Commander John Robert Francis Wild CBE, RNVR, FRGS (born 10 April 1873 in Skelton-in-Cleveland, North Yorkshire to † 19 August 1939 in Klerksdorp, South Africa), known as Frank Wild, was an explorer on five expeditions to Antarctica for which he was awarded the Polar Medal with four bars, one of only two men to be so honoured, the other being Ernest Joyce.[1]
Early life
Frank Wild was the oldest of eight sons[2] and three daughters born to school teacher Benjamin Wild and his seamstress wife Mary (née Cook). The family came from Skelton, North Yorkshire, close to Marton, birthplace of Captain James Cook, to whom the family claimed relationship 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 to Stickford in Lincolnshire, and in late 1880 moved again to Wheldrake near York.[3]
Wild’s family next moved to the village of Eversholt in Bedfordshire.[3] Here his father was appointed clerk of the Eversholt Parochial Charity at Woburn.[4] Frank Wild was educated at Bedford. He joined the Merchant Navy in 1889 at the age of 16, receiving his early training in sail in the famous clipper ship Sobraon. In the Merchant Navy he rose to the rank of Second Officer. In 1900, aged 26, he joined the Royal Navy. The 1901 census shows that at that time he was serving as an Able Seaman aged 27 on HMS Edinburgh, anchored in Sheerness Harbour.
Antarctic exploration
Frank Wild took part in the following Antarctic expeditions:
- In 1901 he was a member of Robert Falcon Scott’s crew as an Able Seaman on the Discovery, along with Ernest Shackleton who was then a sub-Lieutenant.
- Was with Shackleton on the Nimrod Expedition 1908–1909 and was a member of the team that crossed the Ross Barrier and Beardmore Glacier at a record latitude of 88º23’S.
- In 1911 he joined Douglas Mawson’s Aurora expedition and was in charge of the western base on the Shackleton Ice Shelf.
- He served as Shackleton's second-in-command on Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (1914–1916).
As second-in-command, Wild was left in charge of 21 men on desolate Elephant Island as Shackleton and a crew of 5 made their epic rescue mission to South Georgia aboard a lifeboat. From 24 April to 30 August 1916 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 ship Yelcho. Point Wild on Elephant Island is named after Frank Wild, with a monument dedicated to the Chilean captain Luis Pardo who rescued him and his men.
On returning to the United Kingdom in 1916, Wild volunteered for duty during World War I and was made a Temporary Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. After taking a Russian language course, Wild became the Royal Navy's transport officer at Archangel, where he superintended the war materials which arrived during the Allied Intervention in Russia. After the War, Wild went to South Africa where he farmed in British Nyasaland with Francis Bickerton and James McIlroy, two former Antarctic comrades.[1]
From 1921-22 Wild was second-in-command of the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition, a poorly-equipped expedition with no clear plan, and a small ship, the Quest. Shackleton died of a heart attack on South 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]
Frank Wild's younger brother Ernest Wild also went on to become a Royal Naval seaman and Antarctic explorer, receiving a Polar Medal.
Later years
On 24 October 1922 Frank Wild married Vera Altman, the widow of a tea planter of Borneo, at Reading Registry 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 the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition Wild returned to South Africa with Vera where he continued to farm. He bought some land in the Mkuzi valley in Zululand where he tried to grow cotton. The enterprise was a financial disaster and after four years of drought followed by flood, Wild and his wife 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 with Swaziland. However, his success did not last, and he again fell into financial difficulty, ending up almost penniless.[3]
Wild's marriage became troubled, and the strain of their failed businesses increased their marital problems. Vera Wild asked for a divorce, which became absolute on 27 December 1928. Next, Wild took a job as a hotel barman in Gillol. He had slowly developed a drinking problem during his years in South Africa. For the next two or three years he drifted from job to job including battery manager at a diamond mine which went bankrupt, prospecting in Rhodesia, managing a quarry and working at a diamond mine near Klerksdorp.[3]
He married for the second time on 18 March 1931. His new wife, Beatrice Lydia Rhys Rowbotham, was 37 years old and twenty years his junior. They settled in Johannesburg where, desperate for work, in 1932 he worked supervising a stone-crushing machine at the Witwatersrand Gold Mine. He subsidised his meagre income by giving the occasional lecture on the Endurance expedition.
By 1938 Wild’s health was deteriorating and his alcohol problem continued. For a short while he worked on the estate of his wife’s brother-in-law in Messina in the Transvaal, after which they returned once more to Johannesburg. In 1939 he worked at the Belasco Mine in Klerksdorp as a storekeeper.[3]
Frank Wild died of pneumonia and diabetes on 19 August 1939 in Klerksdorp. He was cremated on 23 August 1939 in the Braamfontein Cemetery in Johannesburg.
Wild was awarded the CBE in the New Year Honours List of 1920. He was the recipient of a number of awards for his contributions to exploration and advancing Geography. He was awarded the Patron’s Medal of the Royal Geographical Society. In May 1923 he was made a Freeman of the City of London.[5] Cape Wild on Elephant Island is named after him, as is Mount Wild and Point Wild in other parts of the Antarctic.
His CBE and four-bar Polar Medal sold for £132,000 in September 2009, more than double the estimate.[6]
References
Sources
- Leif Mills, Frank Wild, Caedmon of Whitby, 1999, 350 pages
- Endurance, Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing
- F.A. Worsley, Shackleton's Boat Journey