Preparations and Sledging Excursions at Framheim
And, so, Johansen joined Kristian Prestrud and Jørgen Stubberud in preparing for their upcoming sledging journey eastward to King Edward VII Land. With them, and remaining at Framheim, was cook Adolf Lindstrøm. Prestrud, last seen by Amundsen standing on the ice with his camera, filming the South Pole party as it sped away from him, now would lead the Eastern expedition and serve as commander over this party.I have told him [Amundsen] the truth and it is not always the best to hear, and therefore I am in disgrace, but I will well have to bear it. I believe, I should say, that I have been of good use for him, since we came here onto the barrier, both through the winter during the equipping and on all the depot trips; I was also the leader of the third [depot] tour, when he himself was ill. Everything has been in the loveliest order, and I have not been incapable in the boss’s eyes, for any of that, that I should do here, until he suddenly seemed to have gotten eyes for my incapability, when we had the inferior [i.e., memorable] breakfast on 17 September, after the equally inferior [i.e., memorable] last march back from 80 degrees. 2
Their first preparatory task, according to Prestrud, was to revisit the first depot at 80° in order to retrieve the provisions and equipment left there in September during the premature start. They would need these supplies for the 3-man, 16-dog, 2-sledge excursion upon which they were about to embark. King Edward VII Land lies northeast of Framheim, so this 30 mile southerly trip to 80° South would be a “detour” but a necessary one (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 209–210).
But prior to departing for the depot, the three men hunted and gathered seals for Lindstrøm to have as a food supply over the summer. Once Johansen, Prestrud, and Stubberud had departed east with their dog teams and sledges, Lindstrøm would be left with only one small sledge and several young, untrained dogs and puppies, so he would not be able to hunt seals alone while at Framheim (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 211–212).
The killing of the Weddell seals was easy for the men, as the animals knew not of what human beings were capable, and they lay patiently as the men sent bullets hurtling through their bodies and then cut them up right in front of their families. According to Prestrud, the females and their young were, in general, left to live, while the males were targeted and killed. The dogs, however, maintained Prestrud, were seal-hunting aficionados and availed themselves of the “sport” with relish; while they were not capable of killing the large seals, they did go after the baby seals, he claimed in his chapter of the book The South Pole, wherein they “could easily satisfy their inborn craving for murder, for the scoundrels only killed for the sake of killing; they were not at all hungry, as they had as much food as they liked” (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 213–214). According to Prestrud, he, Johansen, and Stubberud tried to minimize the amount of young seal pups killed by the dogs and kept the dogs tied up to this end. When they left camp for the Eastern expedition, however, Lindstrøm was unable to handle the young dogs remaining at Framheim, and these dogs hunted the baby seals mercilessly. “For them it was the work of a moment to snatch the young one from the side of its mother, and then they were able to take the poor thing’s life undisturbed,” lamented Prestrud (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 214). Prestrud equally lamented that there were no leopard seals in the immediate region to keep the dogs in check; with their lethal set of teeth, these aggressive seals “would certainly have made the four-footed seal-hunters more careful in their behavior,” he wrote (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 215). Prestrud did seem to have some problems with the dogs – both in driving them, as the false start had proven, and in his critical observations of them. Regarding the dogs’ reactions to the seals, as observed in the film footage shot at Framheim (Amundsen Film 2010), they are seen only barking at them and dancing around them, indeed seeming reticent to approach the large seals. 3
Johansen, too, wrote about the sad necessity of killing these silent, peaceful giants and sometimes taking the lives of the females and their babies as well. It was for the sake of survival and science, he surmised. On the occasion of the seal hunt to which Prestrud had referred, which was conducted on October 20, Johansen revealed in his diary that the purpose was not purely for sustenance but also for what he called “so-called science,” for the men had encountered several mother seals with their just-born young and had decided to collect a few samples to take home: “We were going to get hold of 2 of these newly born pups to have them stuffed, and then we were going to get meat for the dogs. And therefore nothing else could be done but to shoot first the mothers and then the pups. It is painful to do such, when one is not in absolute need, but it is after all done for the sake of the so-called science.” 4
And, so, the men shot and killed two female seals with their two pups, to be skinned and preserved as specimens, along with several large seals to serve as food for Lindstrøm and the dogs at camp, as well as for the Eastern Party expedition members.
According to Johansen, on the following day of October 21, the men harnessed “2 teams of the scabby-dogs” to their two sledges and transported the seal carcasses back to Framheim: “It is at least 400 kg weight in such a Weddell-seal and it was well done that dogs like Grim and Graaen, Liket and Dæljen, Kamilla and Vulcanus, and [some] other of the biggest puppies could manage it,” he wrote in his diary. 5 These dogs had all endured the brutal experiences of the false start, with Camilla further undergoing another pregnancy and childbirth, and by this time were all back at work. In addition to the heavy loads, the dogs and men also braved a blizzard that blew into their faces as they toiled up the barrier, making it difficult to breathe. Besides the strenuous pulling of the heavy sledges, the dogs had the additional challenge of avoiding the crevasses that surrounded the camp and that had previously claimed other casualties. To this day, Johansen stated he and the other men were still looking for Bjaaland’s lost dog Idioten who had disappeared into a crevasse shortly before the South Pole party departed on their journey. But it was difficult to know where to look, he stated, and he knew that the crevasses had claimed many other dogs. For this reason, the sled dogs who had remained at Framheim were now chained up when not working, in order avoid any fatal falls.
Camilla especially was working hard, according to Johansen – pulling her own weight and training some of the younger pups as well. Johansen wrote with particular pride when describing the accomplishments of his beloved Camilla, saying that this dedicated dog who had come home alone 10 days after the false start, traveling 60 nautical miles without food and with child (she had been pregnant at the time), and who had subsequently given birth to eight puppies at Framheim not 2 weeks prior to this day of October 21 (although all eight sadly froze to death) now was harnessed and “in the team again,” pulling her load of 400 kilograms of seal along with the other dogs. 6
Approximately a week later, on October 29, Johansen described in his diary the latest antics and adventures of Camilla, who was pulling his sledge along with her son Stormogulen. Stormogulen was the only surviving puppy from Camilla’s second-to-the-last litter of four puppies, born during the winter on April 14. (Stormogulen’s three siblings had been killed during the false start in September, after all four puppies had followed their elders, who were pulling the sledges, out onto the Great Ice Barrier for the premature trek to the Pole – he was the only puppy to run home again and so the only one left alive.) Now Stormogulen and Camilla worked and played together on excursions over the ice and at Framheim. It was also in this same diary entry that Johansen announced that he had made his commitment to Prestrud to join him, as a “private” member, on the Eastern expedition. 7
The Eastern Party Sled Dogs and Their Teams
Of the 51 dogs remaining at Framheim when the South Pole party departed, 16 went on the Eastern journey with Johansen, Stubberud, and Prestrud, and the rest stayed at camp with Lindstrøm. This would make an estimated 35 adult dogs, older puppies, and younger puppies staying with Lindstrøm at Framheim, although, according to Prestrud, it was “ten or twelve dogs” who remained – possibly he was referring only to the puppies, or to the adults, or possibly some of the adults had by now begun to wander away from camp (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 215). The dogs now remaining at Framheim very most likely included Kaisagutten (Kaisa’s son), Lussi (Lucy’s daughter), and Stormogulen (Camilla’s only surviving winter puppy).
Johansen and Stubberud each drove a sledge with 7 dogs, stated Prestrud in The South Pole book (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 215), but the actual count was 8 dogs per sledge, according to Johansen’s diary entry of November 7, in which he also stated that the men provisioned themselves with 96 large pieces of seal meat and 160 smaller ones to serve as food for their sled dogs over the 6-week trip, to be supplemented by dog pemmican from the 80° depot. 8 As Amundsen and his men had taken all the best dogs for the South Pole journey, said Prestrud, he and his expedition were left with the dogs “that had previously shown signs of being rather quickly tired” – although they had done so only “under very severe conditions”; Prestrud, however, was impressed by the dogs’ performance, writing: “As it turned out, our dogs exceeded all our expectations in the easier conditions of work that prevailed during the summer” (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 215–216).
The Eastern Party was fully prepared to venture out on their journey to King Edward VII Land as of November 7 and departed from Framheim on November 8. Lindstrøm filmed the departure as Lieutenant Prestrud, the novice forerunner and commander, was left behind everyone else. Stubberud and his dog team were only a short distance ahead of Prestrud, but, according to the lieutenant, “Johansen had disappeared like a meteor. The last I saw of him was the soles of his boots, as he quite unexpectedly made an elegant backward somersault off the sledge when it was passing over a little unevenness by the provision store. The dogs, of course, made off at full speed, and Johansen after them like the wind” (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 217).
Evidently, Johansen had maintained his gymnastic athleticism as well as his dedication to the expedition. He had worked his way internally past the big disagreement with Amundsen, at least for the time being, to the point that he was now able to allow himself to go on this Eastern sledging expedition under the command of his junior, Prestrud.
In his November 8 diary entry, Johansen named the 16 dogs who accompanied him on this journey east; according to Johansen, 8 dogs pulled his sledge, and 8 dogs pulled Stubberud’s sledge (Johansen Expedition Diary a).9
The eight dogs pulling Johansen’s sledge were:
Vulcanus
Snuppesen
Brun (“Brown”)
Dæljen
Liket (“The Corpse”)
Camilla (also Kamilla)
Graaen (also Gråen)
Smaaen, also called Lillegut (“The Small One” or “Little Boy”)
Finn (also Fin, who had previously fallen into a crevasse)
Kamillo (Camilla’s son)
[Maxim] Gorki
Pus (“Kitty”)
Funcho (also Funko, who was Maren’s and Fix’s son)
Storm (Else’s son born on the ship)
Skøiern
Mons (whom Sverre Hassel had traded out of his team due to the effects of the premature start)
Johansen liked to give his dogs more than one name – he enjoyed calling the dogs by several nicknames given the mood or circumstances. For example, Kløverknegt or Kløverknekt (Jack of Clubs) was also Knegten or Knekten (The Jack). And then there was Grim, formerly known as Skallagrimsen, who has had more names than one could possibly call the formerly bald but not-so-ugly dog. And so here, now, Johansen had also given Amundsen’s red fox Snuppesen a nickname, calling her in his diary entry a name that looks possibly to be “Amalie with the ball” (“Amalie med kula”) – a term of endearment most likely bequeathed upon Amundsen’s favorite female for a reason known to Johansen. Similarly, Smaaen (“The Small One”) was also called Lillegut (“Little Boy”) by Johansen, as he was a puppy on Johansen’s team.
Interestingly, Presturd’s description of the dogs’ morning greetings during a sledging journey very much matches Amundsen’s description of being greeted by the dogs in the morning onboard the Fram. Prestrud did, at Amundsen’s request, help write some of the passages in Amundsen’s The South Pole book, as well as wrote his own chapter, hence the similarity in some of the descriptions about the dogs.It is quite curious to see the behaviour of the dogs when the first head appears through the tent-door in the morning. They greet their lord and master with the most unmistakable signs of joy, although, of course, they must know that his arrival will be followed by many hours of toil, with, perhaps, a few doses of the whip thrown in; but from the moment he begins to handle the sledge, the dogs look as if they had no desire in the world but to get into the harness as soon as possible and start away.
The Eastern expedition headed south for the depot at 80° to retrieve their provisions from there before heading back northeast. The men and dogs covered 15 nautical miles (19 geographical miles) in −15.5 °C temperature during the first day, with Prestrud skiing in front, Johansen’s dog team galloping immediately behind him close to Prestrud’s skis, and Stubberud’s dogs obediently following at the back of the caravan (Johansen Expedition Diary a; Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 219–220).
The going was reasonable for both men and dogs. By the 10th of November, the dogs were running on their own volition, following the flags that had been planted in the snow as markings during the depot trips. These flags now served as the dogs’ map and guide. With his role as forerunner made irrelevant for the time being, Prestrud held on to Stubberud’s sledge and allowed himself to be towed by the dogs. The party quickly moved on. Despite encountering one of the by-now familiar crevassed areas, no sledges were overturned, and the expedition safely crossed through the treacherous region on its way to the depot (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 221–222).
On the fourth day of their journey, November 11, the 3 men and 16 dogs traveled 20.8 nautical miles in extremely loose snow that caused the dogs to sink deep into the powder and reached the two white snow huts they had built during their premature start in September prior to retreating and returning home (Johansen Expedition Diary a). It had been −53 °C (−76 °F) during that disastrous trip on September 12. Now, things were quite different – warmer, at −21 °C, and less stressful, though of course the men and dogs still needed to be as watchful and as careful as ever.
As they approached the white snow huts, the men spotted something black that moved in the distance. They were one mile away from the black speck, so they could not at first determine who or what this was. Stubberud called out that there were men on the ice. Prestrud, in a quick panic, thought that perhaps the “Englishmen” had beaten them there (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 223). But a look through the binoculars told them otherwise.
Johansen, according to his diary entry, was the first to identify the black vision, which he at first thought to be a provision case sitting in the snow outside one of the snow huts. Watching closely, to his amazement, he saw the presumed crate “move and jump up and into a hole in the snow-hut,” after which Johansen immediately called out to Prestrud “there is a dog.” 10 And, so, there was, and this particular dog looked familiar. As the men drew closer to the animal out on the ice, they marveled at how a dog could have managed to survive 75 miles out on the Great Ice Barrier, alone, with no food or assistance (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 223–224). How the dog had come to be there and then had stayed there as long as he/she had, living in the snow hut, was a puzzling riddle to Johansen. By the time the men, sledges, and dog teams had reached a point closer to the mystery dog, he was recognized as Peary, who – unbeknownst to the men – had been let loose by Sverre Hassel, of the South Pole party, at 80° on October 20, and, being exhausted, had not followed the South Pole party. Now, the three men surmised that Peary had somehow “given the southern party the slip” (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 224). But Peary now seemed wary of the Eastern Party as well and would run away each time they attempted to reach him. Prestrud had to ski alone out to the dog so as not to scare him off. “He was a little shy to begin with, but when he heard his name he quickly understood that we were friends come on a visit, and no longer hesitated to approach us,” wrote Prestrud in The South Pole (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 224). Johansen described Peary as trying to run away at first, wherein he “took off in a gallop for a long way, but sat down finally and came then at last toward Pr. [Prestrud] who walked alone over to it….” 11 Peary looked healthy – “fat and round” – according to Prestrud (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 224) and “thick and fat” according to Johansen. 12 It was the men’s best guess that Peary must have survived by dining on the thin and frozen body of Sara, who had sadly fallen dead in her tracks just outside the snow huts during the return from the premature start. Her body had lain here on the barrier since September 15, and it may have been her meager frozen carcass that had provided sustenance for Peary over the prior 3 weeks. This, however, is not known for certain. Prestrud later, after the South Pole expedition party had returned, theorized that possibly Peary had also fed on Neptune, the other of the two dogs who had been let loose by the South Pole party at 80° and who had not caught up to the South Pole party in their trek (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 224); but, again, there is no evidence of this. Johansen, on the other hand, wrote in his diary that day that he believed Peary had probably also been eating some of the seal meat that was stored in the depot at 80°, which would have been enough to sustain him; deciding not to go all the way back to Framheim, he may have begun eating seal at the depot and then ended up eating some of Sara’s body at the snow hut (Johansen Expedition Diary a). Either way, according to Prestrud and Johansen, Peary was very pleased to see the men and sled dogs of the Eastern Party. Johansen wrote in his diary that Peary “now clearly showed its [his] joy, when it found people and companions again in its loneliness on the great ice barrier.” 13
Peary was immediately appropriated by Stubberud, who, according to Prestrud, harnessed the dog and added him to his sled team (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 224). “He did very good service after that,” wrote Amundsen later in his book (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 5).
With the addition of Peary, the Eastern expedition party now consisted of 17 dogs – 8 pulling Johansen’s sledge and 9 pulling Stubberud’s.
The party made camp that night and then reached the depot at 80° on the following morning, November 12. There, they found a note from Amundsen informing them that all was well with the South Pole party. Amundsen had reached there on the 23rd and had left on the 26th of October. Prestrud, in turn, deposited a note for Amundsen to find on his return journey, informing his commander of the Eastern Party’s progress and their finding Peary-the-dog near the 80° depot (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 225–226).
Besides Amundsen’s message that was waiting for him, Prestrud found that there was plenty of seal meat still stored at this depot, which perplexed Prestrud to the utmost. He wrote of his perplexity in The South Pole book:
We had expected that the southern party’s dogs would have finished the greater part, if not the whole, of the seal meat that was laid down here in April; but fortunately this was not the case. There was a great quantity left, so that we could give our own dogs a hearty feed with easy consciences. They had it, too, and it was no trifling amount that they got through. The 4 days’ trot from Framheim had been enough to produce an unusual appetite (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 225).
Perhaps another reason for the unusually large amount of seal meat left here at the first depot is that Amundsen did not take large quantities of it along with him to feed the dogs along the way, as he had a different plan for feeding and utilizing them.
Evidently, little Lillegut had a small gut that was not accustomed at the moment to such feasts.There was a puppy in Johansen’s team that was exposed for the first time in his life to the fatigues of a sledge journey. This was a plucky little chap that went by the name of Lillegut. The sudden change from short commons to abundance was too much for his small stomach, and the poor puppy lay shrieking in the snow most of the afternoon.
In addition to the seal meat, the Eastern Party took from the depot three cases of dog pemmican for their 5-week trip. They loaded up the two sledges with 600 pounds each of provisions, instruments, medical supplies, and equipment and were ready to set off the following morning of the 13th. The dogs were performing so marvelously, said Prestrud, that the men decided they would head directly eastward to explore unfamiliar land rather than backtrack in a northeasterly direction as they had been instructed to do by Amundsen (Amundsen 1912, vol. 2: 225–227).
With all that seal meat in their bellies and all that pemmican on their sledges, the Eastern expedition dogs were well-fed and well-provisioned. If only the South Pole expedition dogs could have had some of this badly needed food on their sledges, rather than having it withheld from them and currently kept in depot! Their fates would have been quite significantly rewritten.
Dog Chart: The Sled Dogs, and Their Teams, Who Worked on the South Pole Discovery Trek and on the King Edward VII Land Eastern Expedition
The 52 Sled Dogs Who Went on the South Pole Trek with Roald Amundsen, in October 1911
Fifty-two sled dogs, working on four sledge teams, comprised the official South Pole party which, with five men, departed for the South Pole on October 20, 1911.
The names of the dogs and the sled teams on which they most likely worked, along with the names of their team drivers, are as follows:
Mylius
Ring
Zanko
Hök
Togo (also Tago)
Hai (also Haika)
Rap
Bone (also Bona)
Uroa (“Always Moving”)
Helge
Isak (also Isaac)
Busaren (also Beiseren)
Tigeren (“The Tiger”)
Obersten (“The Colonel”)
Majoren (“The Major”)
Suggen
Arne
Per
Rotta (“The Rat”)
Uranus
Neptune
Lasse (also Lassesen)
Fix (also Fiks)
Lucy (also Lussi and Lussie)
Hans
Fuchs
Mikkel
Ræven (“The Fox,” also Reven)
Mas-Mas (also Masmas and Mass-Mass)
Else (also Elisa)
Ajax
Knut
Svarten (“Blackie”)
Nigger [sic] (also Niger)
Ulrik
Bjørn (“The Bear”)
Suvarow (also Suvarov and Suvaron)
Peary (after the American explorer Robert Peary)
Svartflekken (“The Black Spot”)
Kvæn (also Kvajn and Kven)
Lap (also Lapp)
Pan
Gorki
Jaala (“Heart,” also Jåla)
Karenius
Sauen (“The Sheep”)
Schwartz
Frithjof (also Fridtjof)
Fisken (“The Fish”)
Samson
Rex
Knud
The 16 Sled Dogs Who Went on the Eastern Expedition, in November 1911
Sixteen sled dogs, working on two sledge teams, comprised the Eastern expedition party which, with three men, departed for King Edward VII Land on November 8, 1911.
The names of the dogs and the sled teams on which they worked, along with the names of their team drivers, are as follows:
Vulcanus (“Vulcan,” also Vulkanus)
Snuppesen (also Fru Snuppesen)
Brun (“Brown”)
Dæljen
Liket (“The Corpse”)
Camilla (also Kamilla)
Gråen (also Graaen and Gråenon)
Lillegut/Smaaen (“Little Boy” or “The Small One”)
Finn (also Fin)
Kamillo
Maxim Gorki (after the Russian writer Maxim Gorky)
Pus (“Kitty,” also Puss)
Funcho (also Funko)
Storm
Skøiern (also Skøieren)
Mons
The 35 Sled Dogs Who Remained at Framheim
Approximately 35 sled dogs remained at the Norwegian Antarctic Expedition base camp Framheim with Adolf Lindstrøm, most of whom were weaker adult dogs, several females, and young and older puppies. These dogs worked on short sledge trips around the camp during October and November 1911.
These sled dogs most likely included the following 14 dogs:
Skalpen (“The Scalp,” also Skalperert; also known as Skelettet – “The Skeleton”)
Grim (“Ugly”)
Kaisagutten
Pasato
Lussi
Stormogulen
Lolla (also Lola)
Hviten (“The White”)
Ester (also Esther)
Lyn
Aja
Bella (also Bolla)
Olava
Katinka
These are the sled dogs who helped Roald Amundsen and the Norwegian Antarctic Expedition discover the South Pole and make the first exploration of King Edward VII Land, in 1911.
A portion of Hjalmar Johansen’s November 8, 1911, diary entry, in which he lists the names of the sled dogs pulling his and Jørgen Stubberud’s sledges during the Eastern expedition to King Edward VII Land. Included are the dogs’ nicknames and positions on the teams (National Library of Norway)
Notes on Original Material and Unpublished Sources
- 1.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 21 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 2.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 21 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 3.
Author’s viewing of original film footage taken by R. Amundsen and K. Prestrud during the Antarctic expedition of 1910–1912, restored by the Norwegian Film Institute and released on DVD, 2010, as Roald Amundsen’s South Pole Expedition (1910–1912)
- 4.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 21 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 5.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 21 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 6.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 21 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 7.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 29 October 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 8.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 7 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:5
- 9.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 8 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:4
- 10.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 11 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:4
- 11.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 11 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:4
- 12.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 11 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:4
- 13.
F.H. Johansen Antarctic expedition diary, 11 November 1911, NB Ms.4° 2775:C:4