Wild thing

I read on the BBC yesterday that Frank Wild's ashes have been taken to South Georgia to be buried with Ernest Shackleton, his final journey South.

Frank Wild had been on Scott's Discovery expedition and was known for his good temperament and love of music. He was an obvious choice for Shackleton's Endurance crew. It must have been a hard decision for Shackleton to have left him on Elephant Island while he and five others sailed off to South Georgia but it was the right one as not many people could have kept the men together for all those months waiting for rescue in the very severe conditions of the island.

Each man had to take a turn as cooks assistant, cooking bits of elephant seal on the elephant seal blubber stove. Each man could thus take a turn in drying out his clothes next to the stove.

Wild managed to make windows in the hut that they had fashioned out of an upturned boat and some pieces of canvas by stitching chronometer glass into the canvas. The hut had hitherto been so dark that the men were suffering from soot blindness, which was sort of the opposite of snow blindness but just as debilitating.They had a concert every Saturday night, thanks to Hussey and his banjo and a special feast and concert on midwinters day.

Wild's belief that The Boss would come back for them was so strong that from two weeks after the South Georgia party had left, he would roll up his sleeping bag each morning so as to be ready when the rescue ship arrived. He must have been doing that for 4 months!