OHYAT: Picture Day

ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO TODAY, the Polar Party went over their measurements from the previous day and decided they were about three miles from the pole itself. In that direction Birdie spotted something, so they marched towards it.



It was the camp the Norwegians had named Polheim. In the tent was a record of the five men who'd been on that spot a little over a month before and a note saying the tent was two miles from the pole, as well as some cast-off supplies, and a letter from Amundsen to King Haakon of Norway which he asked Scott to take back with him.

Wilson happily took a spirit lamp from the stash, 'which I have wanted for sterilising and making disinfectant lotions of snow,' which means by this point the wound Taff Evans had received while building down the sledges must have come to his attention and required serious care.

Then they found the spot they considered 90°S, a little ways away.

We built a cairn, put up our poor slighted Union Jack, and photographed ourselves –

– mighty cold work all of it – less than 1/2 a mile south we saw stuck up an old underrunner of a sledge. ... I imagine it was intended to mark the exact spot of the Pole as near as the Norwegians could fix it.

... Well, we have turned our back now on the goal of our ambition and must face our 800 miles of solid dragging – and good-bye to most of the daydreams!

– R.F. Scott