From Antarctic ice
FREDERICK John Hooper, the arctic explorer, will be forever remembered as the man who found the body of polar hero Capt Scott.
But now – in part two of the full story behind the amazing man – History Hunters look at the busy schedule ahead for our intrepid and adventurous individual who hung up his skis and warmed to the idea of settling down to become a Southport resident working as the Mayor’s Officer.
Frederick was still living in Fareham in 1891 but then moved to Alverstoke, a Domesday-mentioned village near Portsmouth, Hampshire, where he was to find the excitement of sea adventures.
He enlisted in the Royal Navy in September 1907 – when he was just 16 for a near five years of duty.
He served mainly aboard the torpedo gunboat, HMS Dryad, with three calls of duty, the main period from July 1 1908 to May 16 1910 – when his mother died in the February.
This 1893 vessel was one of the first torpedo boat destroyers; at 262ft long and weighing just over 1,000 tons, it was not a small ship by the standard of that time, in fact, it was larger than the majority of WWI destroyers.
Manned by 120 sailors and officers it could reach 18 knots.
Its armament comprised two QF 4.7inch guns, four 6-pounder guns and, a fivebarrelled Nordenfelt machine gun, with her primary weaponry being five 18-inch torpedo tubes with two re-loads.
Hooper (service number 366297 RN) was described as being 5ft 10in, with dark brown hair, a fresh complexion, and hazel eyes and, being of “very good character,” his role aboard the ship given as “Boy Servant or Service”.
After FJH left HMS Dryad the ship was converted, in 1914, to a minesweeper operating in the North Sea and renamed Hamadryad in 1918; its original name, came from tree nymphs of Greek mythology.
Frederick then joined HMS President (July 1910 to June 1912), which was, originally, a proper ship, until the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve created a land-based training area in 1903 with drill practice on the sloop-of-war HMS Gannet moored on the river Thames; this was soon renamed HMS President and the name was transferred to dry land as a training ship.
Today, this name is still attached to the shore establishment/training ship, dubbed “a stone frigate”, and is the largest Royal Naval Reserve unit in the country, maintaining a permanent Royal Navy presence in London, with a compliment of around 300.
Leaving the Navy in 1912, FJ Hooper was picked from 8,000 applicants to become a steward on the Terra Nova (“New World”).
The vessel had originally left for the Antarctic on June 1 1910, delivering Capt Robert Falcon Scott and his four adventurous companions Dr Edward Wilson, Lieut Henry Bowers, Capt Lawrence Oates and Edgar Evans.
Unfortunately it was to be a fateful mission, and Hooper (with four others) was sent out to find the missing explorers.
Hooper joined the expedition and in December 1912 was part of the small party of five (his companions being
Abbott, Dickason, Priestley and Gran) that climbed the 3,794m high Mount Erebus on Ross Island – the southernmost active volcano on the planet – looking for Capt. Scott and his companions.
The lowest recorded temperature on this rescue expedition was -39°F, and – as we recounted last week – Hooper tracked miles across the Antarctic landscape pulling eye watering weights of supplies.
The lone tent was half buried in the desolate, blindingly white Antarctic landscape, off a previously untrodden icy path.
Inside, the frozen eightmonth-old corpse of 44-yearold Capt Scott lay wedged between those of his fellow explorers and respected companions, the flaps of his sleeping bag thrown back, and his coat open, in submission to the elements.
Scott’s esteemed colleagues, Bowers and Wilson, lay covered in their sleeping bags, as if simply dozing.
This was the terrible and poignant scene that greeted Frederick John Hooper, on November 12 1912.
Hooper was awarded the Polar Medal from the King for his actions.
When the celebrated 1948 film Scott Of The Antarctic, starring John Mills, was being made Frederick Hooper provided technical assistance, with his role played by John Owers.
He later admitted the disaster movie was so authentic that it brought a lump to his throat.
Following his harrowing experiences at the South Pole region, the now 23-year-old married 30-year-old Nellie Usmar (born February 3 1884) in January 1914.
But returning to England from his adventurers in the Antarctica was not the end of his special story.
Despite the birth of his daughter, Yvonne Beryl Hooper, on November 27 1914, born in Nellie’s home town of Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire, “Lofty” Hooper then sacrificed his family life by reenlisting just in time for WWI (1914-1918), going off to serve as a Staff Sergeant with the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, looking after the war horses.
After surviving WWI, Frederick enjoyed a healthy round of public speaking engagements and talks on all the experiences he had been through at sea and at the South Pole (which proved very popular for many years afterwards).
Then, for reasons that have yet to be established, he brought his wife and now two young children to Southport – perhaps he just wanted to be by the sea, with fresh air, and settle down, peacefully.
FJ Hooper is officially recorded as being the Mayor’s Attendant from 1922 to 1955 (as the blue plaque outside the mayor’s office states) but, I’m afraid our research shows that he is actually first recorded as the new “Mayor’s attendant and Caretaker” in (at least) the 1920 street directory.
He is listed at 1a (and 3)