A Voyage to the Arctic in the Whaler Aurora

by David Moore Lindsay

March 10th. At five A. M. all was life on board the Aurora. On awaking, I had coffee, which was in the cabin, and, muffling up well, I went on deck, as it was bitterly cold. The night was cloudy and dark but the ship was illuminated with torches, and on each side of the gangway stood the mate and ice-master, calling the roll. The Newfoundland men came on board as their names were called, about three hundred in all, including the quartermasters, who lived down in the quarter-hatch. The men all wore boots made of untanned seal skin, from which the hair had been removed. They were very light and serviceable and came up to the knee. Spikes were driven into the soles to prevent slipping on the ice, and the decks were preserved from these by rough plank sheathing. There was great wrangling and disputing, as many of the men had been celebrating the occasion.

At six A. M. we cast loose and by degrees broke our way from the wharf. The scene, when the sun arose, was intensely interesting; all the sealing ships were out, trying to crush their way towards the narrows, and, as the harbor was entirely frozen over, this was hard work. Two ships, the Resolute and the Polynia, were behind us, and these last sent two or three hundred to assist our Newfoundland crew in pulling on a hawser over our bows, while our Scotch crew on board ran backwards and forwards across the deck to make the ship roll. This rolling often helped greatly when the ship put her bows in a crack. Our method was to go full speed astern for a few yards, and then full speed ahead, the eight or nine hundred men on the ice pulling for all they were worth at the same time, and the Aurora's men on board running across the deck to keep up the roll. As there were thousands of men similarly employed on and about the other ships, and as they were all singing, the scene may be imagined.

The Nimrod and Neptune were moving on, well ahead of us, and when we got into their wake, the Aurora moved along faster. It was eight bells by the time we passed through the narrows; there the ice was much looser, so we all pushed off in our various directions to look for the breeding haunts of seals. Captain Fairweather kept a little nearer shore than the others, and by evening there were only a few ships in sight.

I retired early, as I had been up for many hours, and even the bumping and thumping of the ship, as she went full speed ahead and full speed astern every few minutes all night, did not keep me awake.

March 11th. When I went on deck, a wonderful Arctic scene presented itself. A snow storm was raging and the ship looked as though she had been fast there for years. She was literally buried in snow, and the weather was so cold that the snow had frozen on her yards and rigging. The morning was dark and one could not see very far. Under the starboard bow the ice was heavy, causing the ship to lie over to port. The wind was from the southeast and had driven the ice in on us. There was a great deal of creaking and crunching from moving floes and the wind made a lot of noise in the rigging. By noon the weather had moderated and the snow ceased; by night the wind was coming from the northeast and the ice slackened, the ship being upon an even keel. Of course, snow was not allowed to remain very long on deck, as our big crew had nothing to do but shovel it off.

I looked into the 'tween-decks and saw a horrible mess. The bunks were full of men, many playing cards, as each bunk held four. They must have been stifled. For light, lamps burning seal oil were used, and the reek coming from the main hatch would almost have suggested fire.

During the night, the ship got under way, and her bumping awoke me several times.

March 12th. In the morning, we were again beset. Hearing a noise on deck, I went up. On the poop a lot of duffs were lying about like 64 lb. shot. A crowd of angry men could be seen on the main deck and facing them was the Captain. A big Newfoundland man came up the steps and, breaking a duff in two, held it up and asked the Captain to look at it. It was an awkward moment and called for immediate action. But the Captain was a man of action, so he planted a blow between the man's eyes and asked him to look at that; the man dropped back dazed and the trouble came to an end at once.

The Captain told a story at breakfast about a steward once saying that more tea would not be required for the next voyage as he had been boiling the leaves from the cabin and giving it to the crew. An order was at once issued to serve out good tea of the proper strength instead. Next morning all hands came aft to complain about the black stuff the cook was serving out, and demanding that proper tea, such as they had been having, should be served.

The weather was now fine, and the world very white, the only visible black being a pond of open water half a mile to the east of us. The wind was again from the east and the cold intense; in fact, one could hardly face it on account of small particles of ice driven by it.