The safe return and recovery of one Evans was offset by the loss of another, his friend Taff Evans who, with Scott and the rest of the Polar party, had lost their lives on the return trip from the pole. Edgar “Taff” Evans had earlier confided in his friend Crean about his ambitions on his return to the Gower Peninsula. He was to buy a public house and name it The South Pole. Although not documented, I believe Tom Crean’s gesture to his great friend came in the form of The South Pole Inn, he himself opened in 1929, nine years after his retirement from the Navy. In the land-grabbing days of empire, tensions were high between French and British ships sailing to the outlying islands around Australia, as each sought sovereignty of territory as yet unclaimed by either nation. The particular mission of Ringarooma over the course of the southern hemisphere’s winter period was described as a “punitive mission”. The aim was to subjugate warring tribes of the region. It was probably a wise decision not to speak of his exploits. Tragically Tom’s brother Cornelius, who was a serving RIC officer, was killed in an IRA ambush, in Ballinspittle, Co. Cork on the 25th of April 1920. It was Tom Crean who sprang into action, as the men were circled by a group of killer whales, leaping from floe to floe, until he got near enough to the towering icy face of the Barrier, which he somehow managed to scale. No doubt exhausted by such an arduous and dangerous ascent, he still managed to trek across the Barrier and raise the alarm, leading to the rescue of Garrard and Bowers. ScottPole87S” by Photograph by Henry R Bowers (d. 1912) – Scott’s Last Expedition Vol 1 Smith, Elder & Co, London 1913. Licensed under PD-US via Wikipedia.

No doctor capable of undertaking the operation was available in the Tralee hospital he attended and so he was transferred, via ambulance, in a 70-mile journey to Cork’s Bon Secours hospital where finally his appendix was removed. Crean prepares for the trek to the South Pole with Captain Scott in 1911. (Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge) His funeral was the largest Annascaul had ever witnessed as his family, neighbours, friends and no doubt, a number of former colleagues bade farewell to the Irish Giant. Later, Crean was one of the large group that departed with Scott in November 1911 for the attempt at the South Pole. This journey had three stages: 400 statute miles (640 km) across the Barrier, 120 statute miles (190 km) up the heavily crevassed Beardmore Glacier to an altitude of 10,000 feet (3,000 m) above sea level, and then another 350 statute miles (560 km) to the Pole.* It was later, whilst stationed in Australia aboard HMS Ringarooma, that 24-year-old Crean’s life would unexpectedly take another turn and one that would lead him to a place that can be considered his second home, Antarctica.The men tried to trek to land by hauling their supplies in modified lifeboats, but on each occasion progress was futile. They camped on the vast ice floes at Ocean Camp, and Patience Camp. These were places the men named themselves, and each camp was situated at the point that their attempted treks were abandoned. He was laid to rest in Ballynacourty cemetery, not far from his Gortacurraun birthplace, in a family tomb he himself had built. The inscription on the side of his tomb read “Home is the Sailor, Home from the Sea” and atop of the tomb lay a ceramic bowl of flowers sent by Edward Evans, the man whose life he’d saved some 26 years earlier. Tom Crean did have a life away from the ice of Antarctica and on September 5th 1917 he married Ellen Herlihy who, like Tom was also from Annascaul. He continued to serve in the Navy, throughout World War 1, and beyond. The last ship Crean would serve on was the Hecla, and it was during this service he suffered a serious fall. As a result of this accident he would retire from the Navy on March 24th 1920, and return to Annascaul where he opened a pub, which he named The South Pole Inn. A book review, written by Peter Malone of the Irish Mail on Sunday, shortly after its release described the book as ‘a riveting labour of love’and ‘a gripping yarn and a valuable addition to the literature of Antarctic exploration.’

Tom probably left school around the age of 12, with little more than the ability to read and write, and he would have done so to help out on the family farm. It is thought that one day while at work on the farm, and tending to cattle, Tom allowed them to stray into a field of potatoes, much to his father’s annoyance, and during the resulting argument, Tom vowed to run away to sea. Two of his aunts, Johanna and Margaret, had earlier emigrated and had settled on the east coast of America, but they were over 3,000 miles away from their nephew, so any thoughts of visiting them while on shore leave would be out of the question.The biography titled ‘Crean: The Extraordinary Life of an Irish Hero’ takes us from Crean’s early life up to an account of how the campaign to honour Tom Crean, created by Tim Foley in 2010, celebrated a great victory in 2021, when a government-funded scientific vessel was named RV Tom Crean, in recognition of the great Kerryman. RV Tom Crean, commissioned at ceremony in Dingle, expected to put Ireland at forefront of marine science ] After a five-day sea journey, the weary crew, who’d been subjected to the ravages of Antarctica’s unforgiving landscape and drenched by frozen sea waters, arrived exhausted on a small inlet on the remote and isolated, Elephant Island. Over the course of his career, a number of publications have featured Tim’s articles and in 2017 he decided to utilise his many years of research and study into the life of Tom Crean to compile a biography about Tom Crean. After heroically guiding the Wills to Elephant Island, and being one of only two men able to stand after the effort, Crean was soon among the six man crew, that would attempt to reach the outpost of South Georgia, some 800 miles away, across the Weddell Sea. Their only hope of rescue lay with the Norwegians who manned the whaling stations, on the otherwise uninhabited island.

Crean, Garrard and Bowers decided to pitch tents for the night, and unwittingly, they did so on very unstable ice. They awoke during the night to discover the ice was breaking up beneath them. The men were soon adrift on an ice floe, separated from their sledge and equipment, and one of their horses was lost to the dark icy water. Tom Crean in 1915 on board Endurance, ice-bound in the Weddel Sea. (Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge) And now their own race for survival also began. They trudged and hauled across 230 miles of the Polar Plateau, then 120 miles down the Beardmore Glacier encountering numerous dangers, and near death experiences, before the final 400 miles, across the Barrier, stood between them and the sanctuary of one the huts. No doctor capable of undertaking the operation was available in the Tralee hospital he attended and so he was transferred, via ambulance, in a 70-mile journey to Cork’s Bon Secour hospital where finally his appendix was removed.His formative years in the Navy show him to have been a hard working, obedient and accomplished sailor and by September 1899 he had made it to the rank of Petty Officer 2nd Class, and shortly afterwards he was assigned to Ringarooma, which was operating in Australian waters. Tom had no inkling as to how this assignment would eventually lead him on the road, to a life of adventure and heroism , on the vast frozen continent of Antarctica. Discovery Pulling up near the RRS Discovery in New Zealand in 1901 changed the course of Tom Crean's life. Photograph: Matt Loughrey He was laid to rest in Ballinacourty cemetery, not far from his Gortacurraun birthplace, in a family tomb he’d built with his own hands. The inscription on the side of his tomb read Lieutenant Teddy Evans, who by the time of Crean’s death had been promoted to Admiral Mountevans, owed his life to the Kerryman and he never forgot the historic solo march Crean undertook to save his life, expressing a love for the Irish giant. On this date, and after 5 years of intense research, the most complete biography ever written about Tom Crean was released under the highly reputable publishing house, Irish Academic Press, under its imprint, Merrion Press.

Tom Crean continued life in the Navy and in 1906 Scott, whom he had made such an impression upon, invited Tom to serve with him on the Victorious, an invitation he duly accepted. In 2010, Tim created a Facebook campaign dedicated to achieving official recognition for the Annascaul born explorer. So instead of a glorious push for the Pole, Crean, Lashly and Evans now faced the prospect of hauling their sledge on a 750 mile return trek, having already spent 9 arduous weeks on the ice. On the fourth of January they waved off the Polar Party, and watched as they slowly disappeared into the vast white distance, never to be seen alive again. Again Crean would excel on this quest, albeit none of the expeditions aims were achieved by the Endurance, but what did unfold from this chapter of failure, was one of, if not the greatest survival story, of all time.

Among the first experiences aboard HMS Ringarooma, the ship to which he was assigned, was a 12-day period of quarantine in Nouméa, New Caledonia. The crew’s enforced isolation was a safety measure brought about to prevent any further outbreaks of the deadly bubonic plague which had caused 103 deaths after first being detected in Sydney during the early months of 1900. From Nouméa, Crean and his shipmates embarked upon a three-month tour of the New Hebrides (modern-day Vanuatu), an archipelago of more than 80 islands, located off the northeast coast of Australia. To help raise a young family meant long, hard hours of working the cattle and the fields just to keep them from starvation. The Crean household was no different and fathers often called upon their sons from an early age to help them eek out a living. On the Discovery expedition, Tom Crean also experienced being caught out in temperatures as low as -54 C, falling through thin ice into frigid waters, twice almost losing his life as a result and of course living on a ship that is completely entrapped by ice, for almost two years. When Discovery finally slipped from its icy hold and returned to Portsmouth in September 1904, Tom had firmly established himself as one of the most reliable and valuable crew members aboard, so much so that Scott singled him out for special mention for his ‘ meritorious service throughout‘ and promoted him to Petty Officer 1st Class. The following day his funeral was the largest Annascaul had ever witnessed as his family, neighbours, friends and some colleagues bade farewell to the Irish Giant. It would have been an even larger gathering but the speed by which the funeral was arranged, as was customary, prevented a number of people attending.