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06 evans ch 6 1/30/01 12:55 PM Page 115
Amundsen versus Scott 115
However, none of that mattered on June 15, 1910, when huge
crowds lined the Welsh coastline to cheer wildly as the Terra
Nova, minus Scott, who intended joining the ship later, slipped
her moorings in Cardiff Docks and headed out into open water,
carrying with her the hopes of a nation as she lumbered over
the southern horizon.
It was a far more low-key affair a couple of months later, when
the Fram slid almost unnoticed out of Norwegian waters on
August 9, bound so it was universally believed for Cape Horn,
then up the Americas to the Arctic Circle. Strange, though; a
weird tension seemed to fill the air on board. Something was
definitely not quite right. . . .
Scott joined the Terra Nova in Cape Town and took command
for the long voyage across the Indian Ocean to Australia. The
plan was to visit as many empire colonies as possible, waving the
Union Jack, drumming up contributions, before proceeding
sedately south to Antarctica.
But that telegram in Australia changed everything.
Amundsen had even kept his own team in the dark, waiting until
the Fram reached Madeira on September 6 to take on fresh
water and other provisions before gathering his men on deck to
reveal their true destination. It is my intention to sail South-
wards, land a party on the Southern continent and try to reach
the South Pole. 9
This was jaw-dropping stuff. But before anyone had time to
argue, Amundsen shrewdly appealed to his colleagues patri-
otism, declaring it was now a question of racing the English.
Hurrah, shouted Olav Bjaaland, the expedition s ski expert.
That means we ll get there first! 10
Just before the Fram departed Madeira on September 9,
Amundsen s brother, Leon, was handed the soon-to-be-infamous
telegram, with strict instructions to delay its transmission until
October, by which time, Amundsen calculated, his rival would
be somewhere in the Indian Ocean and out of radio contact.
Untroubled by any hint of scruple and with his conscience at
least technically clear, Amundsen readied himself for the long
voyage south, still checking those plans.
06 evans ch 6 1/30/01 12:55 PM Page 116
116 GREAT FEUDS IN HISTORY
Half a world away, on board the Terra Nova the mood was
somber. Lawrence Oates, sardonic and hardheaded and the only
soldier among the mainly naval team, noted in his diary that
from the moment Scott heard Amundsen was going south he was
under pressure.
Amundsen is acting suspiciously, Scott murmured one day.
In Norway he avoided me in every conceivable manner, adding
savagely, it s the Pole he is after, all right. 11 But how did he
intend to get there? The general consensus on the Terra Nova
was that Amundsen would attack the Pole from the Weddell Sea
side, forgoing the Great Ice Barrier route, which had been tra-
ditionally British.
Back in London the mood was distinctly ugly. No country likes
to be on the wrong side of a David and Goliath battle, with its
concomitant loss of national prestige, and nervous glances were
exchanged over the way that imperial Britain had been so com-
prehensively hoodwinked by a Scandinavian parvenu. Amund-
sen s revelation had come as a bolt from the blue. Longtime Scott
patron Sir Clements Markham spluttered that Amundsen was a
blackguard, who had played a dirty trick, and he forecast
that in any case, Scott will be on the ground and settled long
before Amundsen turns up if he ever does. 12
Which turned out to be an accurate prediction.
When Amundsen finally made landfall in Antarctica on January
14, 1911, Scott had already been established at his McMurdo
Sound base camp for nine days, using that time to begin the
tedious but essential groundwork of laying depot stations across
the Great Ice Barrier for the upcoming expedition. In the three
months of Antarctic summer left to them, the British team
forged their way to 79°30'S, where they stockpiled a huge food
store, which they called One Ton Depot. Then came the weari-
some trek back through storms and howling gales to McMurdo
Sound and some astonishing news.
Far from being on the opposite side of the continent, in the
Weddell Sea, Amundsen had established his headquarters
called Framheim, in honor of his ship farther along the Great
Ice Barrier, a distance of just four hundred miles.
06 evans ch 6 1/30/01 12:55 PM Page 117
Amundsen versus Scott 117
Ice Confrontation
Amundsen s team had been spotted by the Terra Nova as it
explored the Bay of Whales. After choking back their anger and
some rather colorful curses, the British crew had found, to their
considerable surprise, that they mingled easily with the Norwe-
gians, with one crew member, Wilfred Bruce, going so far as to
say, Individually . . . all seemed charming men, even the per-
fidious Amundsen. 13
Nothing, though, could disguise the underlying tension, and
one-upmanship was rampant. Much of it hinged upon Scott s
well-publicized decision to employ three untested motor sledges
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