Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte

‘When I look back at those days I have no doubt that Providence guided us, not only across those snowfields, but across the storm-white sea that separated Elephant Island from our landing place on South Georgia. I know that during that long and racking march for thirty-six hours over the unnamed mountains and glaciers of South Georgia it seemed to me that we were four, not three. I said nothing to my companions at this point, but afterwards Worsley said to me, “Boss, I had a curious feeling on the march that there was another person with us.” Crean confessed to the same idea. One feels “the dearth of human words, the roughness of mortal speech” in trying to describe things intangible, but a record of our journeys would be incomplete without a reference to a subject very near to our hearts.’

Shackleton’s South refers.

The important Polar Medal awarded to Chief Petty Officer Tom Crean, A.M., Royal Navy, a veteran of both of Scott’s Antarctic expeditions and Shackleton’s 1914-16 expedition, in all of which the gallant Irishman played a prominent role - one of the last to see Scott alive, and first to discover his body, he afterwards endured all the trials and tribulations of Shackleton’s open-boat voyage in the Thomas Caird to South Georgia, where he accompanied his leader via mountain tops and glaciers to the island’s whaling station: according to one of his daughters, ‘he was a fiercely modest man who never said a word about the Navy after he left’ but Mount Crean in Antarctica today stands as testament to his remarkable contribution to “The Heroic Age of Exploration”

Polar Medal 1904, E.VII.R., silver, 1 clasp, Antarctic 1902-04 (A.B. T. Crean, “Discovery”), good very fine
£25000-30000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte.

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Originally Ex J. B. Hayward, 1974.

At the request of Commander E. R. G. R. Evans, R.N., senior surviving officer of Scott’s last expedition, a duplicate Polar Medal, with a second clasp for Antarctic 1910-13, was approved and afterwards presented to Crean at Buckingham Palace on 26 July 1913, when he also received his Albert Medal. This duplicate Medal is today on display at the Kerry County Museum, together with Crean’s A.M., Great War service, L.S. & G.C. and Royal Geographical Society awards, and bears a third clasp for Shackleton’s 1914-16 expedition. The medal offered above is Crean’s original Polar award.

Tom Crean was born near Anascaul on the Dingle Peninsula in Co. Kerry in July 1877, one of ten children in an Irish farming family and, according to certain sources, ran away to sea after a bitter argument with his father in the summer of 1893.

Be that as it may, he was indeed enrolled in the Royal Navy in the training ship Impregnable at Devonport later that year and, by 1900, was serving as a Petty Officer 2nd Class in H.M.S. Ringarooma in the Australia and New Zealand Squadron. Here, then, the opening chapter in his remarkable career of polar exploration for, in December 1901, Captain Rich of the Ringarooma was asked to lend support to Captain Scott’s expedition, then gathering at Christchurch, New Zealand, and Crean, on learning that a Discovery seaman had deserted ship after striking a Petty Officer, immediately volunteered to replace him - and was duly accepted.

Scott’s first expedition 1902-04

The Discovery departed New Zealand on Christmas Eve 1901 and, on her arrival in Antarctica, Crean participated in the expedition’s first sledging trip on 3 February, in which he quickly established himself as a likeable and dependable character. In fact, as a physically powerful man with an innate resistance to the the extreme cold, he became the perfect sledge-hauler, spending the equivalent of five months in a harness over the remainder of the expedition, all the while flying a distinctive Irish flag from his sledge. And his achievements included participation in the “Furthest South” journey in November 1902 - so, too, his very survival. Scott’s Voyage of the Discovery takes up the story:

’Whilst we have been away there seems to have been a cold snap throughout the region. Barne with his party got the worst of it, as they were away out on the barrier, where conditions are always most severe. He was absent for eight days, and succeeded in laying out a depot to the S.E. of White Island. His party consisted of Mulock, Quartley, Smythe, Crean and Joyce; all have tales to tell of their adventures, and agree that it was pretty “parky.” The temperature was well below -40 when they left the ship; it dropped to -50 as they reached the corner of White Island, and a little way beyond to -60; but even at this it did not stop, but continued to fall until it had reached and passed -65. At -67.7 the spirit-column of the thermometer broke, and they found it impossible to get it to unite again; we shall never know exactly, therefore, what degree of cold the party actually faced, but Barne, allowing for broken column, is sure that it was below -70.’

And Scott again on a close call for Crean in February 1904:

‘The ice about Hut Point is now so thin as to be dangerous for a long way out. Crean fell in yesterday, and had a very narrow shave, as he could not attempt to swim amongst the sodden brash-ice. Luckily he kept his head, and remained still until others were able to run for a rope and haul him out.’

Universally popular, Crean would receive due recognition in the flurry of publications that followed the conclusion of the expedition, Lieutenant A. B. Armitage, R.N., Scott’s second-in-command, describing him as ‘an Irishman with a fund of wit and an even temper which nothing disturbed.’ Sir Clements Markham, the elderly and somewhat eccentric “father” of the expedition, observed that Crean was ‘an excellent man, tall and a profile like the Duke of Wellington’. Indeed Scott was sufficiently impressed to recommend the hardy Irishman for advancement to Petty Officer 1st Class ‘for continuous good conduct and meritorious service throughout the Antarctic Expedition 1901-04.’ Furthermore, he chose Crean as his Coxswain when given command of the battleship H.M.S. Victorious in 1906.

Scott’s last expedition 1910-13

Once again it is apparent from a proliferation of publications and diaries that Crean performed gallant and outstanding work during Scott’s final expedition, not least as a member of the final supporting party to the Polar Team - Crean was in the final eight on the South Pole run, reaching a point 150 miles from the expedition’s goal, when, on 3 January 1912, Scott made his decision to continue with Bowers, Oates, Wilson and Petty Officer Evans, while Crean and Chief Stoker Wiliam Lashly returned to Hut Point with Lieutenant Edward R. G. R. Evans.

By this stage they had trekked 1500 miles and faced a desperate race against time and the appalling weather, conditions that would famously hasten the end of the Polar Team a few weeks later. When some 240 miles from Hut Point, Evans was found to be suffering from scurvy and when 150 miles from base he was unable to stand without support on his ski sticks. Then, after struggling onward on skis in great pain for four days, during which Crean and Lashly dragged their sledge 53 miles, he was unable to proceed further.

At this point Evans requested his two companions to leave him, urging that unless they left him three lives would be lost instead of one. This, however, they refused to do, and insisted on carrying him forward on the sledge. Crean and Lashly dragged Evans on the sledge for four days, pulling 13 hours a day, until, on the evening of 17 February 1912, a point was reached 34 miles from the refuge hut, where it was thought possible that assistance might be obtained. During the following 12 hours, however, snow fell incessantly, and in the morning it was found impossible to proceed farther with the sledge.

As the party now had only sufficient food for three more meals, and both Crean and Lashly were becoming weaker daily, it was decided that they would separate, and that Crean should endeavour to walk to the refuge hut, while Lashly stayed to nurse Evans.

After a march of 18 hours in soft snow Crean made his way to the hut, arriving completely exhausted. Fortunately, Surgeon Edward L. Atkinson, R.N., was at the hut with two dog teams and the dog attendant. His party, on 20 February, effected the rescue of Evans and Lashly. But for the gallant conduct throughout of his two companions Evans would have undoubtedly lost his life. Both were awarded the Albert Medal, 2nd Class.


Shackleton’s expedition 1914-16

Just as Scott had had no hesitation in selecting Crean for his 1910-13 expedition, Sir Ernest Shackleton was like-minded with the advent of his own adventure in early 1914 - they had of course served together in Antarctica in 1902-04. And given future events, “The Boss” must have been mighty relieved he did so: from the loss of the Endurance to his safe arrival at the whaling station in South Georgia in May 1916, via that quite extraordinary open-boat journey in the James Caird from Elephant Island, the ever reliable Crean was by his side throughout.

Nor was Crean’s latest chapter of polar exploration devoid of personal close shaves, Shackleton writing of one incident that occurred in late January 1915:

‘Later in the day Crean and two other men were over the side [of the Endurance] on a stage chipping at a large piece of ice that had got under the ship and appeared to be impeding her movement. The ice broke away suddenly, shot upward and overturned, pinning Crean between the stage and the haft of the heavy 11-ft. iron pincher. He was in danger for a few moments, but we got him clear, suffering merely from a few bad bruises. The thick iron bar had been bent against him at an angle of 45 degrees.’

Once the Endurance had been lost to the ice, Crean took command of one of ship’s boats in the epic boat-hauling journey that finally brought them to open water - hence the team’s eventual arrival on Elephant Island. However, as a consequence of failing health and numerous cases of frostbite, it quickly became apparent that a bid would have to be made in one of the boats to reach South Georgia and raise the alarm.

Shackleton later wrote:

‘Crean I proposed to leave on the island as a right-hand man for Wild, but he begged so hard to come in the boat that, after consultation with Wild, I promised to take him ... I finally selected McNeish, Mccarthy, and Vincent in addition to Worsley and Crean. The crew seemed a strong one and as I looked at the men I felt confidence increasing.’

And on that extraordinary voyage in the James Caird, one of the greatest - if not the greatest - survival stories in the annals of Polar exploration, Crean once more excelled himself, but not just by way of seamanship. Shackleton later wrote:

‘One of the memories that comes to me from those days is of Crean singing at the tiller. He always sang while he was steering, and nobody ever discovered what the song was. It was devoid of tune and as monotonous as the chanting of a Buddhist monk at his prayers; yet somehow it was cheerful’.

On arrival at South Georgia in May 1916, the three weakest crew members were left with the James Caird, while Shackleton, Worsely and Crean undertook a momentous 36 hour trek, via mountain tops and glaciers, to reach the safety of the whaling station on the other side of the island - a journey never undertaken before. And after collecting their fellow crew members from the James Caird, as well as the boat itself, Shackleton, Worsley and Crean succeeded, after frustrating delays, in rescuing all 22 castaways on Elephant Island.

The latter years

Crean returned to Naval service in the Great War and married Nell Herlihy, whom he had known since childhood, while on leave in 1917. And, having been discharged ashore in 1920, ran the “South Pole Inn” with Nell, in their home village of Anascaul, County Kerry, where he died in 1938; see Michael Smith’s acclaimed biography, An Unsung Hero: Tom Crean – Antarctic Survivor, for full details.