Apsley George Benet Cherry-Garrard (2 January 1886 – 18 May 1959) was an English explorer of
Antarctica. He was a survivor of the
Terra Nova ExpeditionThe Terra Nova Expedition , officially the British Antarctic Expedition 1910, was led by Robert Falcon Scott with the objective of being the first to reach the geographical South Pole. Scott and four companions attained the pole on 17 January 1912, to find that a Norwegian team led by Roald...
and is acclaimed for his historical account of this expedition,
The Worst Journey in the WorldThe Worst Journey in the World is a memoir of the 1910–1913 British Antarctic Expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott. It was written and published in 1922 by a survivor of the expedition, Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and has earned wide praise for its frank treatment of the difficulties of the expedition,...
.
Early life
Born in Lansdowne Road,
BedfordBedford is the county town of Bedfordshire, in the East of England. It is a large town and the administrative centre for the wider Borough of Bedford. According to the former Bedfordshire County Council's estimates, the town had a population of 79,190 in mid 2005, with 19,720 in the adjacent town...
, as
Apsley George Benet Cherry, the son of Major General Apsley Cherry (later Cherry-Garrard) of
Denford ParkDenford Park is a country house and surrounding estate in the English county of Berkshire, within the civil parish of Kintbury.The estate lies near to the A4 road, and is located approximately north-east of Hungerford. Denford Park was built in 1832 for George Henry Cherry. It was the home of...
in Berkshire (later of Lamer Park in Hertfordshire where he became
High SheriffThe High Sheriff of Hertfordshire was an ancient High Sheriff title originating in the time of the Angles, not long after the invasion of the Kingdom of England, which was in existence for around a thousand years...
) and his wife, Evelyn Edith, daughter of Henry Wilson Sharpin of Bedford. He was educated at
Winchester CollegeWinchester College is an independent school for boys in the British public school tradition, situated in Winchester, Hampshire, the former capital of England. It has existed in its present location for over 600 years and claims the longest unbroken history of any school in England...
and
Christ Church, OxfordChrist Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...
. His surname was changed from Cherry to Cherry-Garrard by the terms of an aunt's will, through which his father inherited enormous estates near
WheathampsteadWheathampstead is a village and civil parish in the City and District of St Albans, in Hertfordshire, England. It is north of St Albans and in the Hitchin and Harpenden parliamentary constituency....
in Hertfordshire.
Cherry-Garrard had always been enamoured by the stories of his father's achievements, and felt that he must live up to his father's example. In September 1907,
Dr Edward Adrian 'Bill' WilsonEdward Adrian Wilson was a notable English polar explorer, physician, naturalist, painter and ornithologist.-Early life:...
met with
Captain ScottCaptain Robert Falcon Scott, CVO was a Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery Expedition, 1901–04, and the ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13...
at Reginald Smith's home in Cortachy, to discuss another Antarctic expedition. Smith's young cousin Apsley Cherry-Garrard happened to visit, and decided to volunteer.
Antarctica
At the age of 24, 'Cherry' was one of the youngest members of
Robert Falcon ScottCaptain Robert Falcon Scott, CVO was a Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery Expedition, 1901–04, and the ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13...
's
Terra Nova expeditionThe Terra Nova Expedition , officially the British Antarctic Expedition 1910, was led by Robert Falcon Scott with the objective of being the first to reach the geographical South Pole. Scott and four companions attained the pole on 17 January 1912, to find that a Norwegian team led by Roald...
(1910–13). This was Scott's second and last expedition to Antarctica. Cherry was initially rejected, but made a second application along with a promise of £1,000 (2009 approximation £50,000) towards the cost of the expedition. Rejected a second time, he made the donation regardless. Struck by this gesture, and at the same time persuaded by
Dr Edward 'Bill' WilsonEdward Adrian Wilson was a notable English polar explorer, physician, naturalist, painter and ornithologist.-Early life:...
, Scott agreed to take Cherry as assistant biologist.
Winter Journey
With Wilson and Lieutenant Henry 'Birdie' Bowers, Cherry made a trip to
Cape CrozierCape Crozier is the most easterly point of Ross Island in Antarctica. It was discovered in 1841 during James Clark Ross's expedition with HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, and was named after Francis Crozier, captain of HMS Terror...
in July 1911 during the austral winter in order to secure an unhatched
Emperor penguinThe Emperor Penguin is the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species and is endemic to Antarctica. The male and female are similar in plumage and size, reaching in height and weighing anywhere from . The dorsal side and head are black and sharply delineated from the white belly,...
egg. Cherry suffered from high degree myopia, seeing little without spectacles that he could not wear while sledging. In almost total darkness, and with temperatures ranging from -40 °F to -77.5 °F, they man-hauled their sledge 60 miles (96.6 km) from Scott's base at
Cape EvansCape Evans is a rocky cape on the west side of Ross Island, forming the north side of the entrance to Erebus Bay.The cape was discovered by the Discovery expedition under Robert Falcon Scott, who named it the Skuary. Scott's second expedition, the British Antarctic Expedition , built its...
to the far side of
Ross IslandRoss Island is an island formed by four volcanoes in the Ross Sea near the continent of Antarctica, off the coast of Victoria Land in McMurdo Sound.-Geography:...
. Frozen and exhausted, they reached their goal only to be pinned down by a blizzard. Their tent was ripped away and carried off by the wind, leaving the men in their sleeping bags under a thickening drift of snow, singing hymns above the sounds of the storm. When the winds subsided however, by great fortune they found their tent lodged nearby in rocks. Cherry-Garrard suffered such cold that he shattered most of his teeth due to chattering in the frigid temperatures. Having successfully collected three eggs and desperately exhausted they eventually arrived back at Cape Evans, sometimes only managing a mile and a half a day. Cherry later referred to this as the 'worst journey in the world' at the suggestion of his neighbour
George Bernard ShawGeorge Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
, and gave this title to his book recounting the fate of the 1910–13 expedition.
Polar trek and recovery operation
Cherry was afterwards responsible for helping lay depots of fuel and food on the intended route of the party which would attempt to reach the South Pole, and accompanied the team that would make the attempt on the
South PoleThe South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole or Terrestrial South Pole, is one of the two points where the Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface. It is the southernmost point on the surface of the Earth and lies on the opposite side of the Earth from the North Pole...
to the top of the
Beardmore GlacierThe Beardmore Glacier in Antarctica is one of the largest glaciers in the world, with a length exceeding 160 km . The glacier is one of the main passages from the Ross Ice Shelf through the Queen Alexandra and Commonwealth ranges of the Transantarctic Mountains to the Antarctic Plateau, and was one...
. Cherry was in the first group of those four who returned on 22 December 1911. On his return, Cherry took over navigation on a number of occasions using the sight of his partner until his partner became snow-blind. Without a sighted companion, Cherry managed to overcome his extreme myopia by navigating using the faint gleam of the sun. On 26 February 1912, Cherry and dog handler Dimitri Gerov made one last supply run out to the 'One Ton Depot'. They waited there seven days hoping to meet the South Pole team on their return journey, although the mission was to resupply the dump and not to provide an escort for the polar party 'home' who weren't expected to reach this point for another week or two. Cherry finally turned back on 10 March 1912 in order to preserve his dog team which were short of food, and out of concern for the health of Gerov. Nineteen days later, Scott, Wilson and Bowers died 11 miles (17.7 km) south of the One Ton Depot in a blizzard.
By April 1912, with the Antarctic winter approaching, it was apparent to Cherry and the remaining expedition members that the South Pole team would not return.
AtkinsonEdward Leicester Atkinson DSO AM RN was a Royal naval surgeon and Antarctic explorer who was a member of the scientific staff of Captain Scott's Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13. He was in command of the expedition's base at Cape Evans for much of 1912, and led the party which found the tent...
took command, and Cherry suffering from strain was appointed record keeper and continued zoological work. The scientific work continued through the winter and it was not until October 1912 that a team led by Atkinson and including Cherry was able to head south to ascertain the fate of the South Pole team. On 12 November, the bodies of Scott, Wilson and Bowers were found in their tent, along with their diaries and records, and geological specimens they had hauled back from the mountains of the interior. Cherry was deeply affected, particularly by the death of Wilson and Bowers, with whom he had made the journey to Cape Crozier.
Later life
Cherry developed clinical depression as well as
irritable bowel syndromeIrritable bowel syndrome is a diagnosis of exclusion. It is a functional bowel disorder characterized by chronic abdominal pain, discomfort, bloating, and alteration of bowel habits in the absence of any detectable organic cause. In some cases, the symptoms are relieved by bowel movements...
shortly after returning from Antarctica. His lifespan preceded the description and diagnosis of what is now called
post-traumatic stress disorderPosttraumaticstress disorder is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity,...
(PTSD). Although his psychological condition was never cured, the explorer was able to treat himself to some extent by writing down his experiences, although he spent many years bed-ridden due to his afflictions. He many times revisited the question of what might have been done differently to save the South Pole team — most notably in his 1922 book
The Worst Journey in the WorldThe Worst Journey in the World is a memoir of the 1910–1913 British Antarctic Expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott. It was written and published in 1922 by a survivor of the expedition, Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and has earned wide praise for its frank treatment of the difficulties of the expedition,...
. The book remains a classic, having been acclaimed as the greatest true adventure story ever written. It was published as
Penguin BooksPenguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...
' 100th publication.
In 1939, Cherry-Garrard married Angela Turner (1916-2005). He chose not to have children for fear of passing down mental health issues.
Legacy: the Winter Journey
The igloo on Cape Crozier was discovered by the
FuchsSir Vivian Ernest Fuchs FRS was an English explorer whose expeditionary team completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica in 1958.- Biography :...
-
HillarySir Edmund Percival Hillary, KG, ONZ, KBE , was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953 at the age of 33, he and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers known to have reached the summit of Mount Everest – see Timeline of climbing Mount Everest...
Trans-AntarcticThe 1955–58 Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition was a Commonwealth-sponsored expedition that successfully completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica, via the South Pole...
expedition of 1957–58. Only eighteen inches to two feet of the stone walls remained standing. Relics were removed and placed in museums in New Zealand.
The
BBC FourBBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....
drama-documentary
The Worst Journey in the WorldThe Worst Journey in the World is a 2007 BBC Television docudrama based on the memoir of the same name by polar explorer Apsley Cherry-Garrard.-Synopsis:...
shows the site of the igloo created by Cherry and his two companions near the penguin breeding ground revealing the presence of original equipment left by the expedition.
The three intact penguin eggs that Wilson, Bowers and Cherry brought back from Cape Crozier are now in the collection of the
Natural History Museum, LondonThe Natural History Museum is one of three large museums on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London, England . Its main frontage is on Cromwell Road...
.
Writings
In 1922, encouraged by his friend and neighbour
G. Bernard ShawGeorge Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
, Cherry-Garrard wrote
The Worst Journey in the World. Over 80 years later this book is still in print and is often cited as a classic of
travel literatureTravel literature is travel writing of literary value. Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring a place for the pleasure of travel. An individual work is sometimes called a travelogue or itinerary. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or...
. Cherry also published an obituary of the expedition photographer
Herbert PontingHerbert George Ponting, FRGS was a professional photographer. He is best known as the expedition photographer and cinematographer for Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova Expedition to the Ross Sea and South Pole...
and an introduction to
Edward Wilson of the Antarctic: Naturalist and Friend, a book by George Seaver on
"Bill" WilsonEdward Adrian Wilson was a notable English polar explorer, physician, naturalist, painter and ornithologist.-Early life:...
.
Cherry-Garrard also contributed an essay in remembrance of
T. E. LawrenceLieutenant Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO , known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British Army officer renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt against Ottoman Turkish rule of 1916–18...
in the first edition of a volume edited by Lawrence's brother
A.W. LawrenceArnold Walter Lawrence was a British authority on classical sculpture and architecture. He was Laurence Professor of Classical Archaeology at Cambridge University in the 1940s, and in the early 1950s in Accra he founded what later became the Ghana Museums and Monuments Board as well as the...
T. E. Lawrence, by His Friends. (Subsequent abridged editions omit his article.) Cherry hypothesises in this essay that Lawrence undertook extraordinary acts out of a sense of inferiority and cowardice and a need to prove himself. He suggests, too, that Lawrence's writings—as well as Cherry's own—were therapeutic and helped in dealing with the
nervous shockMental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
of the events they recount.
In Media
Cherry-Garrard's life is detailed in Sara Wheeler's biography
Cherry.
In the film Scott of the Antarctic, Cherry-Garrard was played by
Barry LettsBarry Leopold Letts was a British actor, television director, writer and producer best known for his work on the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who, and for producing the BBC's Sunday Classic drama serials in the late 1970s and early 1980s...
. In the Central TV production '
The Last Place on EarthThe Last Place on Earth is a 1985 Central Television seven part serial, written by Trevor Griffiths based on the book Scott and Amundsen by Roland Huntford. The book is an exploration of the expeditions of Captain Robert F...
', Cherry-Garrard was played by
Hugh GrantHugh John Mungo Grant is an English actor and film producer. He has received a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA, and an Honorary César. His films have earned more than $2.4 billion from 25 theatrical releases worldwide. Grant achieved international stardom after appearing in Richard Curtis's...
. In the
BBC FourBBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....
production '
The Worst Journey in the WorldThe Worst Journey in the World is a memoir of the 1910–1913 British Antarctic Expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott. It was written and published in 1922 by a survivor of the expedition, Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and has earned wide praise for its frank treatment of the difficulties of the expedition,...
', Cherry-Garrard was played by
Mark GatissMark Gatiss is an English actor, screenwriter and novelist. He is best known as a member of the comedy team The League of Gentlemen, and has both written for and acted in the TV series Doctor Who and Sherlock....
.
External links