foot keel-less boat 800 nautical miles across the world’s roughest ocean. We were, however, going to be the first to attempt it just as Shackleton had, with the same number of men crammed into the boat, using the same type of clothing, equipment, and traditional navigation techniques, and with no modern aids to safeguard against capsize or, in the event that it occurred, to help reright ourselves.

      In 2009 Zaz had introduced me to Trevor Potts, a warm, quietly spoken, tough Geordie who, with his three crew, had attempted the “double” in 1993–94. Encountering deadly seas on the approach to Wallis Island, he was forced to sail around South Georgia to the eastern side of the island, landing at Elsie Harbor. The team attempted to cross South Georgia’s mountains from Stromness to King Haakon Bay, doing the reverse of what Shackleton had done, but, due to the complexity of the terrain and a lack of food, they were forced to turn back somewhere near the Crean Glacier. Theirs was an amazing journey nonetheless and one worthy of huge respect.

      Trevor was intrigued by the prospect of us attempting the journey in the exact manner Shackleton did, with six men, using only traditional navigation techniques, nonsynthetic materials for the sails and the hull of the boat, and an open cockpit to steer from using steering ropes rather than a tiller. All of these things would make our lives far more difficult, but I was adamant I wanted to do the voyage as it had been done on the James Caird. Add to this the fact the Alexandra Shackleton didn’t have bunks and modern sea gear, and Trevor was impressed, although perhaps quietly skeptical as to whether the journey could really be done this way.

      In early 2011, I saw a familiar, stocky figure wandering down the quayside in Ushuaia, southern Argentina. It was a mariners’ crossroads if ever there was one, and, sure enough, there was Trevor. I was there to embark on a recce for our expedition, heading to South Georgia and Elephant Island as a lecturer aboard the ship The World, and he was on another vessel going to the Antarctic peninsula. Like ships meeting in the night—except this was a blustery afternoon in Ushuaia—we chatted enthusiastically and agreed to reconvene in the pub later on. After a few beers the normally reserved Trevor leaned over to me and said with a grim seriousness, “It’s pretty scary out there, you know, Tim—noisy, cold, and rough, and big, big sea. I have to say I really don’t envy you doing this but I wish you all the best and will do all I can to help.” We agreed that when Trevor got back to the UK he would set down some thoughts on what he’d learned from his voyage and what he would do differently next time. As we called it a night, he turned to assure me, and perhaps reassure himself, that there would be no next time for him. The report I later received from Trevor proved invaluable in getting things right on board the Alexandra Shackleton and I am indebted to him.

      Where do the people go? Seb’s diagram of the boat’s layout.

      Courtesy of Seb Coulthard

      Trevor mentioned that two other expeditions had attempted the double—an Irish and a German team—and sent me details. He couldn’t offer introductions but suggested that decent information was publicly available on both, including, in the case of the German Arved Fuchs, his book In Shackleton’s Wake. Former round-the-world-sailor Skip Novak, in the meantime, had supported the Irish, and both he and they were quite open to talking about the horrific experience that team had in the Southern Ocean.

      The Irish team’s expedition was called the South Aris and took place in January and February 1997. Their boat was named the Tom Crean in honor of the tough Irishman who accompanied Shackleton after begging to be part of the crew. (Originally Shackleton planned to leave Crean as a reliable right-hand man for Frank Wild on Elephant Island.) The Tom Crean was twenty-three feet long with a seven-foot beam, one foot wider than the James Caird’s. She had synthetic sails, a hull of layered plywood, a tiller rather than steering ropes, and two bunks below deck, but she was certainly no pleasure craft and contained no insulation or padding.

      Her tough, five-man crew of seasoned adventurers was obviously pushed to the limit on the voyage, capsizing three times in extremely bad weather (Force 10) on a course that was seemingly taking them east toward the South Orkney Islands. During each capsize, the crew found themselves upside down with the cabin half full of water. Their water-ballast transfer system allowed them to open a valve and transfer ballast weight, offsetting the center of gravity in the boat and rerighting it. That was all that saved them on each occasion. On getting word from their support boat, the Pelagic Australis, that conditions were deteriorating further, the crew abandoned the boat, with the captain the last to leave. His final act was scuttling the boat by drilling holes through the hull so she would sink and not be a danger to other ships. It was a valiant effort we were keen not to emulate.

      The other attempt was that of experienced German explorer Arved Fuchs and his three shipmates in 2000. With characteristic Teutonic efficiency, his replica James Caird was called, well, it had to be really, the James Caird II. Although built from the same wood as the original, she too used synthetic sails

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