Codes of Survival -Scripts - a series of short factionalized stories based on historical events in the Subantarctic Islands written by Lloyd Godman to accompany the exhibition and installation - 1993 - © Lloyd Godman

Codes of Survival - Scripts

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I had no idea that the island we had come to would look as strange and as foreboding  as this. Here, it was the forest that had me intrigued the most. Gnarls without and great knots within . They seemed to be twisted and tortured  in a way that I had never seen any forest before in any area of Europe. Certainly, the great forests back home I have never seen look like this. Even the deepest depths of the Black Forest seems a kind place by comparison.  We had spent much longer installing a firm base and accurately setting up the instruments for the observation of the Transit than we had anticipated. Our main problem had been the finding  of a solid foundation within the subsoil. Though we had  chosen a site quite close to the coast, the peaty earth, well water saturated, could not provide the necessary stability required  for the necessary solid foundation. We had to embark on digging through this spongy layer to find a firm rock base. A full four  meters of this material was dug through before the obligatory solid base revealed itself. This spongy black layer was surprising in its thickness comprising assumedly of the rotting remains of the many forests fallen in the thousands of years before. As it appears the climate of this area affords a slow growth to these lofty trees, it may be even more deceptive to the age of this strange earthy substance that makes up the soil than we can  estimate.

The water is a by-product from the weather, as there is a permanent mist and rain that plagues the climate, and drips through the earth. It was very doubtful and a chance affair that our venture would succeed in any way with this consistent cloud cover and unclearingness, that threatened to foil our expedition. Apart from the odd glimpses of a pale sun and wisps of blue sky behind the lead grey, little had been seen by us of the settled, clear and fine weather we had hoped for and needed for the
success of the expedition. If the climate we experienced while here is atypical, it could be said the sun in this land is as cold and cruelas a Russian heart and an extended period of life here would become a desperate search to see the sun. There is a general greyness that prevails and it is often only replaced with the 
dense black of storm clouds of rain and hail, that blow in  with the tempestuous winds.

We had spent some considerable time and expense in the arrangements for the buildings of the expedition, and while questioned by some right up to our departure,it proved more than justified in the inclement wether of this land. These buildings  were vital to our sustaining the expedition. When we had all the buildings and tents erected, it was like a tiny village in the wilds of the land. There was a terrace area of bricks which extended  out in front of the main building.

Twice, we were so rained out that we all had to sleep in the main area and salvage the sodden remains of our tents several days later, so the substantial investment in buildings and this service  area was a wise and necessary decision. We were careful with the site, both in choice and our treatment, all rubbish that was  not to be taken back to Germany was buried in a deep pit, some distance behind the camp, dug for this exact purpose. We had cleared some amount of the larger trees by the time of our departure, both from the ease of movement among our camp and the constant supply of fire wood needed to keep these "home fires' burning during our occupation. This had left the hills quite bare in some places, but I suspect that the tress can grow back given time.

Right to the exact night of the transit, it seemed still to be this cloudy weather that would play the largest part in the  achievement of our expedition, but somehow, on the day during the exact hours needed, these broiling mists parted enough to  allow the necessary observations and the Transit of Venus was observed by most of the expedition party. A miracle it may have been, but the expedition purpose was fulfilled and  our spirits cheered with this limited success.

I had taken opportunities as they arose to photograph as much  of the typography with the inclusion of the weird forrest as I chanced to. It was this that fascinated me perhaps more than our designed purpose, though I never let my true feeling be known to the others of authority in the party. There was quite  some time at the disassemblage of the buildings and clean up towards the end of the expedition which I was able to exploit  for the purpose of my photography. Though this time grew  shorter by the day and I rushed to expose as many plates as  I could manage on the final few days that belonged to our stay on the island.

The trees were of a very hard wood, like iron, and great trunks had been blown fat to the ground  by the gales . But  even from these hard iron like trunks, large branches reached tentatively upwards for the failed sunlight. These great trunks lay knurled, knuckled and gnarled in a way beyond belief. All the twisted lengths grew away from the brutality of the wind  direction , in our area this was towards the sea, as if an escape  there could be found. Strong blustery winds must inflict these small island constantly. These trees are sure evidence to the persistent intensity and direction of the gales that inflict this part of the globe. Evidence is also suggested by the illfated ships that have recently blundered onto the rocks with the tragedy of many fatalities.

I had spent time at the grave sites on the bush clad hill above  Port Ross and felt so moved by the human tragedy of the island as to afford some photographic plates to their existence.  Travelling through the forest, even with assistance of another can become a difficult task in many places, with the accompaniment of the photographic equipment a hinderance one could well do without. In all I had shot 115 pictures, 95 with dry plate and a further 20 with wet plate.

Though I had few problems with my photographic equipment,  even managing to keep most things relatively dry over the stay on the island, I did loose a small lens at one of the sites for a photographic study and it seems just simply to have  been forgotten to be packed with the other equipment once  we had finished the exposure to move on. We made  more than an attempt to find it but the nature of the rippled untamed land is such that the same pathway is impossible to follow twice on any one day. The task would be that in nature of  finding a needle in a hay stack. Though I could spend an hour of every day for that last week searching, I finally acknowledged  the loss as permanent once the "Alexandrine" sailed with us on board for the home land.