Christmas was just four days away. HMS Challenger, a British warship stripped of its cannon and stuffed with scientific gear, had just set out on a global expedition to explore Earth鈥檚 last great unknown-the deep sea. When the ship left Portsmouth on 21 December 1872, the wind was blowing hard. By Christmas Day, the ship would be bucking up and down in the Bay of Biscay.
For the next three-and-a-half years, Challenger would criss-cross the oceans taking soundings, probing the sea floor and netting tens of thousands of strange animals. By the end of the trip, the expedition鈥檚 scientists had shown that the sea floor had as varied a landscape as the continents, with immense mountain chains and astonishingly deep valleys. And they had proved that there was life even in the deepest parts of the sea.
The expedition was a great success. But by the time the ship came home, 61 men had deserted, six had died and two had gone mad. So what was it really like to take part in this great endeavour? Writing in the weekly Good Words, chief scientist Charles Wyville Thomson made it seem one great big adventure. When Joe Matkin, assistant ship鈥檚 steward, wrote home, he told another story.
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AFTER a week of foul weather, the sea in the Bay of Biscay had calmed enough for Joe Matkin to write his first letter home. Joe was 19 and a relatively low form of life aboard this floating laboratory. But he was excited by the prospect of a voyage round the world and a chance to see exotic ports, tropical islands and something of the wonders of the deep.
So far, the experience hadn鈥檛 been much fun. Joe had just spent his first Christmas aboard HMS Challenger. And as he confessed to his mother, it had been miserable: 鈥淭he ship was pitching and rolling awfully & we had to hang on to our crockery ware like grim death.鈥�
The weather had been terrible ever since the ship left the naval dockyard at Sheerness on the Thames estuary and set off round the coast to Portsmouth. On the very first night the ship had to run for shelter in the Kent port of Deal. 鈥淭he Scientific blokes made a rush for the railway station and came on to Portsmouth by train,鈥� wrote Matkin. It didn鈥檛 take the seamen long to discover that on a voyage of discovery there was a world of difference between a scientist鈥檚 life and a sailor鈥檚.
Four days out from Portsmouth, Christmas dinner was served. At noon, Matkin and his mess fellows shared meat pie and plum pudding. In the evening, the officers and scientists tucked into roast turkey and other fine fare. At least one seaman did a little research of his own-sampling the quality of the wardroom dinner.
鈥淎 Turkey very mysteriously disappeared just as it was ready to go on the table & it has never been heard of since,鈥� Matkin told his mother. A few days later the thief repeated the experiment. 鈥淎gain last night a Roast Goose, and 2 loaves of Bread were taken off the cooks table before the cook could turn round. Some fragments of a goose and some salt were found this morning up in the main top rigging where the goose had been taken & devoured. I should have liked to have helped pick a bit myself for I have never been so hungry as the last few days.鈥� There were three more Christmases to go.
HMS Challenger was small and cramped. Every spare bit of deck was occupied by dredges and trawls, a steam winch to lower and raise them over the side and hundreds of miles of rope. Extra cabins and workshops had been squeezed in aft-and filled with countless bottles and jars of spirit for pickling specimens.
Every few days while the ship was at sea, the crew took soundings and dropped the gear over the side to collect samples. The men showed a keen interest in what the scientists were doing. 鈥淎t first when the dredge came up, every man and boy in the ship who could possibly slip away, crowded round it, to see what had been fished up,鈥� wrote Henry Moseley, one of the expedition鈥檚 zoologists. It didn鈥檛 last. 鈥淕radually, as the novelty of the thing wore off, the crowd became smaller and smaller,鈥� said Moseley.
The crew鈥檚 curiosity waned partly because they found it hard to get excited about mud-often the only thing in the dredge-and partly because the scientists left them in the dark about the importance of what they were finding. 鈥淭he Scientifics keep all their information and specimens to themselves and I dare say you will know as much about the Expedition from the papers by and bye, as we do who are in the ship,鈥� grumbled Matkin.
By Christmas 1873, Challenger had reached the southern Indian Ocean. It was freezing cold, the sea was rough and the ship was rolling uncomfortably. But it was nothing like as bad as the year before. 鈥淎ll hands were on deck looking out for land till dinner time, when the band struck up-`The Roast Beef of Old England鈥�-which sounded very nice, though the dinner was salt pork & Pea Soup,鈥� wrote Matkin.
In 1874, Christmas was spent in warm, exotic Hong Kong. Food and drink were cheap and the crew followed the traditional Christmas punch with a traditional sailors鈥� punch-up. 鈥淭here was some fighting here on X.mas day between the Russians, Prussians, Yankees & English . . . when there are no foreign sailors to fight with, our men fight with each other . . . they only quarrel when in their cups, & to relieve the monotony.鈥�
By the final Christmas, Challenger had been all over the Pacific and discovered the Marianas Trench, where the sounding lead hit bottom at 4550 fathoms, twice as deep as any sounding taken before. After a long stay in Japan, the ship made for Hawaii, then Tahiti and on east to Chile. It arrived in Valparaiso in November. Even here, only six months from the end of the voyage, the discontent was such that yet more sailors jumped ship. Challenger was back at sea for Christmas-in the treacherous waters of the Strait of Magellan.
Everyone was determined to make this last Christmas special. On Christmas Eve there was a concert, with crew, officers and scientists all taking part. The next day started well, with a good dinner and dancing after. But trouble started later. 鈥淭he pleasantness only lasted until tea-time, for the seamen had managed to smuggle a great deal of liquor into the ship before leaving Valparaiso, which was brought out on X.mas night, and soon did its work, more than half of the Crew were helplessly drunk, and the quarreling and fighting was something awful.鈥�
It was time to go home. On 7 April, HMS Challenger crossed the equator for the sixth time. On 24 May, she sailed triumphantly into Portsmouth. The expedition had been a huge success. The scientists had probed and fished at 362 separate spots, made 492 soundings and discovered 4717 new species. Joe Matkin, the voyage鈥檚 honest chronicler, collected his pay and his discharge and never went to sea again.