Glancing through the small saloon porthole, I saw that HMS Clyde was on the move and I ran up on deck to watch her departure. The ship slowly disappeared into a fog bank that drifted above the cool glacial water. 'The Clyde's off!' I called out to the others below but there were no takers to watch her depart with the injured Aileen now safely on board in the company of a fully qualified Navy medical officer and a well-equipped sick bay. It was such a relief after the last few days of turmoil but how, I wondered, as I returned to my bunk, did we get to this point. Aileen often recalled how her grandmother Nell, who was Tom Crean's wife, had sold the South Pole Inn and moved in with Aileen's newly married mother Eileen Crean and husband Tom O'Brien. For the next twenty years, the domineering matriarch lived with her daughter, son-in-law and their five children in an increasingly cramped house in Tralee, County Kerry, until her death in 1968. Years earlier, following the death of her father Tom in 1938 when she was only sixteen, Eileen had run the South Pole Inn under the watchful eye of Nell. She had wanted to become a nurse but had not been permitted to follow her heart, staying at home instead at the family pub in Annascaul in West Kerry to support her mother. Her sister Mary had already left home to work in Tralee. It was only as Eileen tenderly and expertly nursed her mother through her final illness that Nell acknowledged the sacrifice that her daughter had made as a young woman. She told Eileen that she should have allowed her follow her heart and become a nurse. This was a rare expression of regret from a woman who wasn't very open. Aileen always regretted that her grandmother was so reticent when it came to telling the grandchildren stories about the exploits of her husband and their grandfather, Tom Crean. Tom had shown a similar reticence to talk about his life on his return to Annascaul from his three trips to Antarctica with two of the most renowned Antarctic explorers and sea captains, Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton. But the political landscape in Ireland during the 1920s, when the War of Independence was followed by a bloody civil war, would not have endeared Tom, as a retired British Navy boatswain and decorated hero, to some. Indeed, a short distance from Tom's birthplace is the site where the first landmine was used in the country by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) to blow up a British military truck, in August 1920. The front axle and wheels of the army truck can still be seen in a garden not fifty yards from his old home at Gurtuchrane, just a mile outside Annascaul. It was only later-thanks to author Michael Smith-that the threads of Tom Crean's extraordinary tale were brought together in his magnificent book, An Unsung Hero: Tom Crean - Antarctic Survivor. Aileen understood that Tom's inspiration to the family was immeasurable and that the value of his amazing story to a new generation of Irish children via the primary curriculum is incalculable. He stands as a heroic yet modest figure in history, teaching us about fortitude, inner strength and kindness, accompanied by a steely resolve and a smile. For several years, Aileen was considering how best to celebrate her grandfather's achievements, particularly as the centenary of Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (also known as the Endurance Expedition) was drawing near. This was an expedition where Tom Crean played a prominent role in what was to be his final visit of three to Antarctica. But what was she to do? She wondered if she could attempt to understand some of what Tom had encountered and experienced by completing the famed South Georgia traverse that Tom Crean, Ernest Shackleton and Frank Worsley had undertaken in 1916 in a desperate and brave attempt to find help so that the crew of the Endurance could be saved. She wanted to honour her grandfather's memory by retracing one small, but very significant, part of his historic journey. Aileen shared her tentative plans with her sons Cian and Morgan and they agreed to join in the journey to honour their great-grandfather. She then asked me if I would join the family on the expedition. I was honoured to be given this wonderful opportunity to pay homage to my partner's grandfather and one of Antarctica's great heroes. Aileen, Cian and Morgan, along with myself, knew that we were but bit players in the realm of giants of Antarctic exploration, but that didn't stop us from wanting to take this opportunity to walk in Tom's footsteps across South Georgia and to look at the Antarctic landscape in wonder and awe at the momentous adventure that had brought their family member to this remote island. The plan was that we would travel to the Antarctic region and South Georgia and attempt the four-day traverse that Tom had completed over a thirty-six hour period with Shackleton and Worsley in May 1916 before they reached civilisation and sanctuary in the form of the whaling community in Stromness on the north side of the island. There was a lot to organise and we needed help with the logistics. Aileen sought advice from the best person she could possibly think of-Mike Barry, a Kerry adventurer and the first Irishman to walk to the South Pole, in 2004. He was also a member of the extraordinary team which, in 1997, attempted to recreate the James Caird boat journey across the Southern Ocean and the traverse of South Georgia. He agreed to meet up with us at Ballyseedy Garden Centre and Café near Tralee to answer our questions and, more importantly, to suggest a solution to the conundrum that lay ahead. Mike is a genial and approachable fellow and was happy to advise on a possible course of action. One of our provisos for the trip was that it should be in the spirit of Tom Crean, so, for that reason, we discounted the use of a tour ship liner. It would also be unlikely that a tour ship would have a sufficiently flexible itinerary to allow us complete the traverse, especially as the vagaries of the weather on South Georgia can play havoc with limited timescales. Mike suggested we contact Skip Novak, a world-renowned sailor and mountaineer who operates two sailing boats-Pelagic and Pelagic Australis-in these lower latitudes. Travelling on one of these boats would, Mike believed, give us greater scheduling flexibility to enable us to complete the traverse. There followed a series of emails to Skip Novak to try and establish a sound basis for us to attempt the traverse. We checked out his website for information on travelling in that region of the world and began to realise the difficulties that lay ahead. Sailing in the Southern Ocean is a challenge in itself and we had little or no sailing experience. On South Georgia, we literally had a big mountain to climb and we had scant serious winter mountain or off-piste skiing experience. Notwithstanding the challenges of both getting to South Georgia and ensuring we were fully trained for the traverse itself, we set a date for September 2016 to undertake the Crean family adventure in memory of a heroic grandfather and great-grandfather. Tom Crean, or 'Tom the Pole' as he was known locally, was born on 25 February 1877 at Gurtuchrane outside Annascaul in West Kerry. He was a farmer's son and had nine siblings, five brothers and four sisters. Many of the houses in the village were built on the strength of British Navy pensions and maybe this was the economic incentive Tom needed to join up instead of leading a life as a farm labourer, which would have been his only other career option at the time. Stories would have been told over a few pints in the local bars of far-flung locations around the world, the excitement of international travel, and the comparatively good wages and relative wealth at the end of one's working life in the form of a Navy pension. In 1893, at the age of fifteen, Tom joined the Royal Navy after signing up at the local Coast Guard station at Minard Castle, a couple of miles from Annascaul. By 1900, he had been promoted to Petty Officer Second Class and posted to HMS Ringarooma, a special torpedo vessel. Whilst serving on the HMS Ringarooma, Tom volunteered to join the 1901 British National Antarctic Expedition. A position had become available because a seaman named Baker had struck a Petty Officer on the Discovery and subsequently absconded a couple of days before Discovery was due to set sail from Lyttelton, New Zealand. Tom was on board the Discovery as part of the seconded working parties from other Royal Navy vessels, refitting the rigging and plugging a serious leak which had damaged some stores. He was aware of the shortfall in members and so volunteered to join the ship's crew. He was taken on as Baker's replacement and left the HMS Ringarooma with the high regard and best wishes of his shipmates. The gifts he received from them eventually became family heirlooms within the Crean family treasure chest. The Discovery expedition became the first of three expeditions to the Antarctic that Tom undertook during the period which is commonly called the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. The Discovery, under the helm of Robert Falcon Scott, sailed for Antarctica on 21 December 1901, finally anchoring in McMurdo Sound near what was to become Hut Point. The expedition provided Tom with a great grounding in Antarctic seamanship and Polar travel. Only forty-eight members of the expedition and seven of the Polar party, including Scott, Wilson and Shackleton, logged more...
