Frank Wild: Antarctica's Forgotten Hero

Angie's quest has become deeply personal. Without her detective

work, Frank wouldn't have been found and this expedition wouldn't

be on its way. My journey is pretty short and I know what is going to

be at each place and what time I am heading home. But those early

explorers were the first. They had no idea what was beyond there, or

even how many years they might be away for. Frank's journey and life

started a long way from the doubts of the southern hemisphere. He was

born in Skelton in 1873, in what was then the North Riding of

Yorkshire. His father was the local school-teacher and Frank was the

second eldest of 13 children. When Frank Wild was growing up,

Antarctica was a completely unknown Continent. Only some of the very

fringes had been surveyed at that time. Frank most certainly knew

nothing about Antarctica. He grew up very close to the coast and you

can smell the North Sea from here. From that, he will have picked up a

sense of the hall of the world's oceans. Once he had that spirit in

his veins, this little village was not going to hold him back. Frank

was soon on the move as his father took teaching jobs around the

country. And wherever Frank went, it seemed trouble quickly followed.

When Frank was allowed here in Wheldrake, he went missing and

nobody could find him. Eventually a relative came into the church and

discovered that little Frank had been pulling on one of these bell

ropes. He had got enough momentum going and he could hang on and he

got himself jammed up there on one of the upper ledges, stuck! The

lure of the sea finally hooked Frank. He joined the Merchant then

the Royal Navy. And soon there was an attraction that turned his -and

every other sailor's head. Men were being recruited for a major British

attempt to explore Antarctica. It would be led by Captain Robert

Falcon Scott. Until those little parties of painfully slow human

beings inched their way in woods on the edges of the Antarctic

Continent, nobody knew what was in now. It is rather hard for us to

imagine now what genuine blanks on the map were like. You cannot argue

with the fact that they were adding to the sum of human knowledge.

chance to set foot on unexplored territory excited everyone and

Frank was one of 3000 sailors who volunteered for Scott's great

adventure. Frank did not think he would be picked for the Discovery

expedition because he was too short. But Scott had heard of his

reputation and he could put up with all sorts of privations and

difficulties. Despite his lack of height, Frank was soon saying

goodbye to his father and heading for the great white unknown. Scott

did get an awful lot of people that were in many ways like him very

physically tough. And the toughest of them all, everybody said, was

Scott himself. Like fried wild, he was small and stocky. -- like Frank

Wild. In his three years away Frank Wild certainly impressed Scott. He

set foot on the Antarctic icecap nd picked up the polar medal on his

return to Britain. But Scott wasn't the only one who'd been impressed

by Wild. A young merchant navy officer, Ernest Shackleton, had

also been on the expedition. By 1907 Shackleton was Scott's keenest

rival and he had a new plan to push for the greatest prize of all - the

Shackleton's Nimrod expedition was the hottest ticket in town and

Frank wasn't alone in jumping at the chance to join up. And for the

dark polar winter the boss had a novel way of keeping boredom at bay.

Shackleton came to Wild with his great idea that he should take a

printing cause. I can imagine what he was thinking! But he did it

because the boss told him to. That N'Gotty did because this is the

result, Aurora Australis, the first ever book written, illustrated,

bound and printed in Antarctica. really is a thing of beauty. Look

at this beautiful drawing of the Southern Lights. Printed at the

sign of the penguins by Joyce and Wild. Attitude 37 degrees, two

minutes South. Longitude, 12 minutes East, Antarctica. And the

Penguin trademark, all rights reserved! That is fabulous, and an

unbelievably brilliant drawing here of the men. Here he is, Wild. In

brackets it says Frankie, a sign of affection. The others have got

their names and it is nice that he has got Frankie as well.

Only a hundred copies of Aurora Australis were published, all bound

with whatever Wild and Joyce could get their hands on. Producing the

book was a welcome distraction but the men had a greater purpose in

mind - polar glory. Shackleton's plan was daunting. A 1500 mile

return crossing of an unchartered landscape at altitude. A team of

four would go for it - Marshall, I tell you, I would not want to go

to find this fabulous old equipment. Give me modern gear any day, that's

for sure! You know what, in Frank Wild's time, this was absolutely

the best available. It was well, cotton, fur and leather. You can

imagine that when it gets wet it gets heavier and heavier. At the

same time, those men were getting weaker and weaker. And more starved

and further away from any help. It was a desperate measure. A full-on,

massive commitment. The men climbed onto the Beardmore glacier setting

foot where no humans had been. Each small step forward took them closer

to the South Pole. But as the weeks became months the men were hampered

by snow-blindness and frostbite. Their ponies had died, supplies

were dwindling. Their lives were It was a superhuman effort, but

every mile forward was one mile further away from safety. Think of

it this way. Our domestic freezers run at minus 20. With the winds,

these boys were experiencing temperatures twice as severe. As

Wild and Shackleton huddled in their tents, the enormity of their

plight was obvious. Every day their survival hangs in the balance. They

are running low of food and desperately ill. What it took to

pull themselves out of their sleeping bags and every morning and

get back on the march when they do not have the energy to pack their

sledges? With the life-force draining out of their bodies, the

men continued to haul themselves forward. But the tensions were

building. Year's Eve, 19 aerate, Frank is not full of festive joy.

He is absolutely at the end of his tether. He says they have not been

pulling worth a damp and consequently he has to suffer. He

goes on to say that if they only had Joyce instead of these two

useless beggars then they would have done it easily. I know how he

feels. When you are working at your mental and physical limits, tiny

little things become great, big, heavy issues. The best mates, your

team partners that you previously loved, they can become objects of

hatred. When we are working at our absolute limits, we have got a very

dark place within us. Frank had just about reached toes. With his

team fading fast, Shackleton made a decision that defined him. Just 97

miles from the South Pole, he ordered the men to turn around.

They were so exhausted that to continue would have meant certain

death. Shackleton had relinquished his great chance to claim the pole.

Shackleton would look after his men whatever happened, even though they

were actually in dire straits. Shackleton would put his men before

anything else, and in particular Frank Wild. I think that meant so

much. I don't think Frank Wild never forgot. And there was one

episode that would stay with Frank forever. On the return leg he was

half starving, wracked with dystentry and at his lowest ebb.

Shackleton gave him his last biscuit. It was a small gesture but

in the circumstances it meant so much. Frank wrote: I do not suppose

that anyone else in the world can thoroughly realise how much

generosity and sympathy was shown by this. I do and by God shall

The Nimrod expedition returned home, the men hailed as heroes.

Shackleton was knighted. Frank received another clasp to his polar

medal. The bond between Wild and Shackleton had been sealed. Wild

was Shackleton's utterly loyal lieutenant, devoted to him with

mutual devotion. They complemented each other perfectly. Wild was a

moderated, but he was a rock. Any Even today crossing the Southern

Ocean to get to Antarctica is a serious undertaking. It can be a

stomach churning experience even on a modern ship that has all the

benefits of a re-enforced steel When the explorers of the heroic

age were heading south the journey to get to the ice was often the

most dangerous part of the expedition. The Brits prided

themselves on being a nation of seafarers but the conditions in the

waters around Antarctic were something else.

Even the most seasoned of sailors like Frank Wild were left digging

deep into their reserves of fortitude and endurance.

It's a great feeling this. A good- sized pod of whales over here at

about 2.00 and even got some ice building up on the ship which is a

sure sign we are getting south. It's exciting for us, but this was

a sign of great danger for those early explorers, heavy overloaded

ship, with dogs and supplies for many months or years and as the ice

built up on it, it caused what they call too much top-hamper, the ship

became top-heavy, so the men would spend every hour chipping this ice

off to stop the ship becoming unstable. Frank Wild's ashes are

following in the foot-steps of the great who would use the sub-

Antarctic islands of the southern hemisphere as a launch pad into the

ice. Our target is the remote island of south Georgia, but given

where we are on the planet we have to be aware that the weather could

scupper all our plans. Every day on the Scotia sea down here is a

challenge. I can't help but think about the oel boys, they didn't

have any of this technology whatsoever. Imagine it was like

living on a ship like that, cold and maybe leaky, it won't be as

warm and cosy as here. And then trying to stay in the condition to

do a watch and be out on deck and have take care of the ship. Water

and decks and you try and navigate, look after the dogs. And you are

shivering constantly. Probably below not ever really getting warm

inside. If you have ever sailed on the ocean on a boat you know after

a few days everything is soaking wet and how they managed to dry

that gear out that's the thing I am amazed about, how they stayed human

through all that. We have some waves just hitting the upper deck

here, it has a much more of a feeling of true Southern Ocean

power. Yes, I often refer to it, all the water in the world is

trying to squeeze through and look where we are. Right now we are

about there. There are few places as remote as

south Georgia, on the map of the world it's just a tiny speck, more

than 900 miles from the Falklands. For 60 years, the island was a

centre for the whaling and seal industry and it seemed there would

be a never ending supply of wild animals. The last whalers left

south Georgia almost 50 years ago, the island still gets visitors but

these days they're look to look at Despite spending ten years in the

Antarctic, this is my first visit to South Georgia. I am blown away

Surrounded by thousands upon thousands of these iconic and

absolutely beautiful King penguins, it's amazing to think that Frank

Wild and his men they looked upon them as food. Frank and his men

would go over, grab these birds, eat them raw at first, and that

must have been hard, even if you are starving I would think. Once

you built your strength up, it meant they could cook some more,

extract the oil and use that oil for light and heat to cook more

penguin. I think some of the men rg strug --

really struggled eating raw penguin but Frank was noted as doing all

right on it. He could murder a penguin and eat it straightaway. A

born survivor. Good on him. As the sun set on the Edwardian age

Frank Wild's reputation was rising. With two expeditions under his belt,

it seemed everyone was after his services. Scott was now planning a

push for the Pole, and he desperately wanted Frank and his

team. But Frank rebuffed him, saying Scott was too much the Navy

man. Of course in the Royal Navy it was very regimented. There were

tough laws on the ship. Of course, that didn't really fit in with

Frank Wild's character as it didn't with Shackleton. So, that's the

sort of thing that Frank Wild wouldn't have wanted to be part of.

He was much more of a free spirit. He didn't want that Royal Navy

discipline. He was never hostile, Frank Wild, to Scott. To the extent

that when Scott wanted to reach the the Pole on the 1910 expedition he

was prepared to let Scott have the key diary of when Wild and

Shackleton and Marshall went within 97 miles of the Pole itself.

Frank's knowledge did help Scott, but as we now know, in terrible

conditions the slow walk back from the Pole turned into a death march.

And Scott and four of his men perished. There's the possibility

that Frank Wild would have been chosen as the small group of men to

reach the South Pole with Scott and that's something - that's a real

thought to think that Frank Wild could have died as the others did

on the way back. But on the other hand, could Frank's experience have

proved crucial? Wild was a seasoned polar man. He

had been on two expeditions already. He had proven his mettle with Scott

on discovery, proven his worth with Shackleton as a guy you wanted to

have around you when things got bad. And it's plausible to speculate

that Scott would have reached the Pole and returned with Wild's

experience. With human footprints now at the

South Pole many wondered whether there was anything else left to

achieve. Shackleton certainly thought so. And in 1914 he had an

idea that he believed would make the world sit up and take notice.

And the plan was beautiful. A totally committed traverse of the

continent, from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea via the South Pole T

had certainly never been done and must have felt almost impossible.

Shackleton had it all lined up, including his lead ship, The

Endurance. Importantly, he had his second in command, it was going to

be Frank Wild. Frank had signed up but the expedition was short of men

so Shackleton wrote to the first Lord of the admiralty and asked for

his help. What Shackleton got back was a resounding no. These

Government documents show that Churchill took a particular and

personal interest in this showing his displeasure by saying: These

polar expeditions are becoming an industry, and he goes on to report

enough life and money has been spent on this sterile quest. The

Pole has already been discovered. What is the use of another

expedition? So Shackleton was going to get his

expedition off the ground, it wasn't going to be this way.

Churchill may have thought it a sterile quest, but there were still

plenty of people who disagreed. Frank had just come back from his

third expedition to Antarctica with an Australian team. It had been

another couple of hard years in the cold. Modern day trips like ours

tend to be brief affairs, giving a temporary taste of life here, but

the old boys like Frank immersed themselves in Antarctica, they just

couldn't get enough of it. I just wonder if it's possible to define

what it is that brought those men back every time? It wasn't just

about planting the flag and about the British empire and expanding

that. But it was very much to do with scientific exploration and it

was the equivalent of early space exploration. They were really

coming down to the unknown and they wanted to find out about this

continent and all about the geology and metreology and the ocean, so

there was a lot of that going on. Didn't Frank Wild talk about the

small white voices, little white voices calling him back? He did. He

said once you have been to the great unknown, you cannot escape

the call of the little white voices. Lovely that. It is and it's

actually an expression that many people who come down to Antarctic

today, they still use that because they know exactly what he meant.

What a fabulously sort of powerful combination, the little white

voices, and his love and loyalty to the boss.

With Frank by his side Shackleton set sail on the Endurance in 1914.

He had cobbled the men and money together but he also had a cash-

making venture up his sleeve. He sold the expedition film rights.

Cinema-goers were hungry for tales of the unknown and Shackleton was

hoping to return with an Antarctic blockbuster.

I am hooked on this. This is a film of The Endurance expedition.

They're at the prime of life. Physically really powerful. They've

got that great look in their eyes, slightly dangerous look in their

eyes. They just look brilliant. Frank Wild first appears in this

film looking after the dogs. Small, compact. Incredibly - he looks

really powerful man. He is actually in one of the sub-divided kennels,

that's how small he is. The dog is bigger than him sitting down. He

loved those dogs. He had a great relationship with them, but it

meant that when the dogs had to be put down for various reasons,

running out of food, when they got sick, it was down to Frank to do it

and he reported it just broke his heart. It was the hardest thing he

ever did. Shackleton was hoping for a clear troupb Antarctica but the

weather was against him. There were more icebergs than normal, the pack

ice was extensive and unusually thick. And the ship made slow

progress. This is exciting for us today as it

was for those early explorers, that first touch of the sea ice. It's

thin pact at the minute but they would have had that sense of

excitement, I know. But nevertheless, it was a much more

serious event for them. We are on a very powerful steel ship. We can

tell by modern instruments that this is pretty thin but in the old

days as soon as you touched that ice and the excitement was over,

the real dangers began. No doubt about it. P the Endurance became a

giant battering ram and with the Weddell sea freezing over the

journey south started to grind to a halt.

By January 1915 the ship was surrounded. It's literally gripped

in the ice, like a vice. She's held newspaper the ice and moves around

and the hope that she might sort of - they might be able to cut

themselves through or blast themselves through of the ice but

as it is they're held for ten months. Until they realise that

actually they're not going to get the ship out of the ice and not

going to reach land either. The remote location rendered the

wireless useless. Unable to raise the alarm, the world was oblivious

to their fate. Shackleton and Wild had a major

problem. With the Antarctic winter approaching, there would be no

prospect of being released from the ice. The challenge now would be to

keep morale high. The men hunkered down in the

Endurance and although supplies were plentiful, the waoeultd life -

- wildlife was harvested and the occasional fish in a penguin's

stomach helped break the culinary monotony. Routine was established,

games were played but the ice was unrelenting.

Eventually the Endurance could endure no more. The Hull is

shattered. The masts and spires are unusable. She held there like a

dying animal. Shackleton told Wild what the ice gets, the ice keeps.

The great expedition was now a battle for survival.

There is a cracking photograph of Wild surveying the wreckage of

their once beloved ship before she goes down and yeah, I mean, he

looks dejected, of course. The ship is like soon to go. It's a very sad

photograph, but actually Frank Wild is one of those leaders that he

wouldn't let the men realise how he is feeling. Not that he was a stiff

Victorian Edwardian who wasn't in touch with his feelings, he was a

great leader, he was hurting inside. He was very cool, very calm. His

job was all about keeping the men's spirits up.

The 28 men were forced to camp on the ice and for almost six months

they were carried along on its slow drift north.

They tried to haul the rescued lifeboats across the ice towards

the sea but progress was just too slow. And the back-breaking work

They finally drifted so far North that the pack ice began to break up.

They reached open sea and had only one possible landing place to aim

for. It was do or die. The men landed here, Elephant Island, one

of the most desolate places in the whole Antarctic peninsula. It is

bleak, barren and windswept. But for those men in their pitiful

condition, it looked like salvation. They soon found out it was anything

but. I wanted to land here today but it is just impossible, even

with the support of a modern ship like this. It puts into perspective

what Frank Wild and his men really did. They were at the end of the

nearly impossible journey, starving to death, but they still pulled up

and landed. Then again, they had to. If they had not landed Elephant

Island was well off any normal shipping route.

-- if they had not landed, they would have died. Shackleton decided

to take five men with him in the lifeboat. They went to get help

from the whaling stations of South Georgia. All that stood in their

way was 800 miles of ocean, 70 mph winds, and mountainous waves. As he

handed over command to Frank, Shackleton wrote, I have every

confidence in you and always have done. May God prosper your work and

your life. The fate of the 21 men are remaining on Elephant Island

now lay in the hands of Frank Wild. Men were weeping around him when

Shackleton left, but Frank Wild, ever the great leader that he was,

he got the men working, with no time for feeling down in the dumps.

You have got to put your mind to the simple task of surviving. He

kept hope alive in their hearts and that is the crucial thing. The men

sheltered underneath the two remaining up turned lifeboats.

Conditions were squalid, but every day it Frank would tell his men to

pack their bags because the boss was coming back. The battle for

morale was everything. Saturday nights were music nights. Frank

would raise a toast to the boss and the men. Inevitably, somebody else

would raise a cup and propose a toast to wives and sweethearts. And

may they never meet! The raucous evenings were accompanied by the

weather man and banjo player of the expedition, Leonard. He gave the

men are short of what became known as vital, mental medicine. My name

is frankly wild and I am on elephant aisle. The roof is without

the tile. -- Frank Wild. It is the most palatial dwelling place you'll

find on Elephant Island. The weeks of waiting turned into four

agonising months and the men could only assume that Shackleton and the

crew had been lost. We were sitting down to a magnificent meal of cold

steel bones, seaweed and limpets. The men on duty suddenly heard a

sudden yell. Wild, there is a sheet! We should like to flower.

The wonderful news meant everything was cooked over. Over a few minutes,

Shackleton was among us, laughing and shouting like a schoolboy to

think that we will be rescued and safe and well. I believe without

any doubt that this was Frank's finest hour. They were almost out

of fruit. He did not admitted to the men, but hope must have been

fading fast. -- he did not admit it. He had kept those men on Elephant

Island alive. Our journey among the icebergs is much more comfortable

than any that Frank would have taken. For his relatives, it has

been a voyage into the past, helping them understand what they

great uncle went through. 1901, 1909, 1916, 1921, the various

expeditions. Are these the original letters? Yes. Your affection at

cousin Frank. He was writing to Maggie. Here he is talking about

Elephant Island. Thank you for the letter and congratulations. I am

glad you always thought we should get through. So did I. As you know,

that helps. Well. It must have been clear to him that what he was doing

was significant. He would have been very proud, knowing that these

letters would end up in the right hands, somehow. As Frank penned the

letter, the battle of the Somme was ending. The men from Endurance were

not the only men that had been to hell and back. The world that he

left in 1914 was shattered on the battlefields of the Western Front.

The explorers heroics were eclipsed. A loving letter at the same time as

hundreds of thousands of men were dying in the trenches. I think my

grandmother was a bit upset about that at one stage. He was on an

expedition, when her husband was fighting in the war. You can

understand that. Even though conditions on expeditions can be

desperately difficult, at least nobody is trying to kill you.

they have chosen that life, haven't they? It must have been a funny

time for the family. I think so. Heroism, in all its forms, was

being redefined. At that point, you realised that Shackleton and his

men have been living in the last surviving bubble of the pre-war

world, still operating by the old rules about terrorism, still naive

in some ways about what their world was like. -- heroism. They were out

of step. Shackleton's men threw themselves into the war effort and

Frank and the crew were scattered across the globe. It seemed that

polar exploration would be a thing of the past. An awful lot of actual

people die at the Battle of the Somme, but among other associated

casualties is the idea offer the stiff upper lip to polar explorer,

I think. They cannot keep it up after that. The world may well have

been changing, but Antarctica would not let go of Shackleton. In 1921,

he was planning another crack at the frozen South, this time to

explore its uncharted islands on The Quest. He sent word out that he

wanted the boys back together and Frank dropped everything to answer

By the new year, they arrived in South Georgia. They landed at grid

for can, a place that Wild and Shackleton you well because of

previous expeditions. -- knew well. On the evening of the 4th January,

1922, the men had dinner. It was the last time that Wild would see

Shackleton alive. At 2 o'clock the next morning, the doctor was called

to Shackleton's cabin. He treated him for Severe neuralgia, but

within minutes, Ernest Shackleton was dead. His heart had failed. He

was only 47. Once again, all eyes were on Frank. He was eyes calm

throughout this terrible drama. The -- ice Khan. I think Frank Wild was

devastated and broken-hearted by it. He behaved in a way that he

believed Shackleton would have expected him to behave. That would

be not to be over the emotional. Just take this on board and deal

with the tragedy the best way that he could. For a second time, Frank

found himself leading the men in difficult circumstances. He told

the stunned crew that the expedition would carry on.

Shackleton's body was supposed to be sent back to England and the

Quest continued its voyage. It was decided that Shackleton's remains

should be buried on South Georgia. It was only one month later when

they could get back to the island so that Frank could say goodbye to

his dear friend and mentor. Without Shackleton, he was bereft. After

two draining decade in the Antarctic, Frank's career on the

ice was over. He had been awarded the Polar Medal five times and had

even received a gong from the King. With the death of Shackleton, he

had lost his best friend so he turned his back on the cold and

Frank's head had been turned by what South Africa offered. It was

much warmer for a start. With his new wife into, he landed in the

bush land in the shadow of these mountains. Andrew -- Andy Butler

knows about the law of this landscape. She lived here for 20

years. What was it that made him want to come to Africa to be a

farmer, of all things? At that time, Africa offered so many prospects,

it was an opportunity for adventure. He felt that he could find his

fortune in Africa. I think really he wanted to just get away and

start a new life. There was not much going on in Europe at the time.

The Great Depression was coming. was the Great Depression and the

end of the war and things were very difficult. There was very little

work. He was that actually qualified to do anything other than

go down into frozen wastelands. Frank had big plans. He sent �6,000

into his cotton farm, clearing and setting up his farm and setting up

home. We are actually on Frank Wild's land. This is it. This is

exactly it and we know this because I have a small photograph here.

There he is, sitting in front of the House that he built with this

wonderful background of the mountain. Funnily enough, he has

some chickens on his lap. Peggy looking on. He is a good dog man,

isn't he? We must be at his front door. Look at that. I can tell you

that we are not far away. It is a magical feeling. Ghost mountain

looks idyllic, but it was tough out here for Frank and things were

about to get harder. The union is the land of eternal sunshine. This

time the sun has over done good. The searing, scorching drought,

sweeping across the North West Cape. Once again, nature makes war on man.

Not for the first time, Frank was battling against the elements and

after the drought came the floods. He stuck it out for six years and

in the end, all his money was gone. He literally had to walk away.

must have been heartbreaking. worked so hard to try and make it

work. It was tragic for all the farmers in this area. If that was

not bad enough, his marriage was also over. The irony of the story

is that Frank had made this little bit of Africa after the ship on his

last expedition. -- name to this bit of Africa. He called it Quest.

He had found something but it was not the paradise he had hoped for.

Frank made ends meet working on the railway and even took a job in a

bar. When a South Africa reporter tracked him down, it was headline

A picture was painted of Frank as broke and neglected. A hero of The

Empire who had fallen on hard times. For a proud, private man this

national exposure was deeply hurtful and embarrassing.

But an alternative view of the man emerges from someone who met him

during his time in South Africa. Bjorn's father was Frank's friend,

he was a boy when he shared a photo session with a real life Antarctic

hero. My father wanted a decent photograph of Frank and when this

troubling photographer came around he arranged for him to take his

photograph. So he came out to our house and against the side wall of

the garage set up his back cloth and took the photographs. Even

though this is a beautiful photograph, and it tells us a lot

about the man Frank, particularly those beautiful eyes. Piercing. No

doubt about that. Those eyes have seen things. He photographed bloody

well, didn't he? Can you help fill in the sort of three-dimensional

part, your memories of Frank. What did it feel like to be around him?

He stood out as being exotic. He was a man of presence. He was a

leader. He was a nice man. It's great to get an impression of Frank

but in the early 1930s he was still struggling, a maul man lust --

small man lost in a big country. He followed the money and headed for

Johannesburg. The city had sprung up almost

overnight 50 years earlier. A by- product of the gold rush. But when

Frank arrived the depression was biting. And mining jobs were hard

to come by. But he knew that if he was to salvage anything out of his

South African adventure he would have have to get out there and dig

And this is where Frank found a new life in the gold mines near

Johannesburg. Only the most resourceful could take it out here.

With the blistering heat and the tough Africans and frank was one of

many men working these quarries sifting through tonnes of rock

hoping to find enough gold for a fresh start.

Frank never did strike gold. The shine of Africa was losing its

gloss. He wrote home that the country was

overboasted and overrun by pests, droughts, floods, locusts, hail,

army worm, ants, mosquitoes and politicians, the last named being

the worst. His life was poles apart from his glory days in the

Antarctic. So he went back to the city, a place of refuge where his

former accomplishments were recognised and his courage

Even today the gentleman's clubs of Johannesburg feel like they're

holding on to a forgotten era. But for Frank it was a home from

home, where he could reflect on the Here was a place where the ideals

of The Empire and being British were as important as the comfort

provided by the leather chairs, the whisky, and the cigars.

But even this was a short-lived glance into a disappearing world.

The club subs were too expensive for Frank and he moved on again.

But finally, after years of disappointment, there was a light

in his life. His redemption came in the form of

Beatrix, known as Trix, and they got married in 1933 and it was a

great union. She was this rather small woman, I think quite plain.

She smoked as much as Frank Wild did and she would roll her own

cigarettes. She didn't seem to mind the fact that they had very little

money. She just adored him and he adored her. It was really a time of

great happiness. Frank had found his soul mate. But he still had

money troubles. Despite his small polar pension from the British

Government, he often relied on the support of family and friends. He

couldn't retire just yet. Now in his mid-60s he was working as a

store keeper in a mine 150 miles south of Johannesburg but the Frank

Wild of old was beginning to fade away. All those expeditions had

taken their toll. He was suffering with diabetes and his haeult

failing -- health failing. In suggest 1939, five days after being

taken ill, Frank Wild, the unsung hero of the great age of Antarctic

exploration died peacefully in his bed from pneumonia.

Frank was 66 years old, he had spent much of his time in South

Africa struggling. It appeared to be a life lost. 16 years of bumping

along the bottom, unable to make his fortune in farming or mining.

He must have wondered whether he had made an impression in this land.

The answer to that became clear at his funeral.

They pay their last tribute to a great explorer, this simple cortege

passing through a Johannesburg cemetery is the last seen in the

vivid last story of commander Frank Wild, late comrade of Captain Scott

and Sir Shackleton. He was a member of five expeditions to the South

Pole and ended his days on a gold mine, small of stature, he

possessed the courage of a lion and his keen eyes were ever set towards

what is right amongst men. And so, a British hero embarks on his last

voyage of discovery. The packed chapel and the news reel

cameras were sure signs that Frank's achievements had been

recognised. And as the great and good of The Empire paid their

respects, plans were made to give Frank a fitting send-off. His ashes

would be buried in the the one place many felt they really

belonged, in South Georgia, next to Shackleton. But a week after his

funeral, the Second World War started and the plans were shelfed.

The years became decades, and with the death of his wife Trix, the

casket containing his ashes was lost. There was only one clue to

their whereabouts which proved vital in the search for Frank. How

did you pick this apart? Well, really with great difficulty, but I

did have a small paper cutting and in this cutting they said his

remains are in a chapel. That was the clue. It was a vague clue. But

it was just still something to keep me going. How many chapels are

there in Johannesburg? Exactly but I was drawn to this chapel here.

Instinct? Pure instinct. I really like that. It's a great detective

story. Yeah. These handwriten ledgers detail the tens of

thousands who have passed through Braamfontein cemetery but they also

reveal Frank's ashes hadn't been scattered, they had been taken.

that really gave me hope that they were still physically kept

somewhere. Still contained in something. The breakthrough came

when Angie discovered there was a chamber underneath the crematorium

which contained unmarked or unclaimed remains. This is a first

for me, Alan Alan... She asked the manager to check it shelf by shelf.

He discovered there were Wilds in here, but they weren't the right

ones. Another Wild. Unbelievable. Two Wilds here in opposite corners.

Both the wrong ones. On a wild goose chase here. I placed it back

and I pushed it back and heard a sound. Catching of another casket.

It was a crucial moment. Behind this casket were Frank Wild's

remains. After a seven-year search, Frank Wild's return to south

Georgia has been a long time coming. It's 90 years since he was last

here, paying his respects to his beloved Shackleton.

Now he's about to be buried next to his great friend and frank, a true

wanderer, can finally find peace in his spiritual home.

What are are your thoughts? I am feeling anxious. And I do feel

quite emotional about it. Also, I have a sense of relief, because

this is the end of the journey and I feel we are now reaching some

closure on this extraordinary story. Shackleton's funeral took place at

the old whalers Church in Grytviken so it's fitting Frank is being

honoured here too. Here, in South Georgia we honour the memory of

John Robert Francis, Frank Wild. And prepare to fulfil the wish of

his wife, his family, and other loved ones by laying his mortal

remains to rest, close by to those of his dear and trusted friend, Sir

I must go down to the seas again, to the gypsy life, to the gulls way

and the whales way, where the winds like a knife and all I ask is a

merry yarn from a laughing fellow rover. And quiet sleep and a sweet

dream when the long trip's over. He has showed wonderful qualities

of leadership, Shackleton wrote, and more than justified the

absolute confidence I placed in him. Later, Shackleton would add: It is

hardly necessary to write about him, he is my second self. I love him.

He has been a tower of strength to There aren't many many people who

have two funeral processions and there are few places in the world

where a cortege has to weave its None of us know where life's

journey will take us, and as an explorer, I know that with more

certainty than most. But who would have thought that the mischiefous

little boy who once swung on the Church bells would finally be laid

to rest 8,000 miles away from Yorkshire, in this quiet corner of

a lonely island outpost. We claim your love today as we

return these ashes of Frank Wild to the ground. In life, Shackleton and

Wild were remarkable men, so it feels right that their graves are

the only ones here pointing south, to the icy land that brought them

Frank always found it hard to resist the little white voices that

would bring him back to Antarctica time and time again. He loved this

place, finding joy in its savage beauty. He understood that

companionship and loyalty were paramount, that in the wilderness

the expedition was the greatest cause of all.

I have been asked about my polar heroes and I have them all there,

Scott, Shackleton. The whole lot. It's hard to put one in front of

the other. They each had special talents. But Frank Wild only knew a

little bit about him, just a couple of sentences, but I feel that by

learning about Frank I have actually been part of rewriting the