In common with many of the expeditions of the Heroic Age, Douglas Mawson's Australasian Antarctic Expedition (AAE) employed dog-hauled sledges as a principal means of transportation during exploration of the continent. Dog sledges could carry more weight and travel faster than man-hauled sledges; they were more reliable in the freezing temperatures than motor-sledges; and dogs had proved to be more adaptable to harsh Antarctic conditions than ponies.
Mawson purchased fifty sledge dogs from Greenland and transported them to Antarctica on the expedition's ship . The trip was arduous for the dogs and by the time the expedition arrived in Antarctica on 8 January 1912 only 28 of the dogs were still alive. These were split into two groups: nineteen stayed with Mawson at the expedition's main base and the remaining nine were sent with Frank Wild to the western base. All of the original dogs at the main base were dead by the end of 1912; accidents and illness had accounted for many of them and some were killed and eaten when food ran out on Mawson's main sledging journey. At the western base two dogs survived to accompany the party home.
Three pups had survived at the main base and their numbers were supplemented by 21 dogs donated to Mawson by Roald Amundsen on his return from the South Pole. Eleven of Amundsen's dogs were shot almost immediately to conserve the food supplies. During the year another dog was attacked by his companions and had to be destroyed, and the only bitch died during an operation. One puppy was born though, so twelve dogs were picked up with the party at the end of 1913.
The dogs were put briefly into quarantine in Adelaide Zoo and then a number were adopted by members of the expedition. Two were donated to the zoo, and the remaining dogs were sent to Kosciuszko National Park where they joined the surviving dog from the western base pulling sledges for visitors.
Dogs on polar expeditions
Douglas Mawson, the leader and organizer of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, decided to take fifty Greenland Dogs with him; he believed that number would be more than sufficient for the exploratory sledge journeys that he was planning to undertake during the year he planned to spend in Antarctica. Mawson favoured dogs over ponies because, although they could only pull a little more than their own body weight, their food could be supplemented with meat from the fauna of Antarctica and – if necessary – from other dogs, so they did not need the vast imports of fodder that ponies required to see them through an expedition. Mawson had been impressed by the enthusiasm of the dogs on the Nimrod Expedition when he had accompanied Ernest Shackleton to Antarctica. Both Shackleton and Robert Falcon Scott were dubious of the advantage of dogs over ponies. Amundsen and the Arctic pioneer Fridtjof Nansen were passionate advocates and thought the British explorers had misunderstood how to employ dogs in the polar regions; Amundsen pointed to their successes in the Northern Hemisphere and the relative ease of handling dogs compared with ponies, especially in heavily crevassed areas where a fallen dog could often be easily retrieved but a fallen pony was usually lost. The Norwegians were thoroughly utilitarian in their approach to dogs though; although they could be affectionate with the animals, there was little thought given to their survival when they had outlived their usefulness. Scott had used dogs on his Discovery Expedition and had felt it badly when he had been forced to kill them all during his southern sledging journey. Nevertheless, his attitude towards dogs was similar to Amundsen's and Mawson's:
Voyage to Antarctica
With the help of C. A. Bang and the Royal Danish Geographical Society in Copenhagen, Mawson procured fifty dogs from Greenland in July 1911. As Bang was not a dog expert, Mawson made sure Ernest Joyce, the dog handler from Shackleton's Nimrod Expedition, was on hand to assist him. One of the dogs went missing in Greenland while waiting to be transported, but it was replaced and the dogs were shipped to Copenhagen. Unfortunately, Wilhelm Filchner had also ordered dogs from Greenland for his Antarctic expedition and the two sets of dogs were delivered as a single group. The Germans arrived first to collect their consignment and initially selected all the best dogs, but when Joyce arrived he insisted that they should be divided more fairly. By the time the dogs were ready to travel to England three pups had been born, swelling the number to 53, but en route to London one of the adult dogs was lost.
On arriving in London on 17 July 1911, they were placed in quarantine at Spratts Dog Home in Surrey until Aurora, the expedition's ship, was ready to sail on 27 July. One dog and one pup died at Spratts. Travelling with the 48 remaining dogs and two pups from London were two members of the expedition, Belgrave Sutton Ninnis and Xavier Mertz, who had been appointed dog-handlers despite having no previous experience. From the start, discipline among the dogs on board Aurora was maintained by frequent "thrashings".
Aurora went first to Cardiff arriving on 31 July and after four days set out for Cape Town on 4 August. On the day of the sailing Ninnis recorded that they had lost a pregnant bitch but the two pups were still well. The voyage to Cape Town was hard on the dogs and, although there were frequent litters born, few of the pups survived for any time; at least 27 pups died between leaving Cardiff and arriving at Cape Town on 27 August. The adult dogs suffered too and by the time the ship docked in South Africa the two best breeders, Peggy and Hilda were having seizures. They were diagnosed as having distemper and chorea and both died on 28 September the day after the ship had put out from Cape Town.
Five more dogs and at least four pups died between the ship leaving South Africa on 27 September and arriving in Australia on 4 November, as the fits that had affected Peggy and Hilda became more common. Though Ninnis and Mertz wanted to vary the dogs' diet they had little to feed them other than biscuit and were unable to devise a regimen that prevented or decreased the symptoms. Auroras captain, John King Davis, had intended to get a stock of fish before leaving Cape Town as a supplement for the dogs' diet, but Mertz made no mention of this addition when he was interviewed after the dogs had arrived in Tasmania.
In Hobart, the dogs (accompanied by Ninnis and Mertz) were put into quarantine until the expedition was ready to depart. Mawson had intended that they start their training during their stay in Hobart, but quarantine was strict and nothing seems to have come of this plan. At the quarantine station – on a better diet, in less harsh conditions, and able to exercise – most put on weight and their condition improved, but the seizures and deaths continued. Vets and inspectors were unable to agree on a diagnosis or prescribe for the illness, and five more dogs including Hooker, one of the early pups, died during the month they spent in quarantine. On 2 December 1911, the remaining 36 dogs and two pups were loaded back aboard, and Aurora set sail first for Macquarie Island and then Antarctica. The ship arrived at Macquarie on 12 December and the dogs were let off under the care of Ninnis while the wireless relay station was established. The sealers working on the island helped secure the dogs and killed some elephant seals to feed them:
On 23 December most of the dogs were re-embarked; one which had proved itself vicious was abandoned.
The mysterious seizures continued to cause deaths among the dogs as the expedition approached its destination; seven more dogs died. The expedition's medical officers, Sydney Jones and Archibald Lang McLean, determined the cause to be gastroenteritis in the majority of cases.
Main base
First season, 1912
By the time Mawson decided to make his main camp at Cape Denison on 8 January 1912, there were 29 adult dogs left on board. One of these, Mrs Bruce, died during the time the ship was being unloaded and the main base established, and her pup died on 11 January when it was accidentally washed overboard by the crew. Mawson and Frank Wild agreed that 19 of the remaining dogs would stay at the main base and 9 would accompany Wild and his party as they sailed west to set up a second base.
At Cape Denison the dogs initially fared well. Although the winds were fierce and blizzards frequent, the dogs seldom suffered unless the temperatures were well below zero; some of the stronger dogs were quite happy to sleep outside even when the conditions were severe enough to keep the men trapped in the huts. When the conditions became too extreme the dogs were brought in to the "verandah", a partially enclosed passage outside the door of the hut, or into the hangar. In July conditions deteriorated to such an extent that even though the dogs had been taken into the verandah, they were still often found frozen to the ground – Mawson noted "They whine piteously for they can't move".
A hierarchy among the dogs was quickly established. Basilisk, who was "quick as lightning when it came to a scrap", became the leader, Ginger Bitch (originally and officially called Alexandra) was his constant companion, and Shackleton was next in line as top dog. Another dog, Jack Johnson – named after the boxer – was constantly testing himself against the other dogs, he had heavy scarring as result.
There was little attempt to control breeding; any pups that survived to adulthood would be useful additions to the sledge teams. Pups were born regularly, but few survived more than a few days; they were either eaten by their mothers, killed by the other dogs, or perished in the harsh conditions. It was not until March 1912 though that the first casualty occurred among the immigrants. On 7 March Mawson recorded that one of the dogs, Caruso, had been found with a cord wound tightly round his neck. McLean operated on him. Although the wound was deep and over a long, his condition initially improved, but after a few weeks he deteriorated and on 30 March he had to be shot. On 28 June McLean accidentally mixed some broken glass into the dog's food. Mawson was anxious about them but they did not appear to experience any ill effects.
Mawson planned for a number of sledging parties to set out as soon as the weather allowed. The work outside the camp mostly involved laying up stores in supply depots in preparation for these journeys. Serious training for the dogs was underway by June and progressed well. In hauling the supplies out to the depots the dogs were invaluable; six dogs could pull a sledge with a load of . Unfortunately the men became somewhat blase about managing the dogs and on 15 August 1912 Mawson, Ninnis and Cecil Madigan, returning from a drop at the supply depot known as Aladdin's Cave noticed that the dogs which had accompanied them had not followed them when they had left for the base. The weather was already closing in and it was decided that they could not go back to fetch the dogs. The blizzard lasted for days and it was not until 21 August that a rescue party consisting of Bob Bage, Mertz and Frank Hurley could set out. By the time the rescuers reached Aladdin's Cave, the dogs – frozen and starving – were close to death. Grandmother was in the worse condition and despite the men's best efforts died four hours later. Franklin and Basilisk were left behind again on 26 September. Mertz, Hurley and Ninnis set out rescue them on 1 October when the blizzard lifted but were forced to turn back and were not able to set out again until 3 October. They eventually located the cave but the dogs were no longer there; when the group returned to the huts they found the two dogs had arrived just ahead of them, none the worse for wear.