GROUPS AND SINGLE DECORATIONS FOR GALLANTRY
William Launcelot Scott Fleming - universally known as Launcelot - was born in Edinburgh in August 1906, the youngest of four sons and fifth of five children of Robert Alexander Fleming, a surgeon, and Eleanor Mary, the daughter of the Rev. William Lyall Holland, rector of Cornhill-on-Tweed. Educated at Rugby, he went up to Trinity Hall, Cambridge in 1925, graduating in Geology, followed by two years as a Commonwealth Fund Fellow at Yale University. He then returned home to study Holy Orders at Westcott House, Cambridge and was ordained deacon in 1933 and priest in 1934.
Arctic Geologist
At Sir Vivian Fuchs’s suggestion, Fleming joined an expedition to study Vatnajokull in Iceland led by Brian Roberts in 1932, and also an expedition to study the Ny Friesland ice cap in Svalbard led by A. R. Glen in the following year, both valuable experiences in view of his forthcoming part in the British Graham Land Expedition to Antarctica 1934-37 - the first major expedition to leave Britain since Scott’s last journey. Of his trip to Iceland, Fleming wrote: ‘Vatnajokull is about the size of Yorkshire. We sledged across, spent some days mapping and geologising and botanising on the northern edge, and returned by the same route to pick up the seismograph. We enjoyed it all immensely not least because we got on very well together and everyone had some particular responsibility in the scientific and survey side of the expedition's programme. We were divided into two three-man sledge teams each pulling a Nansen sledge loaded with 1000 lbs of gear. For most of the time we were on skis, which on an uphill grade had to be fitted with skins to get a grip. Man-hauling is very hard work and is apt to make one mule-minded - with a sullen suspicion that you are the only member of your team who is really doing any work, until you discover that the others have exactly the same idea. The main constituent of our sledge rations was Pemmican. It is advertised on the tin as a meat extract rich in albumen, meat fibre and animal fat - which is exactly what it tastes like. You take it like a soup and it is more palatable with pea flour added. A plate full after pitching camp gives you the impression you've had a five course dinner; the great thing is to go to sleep before you discover you haven't - because sledge-rations are deficient in solid food and though one gets plenty of energy and vitamins, it is chiefly conveyed as liquid and the result is that one's inside is astonishingly empty. When we got back to Hohn we learned that the trawler company were unable to fetch us back. This was a serious blow. But our guide's father was a Member of Parliament, and when he learned the news he said very helpfully 'I will telephone the Prime Minister'. Now, in Iceland all the telephones were on a party line; he who speaks loudest gets through. Thorliefson was an accomplished telephonist. He blew everyone else off the line, and presently announced that the Icelandic Navy couldn't help because a third of it was off the North Coast, a third in dock, and the other third - they didn't know where it was. Eventually we managed to hire a motor boat. The crew of four kissed the entire populace of Hohn before we set off - an ominous sign. We left in sunshine setting course for the Westmann Islands. At about 4 o'clock the skipper, who appeared to be alarmist by temperament, pointed to the horizon and said 'Storm'; and storm it jolly well was. The entire night there was a vicious wind and we were uncomfortably close to a lee shore. I passed through those two stages of seasickness - first of fearing that you are going to die and then of fearing that you won't. At dawn, the skipper was obviously lost; we followed in the wake of a trawler, but as trawlers trawl in a circle that didn't get us anywhere. Eventually one of our own party sighted the Westmann Islands. We sailed home in the mail steamer to Leith, which was the only prosaic part of the trip.’
Antarctica - Chaplain and Geologist
And so to the British Graham Land Expedition to Antarctica 1934-37, in which Fleming acted variously as Chaplain, Geologist and Glaciologist, and firmly established himself as a popular mainstay of the expedition, passing three years away on the ice, studying rock formations, glaciers and fossils, and being one of three who went on the sledge journey of discovery that mapped hundreds of miles of coastline that no one had ever seen before - and ran so short of food for the dogs that they had to kill seven of them. Of the voyage to Graham Land, Fleming - with his usual modesty and good humour - wrote: ‘The voyage out was an unusual experience because ... the members of the party were the crew. It was less expensive that way. We had one paid hand - a cook. He was a nice chap but our leader when he interviewed him forgot to put the leading question as to whether he could cook. Only a minority of our party knew which rope to pull and this made the task of the Captain and two mates doubly anxious. We ran into bad weather five days out when we got into the Bay of Biscay. One incident will illustrate the kind of problem which faced our officers. The storm gathered force at night, and we had to shorten sail with all hands on deck. I was given a rope by the second mate. When he said to let go I paid out the rope round the belaying pin. He got a bit agitated and shouted Let go; so I took the rope off the pin and let it go. Up shot the rope into the inky skies and down came the top yard on the cross trees with an almighty crash. It then transpired that one of my shipmates was somewhere aloft in the vicinity of that yard ... when he got back on deck he said a lot of things which were not at all proper for a parson to hear ... The sailors terminology, however, often lacks clarity; 'Vast heaving'; well, the first time we got that order we gave a vast heave, and felt a bit hurt by the Mate's pitying smile. However, we got the way of it; 68 days to Montevideo; about 20 more to Port Stanley the capital of the Falklands, and another 16 or so to Graham Land; working watch to watch. It was a good way to get our party settled down, and once we were into the fair weather of the Trade Winds belt it was most enjoyable for all of us except for one of our party who was sick every day from England to Montevideo.’
And of his epic journey of discovery, undertaken with biologist Colin Bertram and experienced explorer Steve Stephenson - a journey that nearly ended in disaster in circumstances not dissimilar to Captain Scott’s ill-fated expedition - he recorded in his diary in early November 1936, as they became trapped in appalling weather:
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