As we know now coal ran so short that it came to an alternative of dumping Campbell, his men and gear hastily on the beach at Cape Adare, or taking them back to New Zealand.  As one member of the crew said:  “Exploring is all very well in its way, but it is a thing which can be very easily overdone.”  The ship was as ready to get rid of them as they were to get rid of the ship.  They were landed, working to their waists in the surf, and the ship got safely back to New Zealand.

Scott decided that the period of waiting until the pony party arrived from One Ton should be employed in sledging stores out to Corner Camp.  But the dog-teams were done, “the dogs are thin as rakes; they are ravenous and very tired.  I feel this should not be, and that it is evident that they are underfed.  The ration must be increased next year and we must have some properly-thought-out diet.  The biscuit alone is not good enough."[120] In addition, several dogs were feeling the effects of injuries due to the crevasse incident.  There remained the men and the one pony which had survived out of the three sent back from Bluff Depot, namely Jimmy Pigg.

The party started on Friday, February 24, marching by day.  It consisted of Scott, Crean and myself with one sledge and tent, Lieutenant Evans, Atkinson and Forde with a second sledge and tent, and Keohane leading James Pigg.  On the second night out we saw the pony party pass us in the distance on their way to Safety Camp.[121] At Corner Camp Scott decided to leave Lieutenant Evans’ party to come in with the pony more slowly, and himself to push on with Crean and myself at top speed for Safety Camp.  We made a forced march well into the night, doing twenty-six miles for the day, and camped some ten miles from Safety Camp, where the pony party must by this time have arrived.

The events which followed were disastrous, and the steps which led to a catastrophe which entailed the loss of much of our best transport, and only by a miracle did not lead to the loss of several lives, were complicated.  At this moment, the night of February 26, there were three parties on the Barrier.  Behind Scott was Lieutenant Evans’ party and the pony, James Pigg.  Scott himself was camped within easy marching distance of Safety Camp with Crean and myself.  At Safety Camp were the two dog-teams with Wilson and Meares, while the pony party from One Ton Depot had just arrived with five ponies which were for the most part thin, hungry and worn.  Between Safety Camp and Hut Point lay the frozen sea, which might or might not break up this year, but we knew from our observations a few days before that the ice was in a shaky condition.  At that time the ice sheet extended some seven miles to the north of Hut Point.  The season was fast closing in:  temperatures of fifty or sixty degrees of frost had been common for the last fortnight, and this was bad for the ponies.  We had been unfortunate in having several severe blizzards, and it was already clear that it was these autumn blizzards more than cold temperatures and soft surfaces which the ponies could not endure.  Scott was most anxious to get the animals into such shelter as we could make for them at Hut Point.