bantarleton:

Today in 1912 Lawrence Oates, aware that his severe frostbite was slowing the progress of the expedition, left his companions saying: “I am just going outside and may be some time.” Oates then walked from the tent into a blizzard of −40 °C to his death.

Robert Falcon Scott wrote in his diary, “We knew that poor Oates was walking to his death, but though we tried to dissuade him, we knew it was the act of a brave man and an English gentleman.”

Oates’ sacrifice however made no difference to the eventual outcome. Scott, Wilson and Bowers continued onwards for a further 20 miles towards the ‘One Ton’ food depot that could save them but were halted at latitude 79°40’S by a fierce blizzard on 20 March. Trapped in their tent by the weather and too weak, cold and malnourished to continue, they eventually died nine days later, only eleven miles short of their objective.

Their frozen bodies were discovered by a search party on 12 November 1912. Oates’ body was never found. Near where it was presumed Oates had died, the search party erected a cairn and cross bearing the inscription; “Hereabouts died a very gallant gentleman, Captain L. E. G. Oates, of the Inniskilling Dragoons. In March 1912, returning from the Pole, he walked willingly to his death in a blizzard, to try and save his comrades, beset by hardships.”

Oates, Scott and three companions had reached the pole on 17 January 1912 only to discover a tent that Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his four-man team had left behind after beating them in the race to be first to the Pole. Inside the tent was a note from Amundsen informing them that his party had reached the South Pole on 14 December 1911, beating Scott’s party by 35 days.