Elephant Island
With the Endurance abandoned and the 300-mile journey to Elephant Island their new goal, the men had to resort to lifeboats to reach the island. Orde-Lees was in the lifeboat titled the Dudley Docker, and he was notably not eager to pitch in. When a storm threatened to sink the craft, he climbed into his sleeping bag rather than helping the other men with the rowing. However, he finally pitched in once it looked likely that the boat would sink.
When they finally reached Elephant Island, Shackleton and five men set off for South Georgia on a retrofitted lifeboat, leaving other men, including Orde-Lees, behind at Elephant Island under the charge of Frank Wild.
Orde-Lees and the remaining men spent months on Elephant Island. With no natural shelter, the men constructed a shack and wind blocks using their two lifeboats and pieces of canvas and stone that they lit with blubber lamps. The men hunted penguins and seals, which Orde-Lees took a lead role in.
The men were finally rescued from Elephant Island on August 30, 1916, four and half months later. Orde-Lees’ account of the time on Elephant Island is the most detailed account we have of it, so even Shackelton’s eventual telling of the event, and everything we know about it is based on his diary.
For example, Lee’s diary page on the right, and the following quote from that page, indicate the reality of the living situation on Elephant Island. In the middle of the image, Lees included a drawing of their sleeping bag situation to provide his readers with a visualization of their experience.
He compliments this figure with an explanation: “We are very crowded, especially laterally for there is not even room to place a foot between the sleeping bags so that when one of the members…wishes to go out he is compelled to step on the other bags.” Lees’ detailed description provides insight into their daily struggles and humanizes the expedition experience.
Works Cited
British imperial trans-antarctic expedition | britannica. (n.d.). Retrieved November 19, 2024, from https://www.britannica.com/topic/British-Imperial-Trans-Antarctic-Expedition
“Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge » Picture Library Catalogue.” Accessed November 19, 2024. https://www.spri.cam.ac.uk/picturelibrary/catalogue/itae1914-16/.
Behrendt, John C. “Elephant Island and Beyond: The Diaries of Thomas Orde Lees: By John Thomson Bath, Somerset, U.K.: Bluntisham Books, The Erskine Press, The Bath Press, 2003. 339 Pp. £24.95. ISBN 1852970766.” Arctic, Antarctic, and Alpine Research 36, no. 4 (November 2004): 636–636. https://doi.org/10.1657/1523-0430(2004)036[0636:BR]2.0.CO;2.
Hurley, Frank. “The Elephant Island Party.” Wikipedia. 10 May 1916. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Trans-Antarctic_Expedition Accessed 11 Nov. 2024.
Thomas Orde-Lees diary, Mss-185. Rauner Library Archives and Manuscripts. https://archives-manuscripts.dartmouth.edu/repositories/2/resources/2266 Accessed October 26, 2024.