Clarence Howard Hare (2 Dec 1880 – 31 May 1967) was born in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

and worked in

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

as Captain

Robert Falcon Scott Captain Robert Falcon Scott, , (6 June 1868 – c. 29 March 1912) was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the ''Discovery'' expedition of 1901–1904 and the ill-fated ''Terra Nov ...

's steward. He was part of the shore party at Hut Point during the

Discovery Expedition The ''Discovery'' Expedition of 1901–1904, known officially as the British National Antarctic Expedition, was the first official British exploration of the Antarctic regions since the voyage of James Clark Ross sixty years earlier (1839–18 ...

of 1901–1904, and narrowly escaped death on Ross Island in March 1902.

Antarctica

Hare was born in December 1880 in

Invercargill Invercargill ( , mi, Waihōpai is the southernmost and westernmost city in New Zealand, and one of the southernmost cities in the world. It is the commercial centre of the Southland region. The city lies in the heart of the wide expanse of t ...

, the son of a

banker A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Becaus ...

. He began his adult life as a clerk, and was employed in this position in November 1901 when the ''

RRS Discovery The RRS ''Discovery'' is a barque-rigged auxiliary steamship built in Dundee, Scotland for Antarctic research. Launched in 1901, she was the last traditional wooden three-masted ship to be built in the United Kingdom. Her first mission was th ...

'' made landfall in his then-home, Lyttelton. The ship dismissed its

wardroom The wardroom is the mess cabin or compartment on a warship or other military ship for commissioned naval officers above the rank of midshipman. Although the term typically applies to officers in a navy, it is also applicable to marine officer ...

assistant and steward in this port, and Hare, who had befriended ship's officer Reginald Ford, was signed on the spot to fill the vacancy on the ship's roster. He soon learned that this assignment meant that he would be the personal steward of the ship's captain,

. As a ship's captain on a vessel unofficially but firmly run along

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

lines, Scott was rated to have a personal servant. Hare kept his own journal and counsel, observing at one point that his captain was "over sensitive and got worked up if things did not go as planned." Soon after the expedition landed on Ross Island in March 1902, Hare joined a sledging party who intended to probe the 80-km. length of the island, with their goal that of reaching the other end,

Cape Crozier Cape Crozier is the most easterly point of Ross Island in Antarctica. It was discovered in 1841 during James Clark Ross's expedition of 1839 to 1843 with HMS ''Erebus'' and HMS ''Terror'', and was named after Francis Crozier, captain of HMS ' ...

. A blizzard hit the sledgers and Hare was physically separated from his party, slipping and falling down an icy slope. Lost and disoriented, he was without equipment to camp or build a fire for forty-eight hours. Hare later confessed that, lonely and discouraged, he had sat down in the snow to die; his life had been saved by a

sled dog A sled dog is a dog trained and used to pull a land vehicle in harness, most commonly a sled over snow. Sled dogs have been used in the Arctic for at least 8,000 years and, along with watercraft, were the only transportation in Arctic areas ...

, ''Kid'', whom Hare (who had no Polar experience) had treated as a sort of

pet dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it is derived from the extinct Pleistocene wolf, and the modern wolf is the dog's nearest living relative. Do ...

. While this type of contact between humans and sled dogs is not generally recommended, it had encouraged Kid to become affectionate with the human, and in this crisis Kid revived the endangered explorer by licking his face. Eventually, although completely alone, Hare managed to orient himself and return to base. Hare remained at Hut Point during the winter of 1902, but returned to New Zealand in February 1903 aboard a relief ship, the ''Morning''. He was awarded the

Polar Medal The Polar Medal is a medal awarded by the Sovereign of the United Kingdom to individuals who have outstanding achievements in the field of polar research, and particularly for those who have worked over extended periods in harsh climates. It ...

for his part in the expedition. He again signed on to the ''Discovery'' in June 1904 to accompany the captain from New Zealand to London. This was his final Antarctic service; he returned to his native land. The New Zealand Culture Ministry reports that in later life, the banker's son worked as a

piano tuner Piano tuning is the act of adjusting the tension of the strings of an acoustic piano so that the musical intervals between strings are in tune. The meaning of the term 'in tune', in the context of piano tuning, is not simply a particular fixed ...

. When he died in May 1967, he was the final survivor of the Discovery Expedition.

Legacy

Hare Peak, a summit of the system of mountains that surmounts the eastern side of the Leigh Hunt Glacier, was named after Hare in 1962. It is located on the

Dufek Coast The Dufek Coast is that portion of the coast along the southwest margin of the Ross Ice Shelf between Airdrop Peak on the east side of the Beardmore Glacier and Morris Peak on the east side of Liv Glacier. It was named by the New Zealand Antar ...

within the

Ross Dependency The Ross Dependency is a region of Antarctica defined by a circular sector, sector originating at the South Pole, passing along longitudes 160th meridian east, 160° east to 150th meridian west, 150° west, and terminating at latitude 60th para ...

, a section of Antarctica that is under the nominal suzerainty of Hare's homeland of New Zealand.

Book

In September 2022 Clarence Hare's diary from the 1901 Discovery expedition to Antarctica was published for the first time.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hare, Clarence H. 1880 births 1967 deaths New Zealand and the Antarctic New Zealand explorers New Zealand recipients of the Polar Medal