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Frank Wild | |
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 Wild in 1914 | |
| Born | John Robert Francis Wild (1873-04-18)18 April 1873 |
| Died | 19 August 1939(1939-08-19) (aged 66) |
| Burial place | Grytviken,South Georgia 54°17′06″S36°30′26″W / 54.28511944401586°S 36.50727886228288°W /-54.28511944401586; -36.50727886228288 |
| Occupation(s) | Antarctic explorer, sailor |
| Awards |
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| Military service | |
| Branch | |
| Service years | 1889–1939 |
| Rank | Lieutenant |
| Unit | Royal Naval Reserve |
Expeditions
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John Robert Francis WildCBE FRGS (18 April 1873 – 19 August 1939) was an English sailor and explorer. He participated in five expeditions toAntarctica during theHeroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, for which he was awarded thePolar Medal with four bars, one of only two men to be so honoured, the other beingErnest Joyce.[1]
Frank Wild was born inSkelton-in-Cleveland,North Riding of Yorkshire, the eldest of eight sons[2] and three daughters born to Benjamin Wild, a schoolteacher, and his wife Mary (née Cook), aseamstress. The family came from Skelton close toMarton, birthplace ofCaptain James Cook, to whom the family claimed ancestry through Mrs. Wild;[2][3] her father was Robert Cook, who claimed to be a grandson of the great explorer. By 1875, the Wild family had moved from Skelton toStickford in Lincolnshire, and in late 1880 moved again toWheldrake nearYork.[3]
Wild's family next moved to the village ofEversholt in Bedfordshire.[3] Here his father was appointed clerk of the Eversholt Parochial Charity atWoburn.[4] Frank Wild was educated atBedford. He joined theMerchant Navy in 1889 at the age of 16, receiving his early training in sail in the clipper shipSobraon. In theBritish Merchant Navy, he rose to the rank of second officer. In 1900, aged 26, he joined theRoyal Navy. The 1901 census shows that at that time, aged 27, he was serving as anable seaman onHMS Edinburgh, anchored inSheerness Harbour.
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Wild took part in the following Antarctic expeditions:
As second-in-command of Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, Wild was left in charge of 21 men on desolateElephant Island as Shackleton and a crew of five undertook an epic open-ocean voyage toSouth Georgia aboard the lifeboatJames Caird in order to seek rescue. For more than four months, from 24 April to 30 August 1916, during the Antarctic winter, Wild and his crew waited on Elephant Island, surviving on a diet of seal, penguin and seaweed. They were finally rescued by Shackleton aboard the Chilean shipYelcho.Point Wild on Elephant Island is named after Frank Wild; a monument dedicated to the Chilean captainLuis Pardo, who rescued him and his men, now stands at the site.
On returning to the United Kingdom in 1916, Wild volunteered for duty duringWorld War I and was made a temporary lieutenant in theRoyal Naval Volunteer Reserve. After taking aRussian language course, Wild became theRoyal Navy's transport officer atArchangel, where he superintended the war materials which arrived during theAllied intervention in Russia. After the war, Wild went to theUnion of South Africa, where he farmed inNyasaland withFrancis Bickerton andJames McIlroy, two former Antarctic comrades.[1]
From 1921 to 1922, Wild was second-in-command of theShackleton–Rowett Expedition, on the converted Norwegian shipQuest. Shackleton died of a heart attack onSouth Georgia during the expedition, and Wild took over command and completed the journey, combating unfavourable weather to Elephant Island and along the Antarctic coast.[1]
Wild's younger brotherErnest Wild also went on to become aRoyal Naval seaman andAntarctic explorer, receiving aPolar Medal.
On 24 October 1922, Wild married Vera Alexandra Altman (née Bogosoff), the widow of a tea planter ofBorneo, atReading Register Office. They had first met in 1918 when Wild was serving in Russia, and he had assisted her to obtain a passage home to England. After theShackleton–Rowett Expedition, Wild returned to South Africa with Vera where he continued to farm. He bought some land in the Mkuzi valley inZululand where he tried to grow cotton.
The enterprise was a financial disaster and after five years of drought followed by flood, Wild gave up. Next he was involved in railway construction and for a time had some success with a contract to extend the South African railway to the border withSwaziland. However, the contract ended and he was forced to seek employment elsewhere.[3]
Wild's marriage to Vera was in difficulty shortly after arriving inZululand and she asked for a divorce, which became absolute on 27 December 1928. Next, Wild took a temporary job as a hotel barman at Gollel inSwaziland which was owned by a friend of his. Caught in the 1930 Depression, he was forced to move from job to job, including working as a battery manager at a diamond mine which went bankrupt, prospecting inRhodesia and managing a quarry. He subsidised his meagre income by giving the occasional lecture on theEndurance expedition.
He married for the second time on 18 March 1931. His new wife, Beatrice (Trixie) Lydia Rhys Rowbotham, was 47 years old and ten years his junior. They settled inGermiston, where in 1932, he worked supervising a stone-crushing machine at aWitwatersrand gold mine. Wild earned enough money not only to buy a car (aWolseley) but to take two holidays in the hinterland and coast of South Africa.
Due to ill health, he was forced to leave the mining job and he was given a job by his brother-in-law Pat O'Brien Frost to oversee the building of Frost's house inHaenertsburg in the Eastern Transvaal. However, he had little respect for Frost; that and the demands of building the house in an extremely remote part of the country caused him to return toJohannesburg. He received the offer of a job as a storekeeper on the Babrosco Mine nearKlerksdorp from his friend Jack Scott, the mining magnate. He had also been awarded theCivil List pension from Downing Street.
Wild died ofpneumonia anddiabetes in Klerksdorp on 19 August 1939, aged 66 years. He was cremated on 23 August 1939 atBraamfontein Cemetery inJohannesburg.
In the 2000s, while journalist and author Angie Butler was researching a book about Wild she discovered his ashes were still in a vault at Braamfontein Cemetery. On 27 November 2011, the ashes of Frank Wild, Shackleton's "right-hand man", were interred on the right-hand side of Shackleton's grave site inGrytviken,South Georgia. Wild's relatives and Shackleton's granddaughter, the Hon. Alexandra Shackleton, attended a service conducted by the Rev DrRichard Hines, rector of theFalkland Islands. Butler said, "His ashes will now be where they were always supposed to be. It just took them a long time getting there."[5] The journey to South Georgia, the service and the interment were the subject of aBBC Radio 4 programme in theCrossing Continents series.
His grave is marked with a rough-hewn granite block with the inscription: "Frank Wild 1873–1939, Shackleton's right-hand man."
Wild was awarded theCBE in theNew Year Honours List of 1920, and in May 1923 he was made aFreeman of the City of London.[6] He was also the recipient of a number of awards for his contributions to exploration and for advancing geography: He received theRoyal Geographical Society'sBack Award in 1916 and the Society'sPatron's Medal in 1924.
Cape Wild andPoint Wild onElephant Island in the Antarctic are named after him, as isMount Wild in the Queen Alexandra Range andMount Wild in Graham Land. His CBE and four-barPolar Medal sold for £132,000 in September 2009, more than double the estimate.[7]
On 25 November 2011, the Government ofSouth Georgia and South Sandwich Islands issued a set of commemorative postage stamps honouring Frank Wild along with other Antarctic pioneers. The set comprises eight stamps in fourse-tenant pairs with denominations of 60, 70 and 90 pence, and £1.15. They are available from theFalkland Islands Philatelic Bureau.
In April 2012,BBC2 broadcast "Frank Wild: Antarctica's Forgotten Hero", presented byPaul Rose, which placed Wild's achievements alongside those of Shackleton and the other explorers of the Heroic Age. The documentary film also featured commentary from polar historian Dr. Huw Lewis-Jones, authorFrancis Spufford and explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes.[8] Of Wild, Paul Rose has said: "He was a true great. He stood shoulder to shoulder with Shackleton. They made the perfect team. With Shackleton’s great leadership skills, and Frank’s cool head and experience, they were able to handle almost anything that the Antarctic could throw at them."[9]
On 29 September 2016, a statue of Wild was unveiled in his hometown ofSkelton-in-Cleveland.
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