STORY OF HERO’S HELPER AS HUNT Stranded on the polar ice with no help for 750 miles, the man who lifted spirits of Shackleton’s men with a banjo and a bottle of whisky
THREE simple words echoed in the freezing air as their ship, their lifeline and their hope vanished in front of them.
A crew of 27 watched in horror after Polar explorer Ernest Shackleton yelled out: “She’s going, boys.”
Endurance, which had been locked in the ice for 10 months, finally sank into its watery grave.
The crew feared the same fate – stranded, some 750 miles from safety.
But they would, of course, survive. Thanks to the heroic leadership of Shackleton and right-hand man Frank Wild, who proved to be instrumental – literally – in maintaining morale.
Frank, who stood just 5ft 4ins but had the heart of a lion, was a fixture at Shackleton’s side throughout his four expeditions to Antarctica.
Endurance sank on November 21, 1915. And in the uncertain weeks and months that followed it was Wild who kept the crew’s spirits alive by playing the banjo and sharing whisky he had salvaged from the ship.
IMAGINATION
More than a century on, a new breed of explorers has been searching for the sunken wreck in the Southern Ocean’s Weddell Sea. But with cruel irony, their efforts were thwarted when a remote submarine became trapped in ice – just like Endurance.
The search team hoped to take pictures and build a 3D image of the wreckage. Their efforts were closely fol lowed by Tim Fright, 35 – a greatgreat- nephew of adventurer Wild.
He was raised on tales of Uncle Frank’s heroics, surrounded by expedition mementoes.
Tim, from Esher, Surrey, said: “I found out about Frank as a young boy. We had a large photo on our stairs of him tending to expedition dogs. There were all these knick-knacks and things around the house.
“We’ve got a walrus tusk, a couple of medals, a little box made from wood from one of the expeditions – and one of his old skis in the garage.”
Many artefacts lie trapped aboard the Endurance and the images – which experts say would have been razor sharp – could have offered a glimpse of a world gone by.
Yorkshire- born Wild was once described by Irishman Shackleton as “my other self ”. It was the 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition that would define the pair. Shackleton and
Shackleton shouted ‘she’s going, boys’. The stern rose, then she dived ...it was over FRANK WILD EXPLORER ON SEEING ENDURANCE SINK
his crew were hoping to cross Antarctica in the first mission of its kind when the Endurance became stuck fast in polar ice in January, 1915.
The crew abandoned ship and lived in tents on the ice. One amazing photo shows them playing football alongside Endurance – frozen solid like a ghostly galleon. After 10 months, the ship’s hull finally cracked under the pressure. Wild recalled the sinking in his polar diary and was overcome, writing: “It was a sickening sensation to feel the decks breaking up under one’s feet, the great beams bending and snapping with a noise of heavy gun fire.
“Shackleton was on the lookout platform and everybody else in the tents when we heard him shout, ‘She’s going boys!“Running out, we were just in time to see the stern of the Endurance rise and then a quick dive and all was over. I felt I had lost an old friend.”
Shackleton was bereft and unable to watch as she sank to the ocean floor. In his own diary note, he said: “At 5pm she went down by the head. I cannot write about it.”
Shackleton and his men spent weeks surviving on the ice, hoping the floes would drift them to safety. In the bleakest of times, Wild, with his banjo, and other musicians among the crew staged concerts to boost morale. When the ice began to crack they were forced to use their lifeboats to reach Elephant Island – a remote and unforgiving landmass off the coast of Antarctica.
Wild was in charge of 21 men who stayed on the island as Shackleton and five others then set sail for South Georgia in search of help. They arrived 16 days and some 750 miles later.
Shackleton rallied a rescue team and returned to save his crew. Remarkably, they all survived. Back in Blighty the nation rejoiced as first word of