The Terra Nova Diary

William's Terra Nova diary only covers the final attempt to reach the Pole and particularlly the return of the final support party. It describes very vividly how Lieutenant Evans, Tom Crean and William struggled to return safely.

On this expedition William used a small Navigating Officer's Notebook to make notes which he later expanded. These expanded notes were reproduced by Apsley Cherry-Garrard in The Worst Journey in the World.

In 1936, long after the safe return of the Terra Nova, the University of Reading appointed the skilled and eccentric illustrator Robert Gibbings as a lecturer in Typography, Book Production and Illustration. He contacted William to ask for permission to use the diary for one of his student projects. William wrote back in October 1938 saying that he saw no reason why not and was happy to help, though he did seem concerned about the brevity of his field notes and explained, “My diary is as I dotted it down after doing a very hard days dragging. I could not bring myself to write more although many little incidents cropped up each day as we trudged along hour after hour, trusting in God to give us strength to fulfil the duty we were entrusted with and to bring back to safety Lieut Evans.”

It is not clear why Robert Gibbings selected William’s Diary but presumably he had read Apsley Cherry-Garrard’s The Worst Journey in the World. The book has the rather long title

‘The Diary of W. Lashly, a record of the return journey of the last supporting party with Capt Scott to the South Pole, with a foreword by Admiral Sir Edward R.G.R. Evans’.

It is eight inches by five and a half inches in size and contains just 37 pages. The text is identical to the section on the return of the final support group in The Worst Journey in the World but is illustrated with four small drawings. Robert Gibbings’ name does not appear in the publication but there is an initial page which explains:

“This book was printed in the Fine Art Department of the University of Reading, the type being set by printers’ apprentices and the illustrations designed and engraved by students of book production. 75 copies have been printed for private circulation of which this is number XX

In his brief foreword, Admiral Evans, whose life William and Tom Crean saved, wrote:

“This little volume is a chapter from the life of one of those steel-true Englishmen whose example sets us all a-thinking. I owe my life to Lashly's devotion and admirable duty-sense. He is one of those Yeomen of England whose type gave us Drake’s men and Nelson's men and Scott's and Shackleton's men, and will do so again.”

Only 75 numbered copies were printed and the book is very rare (a copy sold in a Southerby's sale in 2017 for £5,250 and another in the USA for $15,000).