Adolphus Greely - True Tales of Arctic Heroism in the New World

Sailing in the small paddle-wheel steamer Victory , Ross passed through Baffin Bay into Lancaster Sound, whence he shaped his course to the south. Discovering the eastern shores of North Somerset and of Boothia, he put his ship into winter quarters at Felix Harbor, which became his base of operations. Rarely have such valuable explorations been made without disaster or even serious hardships. Boothia was found to be the most northerly apex of the continent of North America, while to its west King William Land and other extended areas were discovered.

Of surpassing interest and importance was the magnetic work done by James Clark Ross, a nephew of Sir John. Many persons do not realize that the place to which constantly points the north end of the needle of the magnetic compass is not the north geographic pole. The locality to which the compass turns is, in fact, nearly fourteen hundred miles to the south of the north pole. With this expedition in 1830, James Clark Ross by his many observations proved that the north magnetic pole , to which the needle of the compass points, was then very near Cape Adelaide, in 70° 05′ north latitude, 96° 44′ west longitude. 1 1 While the north magnetic pole constantly changes its position, yet such movements are very slow, and while at present its exact situation is not known, its locality is quite near this.

The adventures of the crew in their retreat from Boothia Land by boat and sledge are recorded in this sketch.

Captain Ross failing to free his ship from the ice the second summer, it was clear to him that the Victory must be abandoned the coming spring. It was true salmon were so abundant in the lakes of Boothia that five thousand were caught in one fishing trip, which netted six tons of dressed fish, but bread and salt meat, the usual and favorite food of the crew, were so short that it had become necessary to reduce the daily issues. Fuel was so reduced that none remained save for cooking, and the deck had to be strewn with a thick coating of gravel, for warmth, before the usual covering of snow was spread over the ship. Creatures of habit, the seamen now showed signs of depression bordering on discontent if not of despair.

There were two routes of retreat open to Ross, one being toward the south, attractive as being warmer and possibly more ice-free. He chose, however, the way to the north, which, desolate as it might be, was known to him both as to its food supplies and also as to the chances of meeting a ship. Every year the daring Scotch whalers were fishing in Lancaster Sound, and at Fury Beach, on the line by which he would travel, were large quantities of food, boats, and other needful articles – landed from the wreck of Parry's ship Fury in 1825.

Ross did not plan his abandonment of the Victory any too early, for in January Seaman Dixon died and his mate Buck lost his eyesight from epilepsy. Signs of the dreaded arctic horror, scurvy, were not lacking, as the foolish seamen were averse to the antiscorbutic lime juice and refused to take the fresh salmon-oil ordered by the doctor. Ross was also affected, his old wounds breaking out afresh, reminders of the day when as a lieutenant he had aided in cutting out a Spanish ship under the batteries of Bilbao.

Knowing that the Victory would be plundered by the natives after its abandonment, Ross provided for a possible contingency of falling back on her for another winter, and so constructed a cave inshore in which were cached scientific instruments, ship's logs, accounts, ammunition, etc. Sledge-building began in January, and the dismantling of the ship proceeded as fast as the weakness of the crew permitted.

It was impossible to reach the open water of Prince Regent Inlet without establishing advance depots of provisions and of boats, as the conditions at Fury Beach were unknown. Floe-travel was so bad, and the loads hauled by the enfeebled men so small, that it took the entire month of April to move a distance of thirty miles two boats and food for five weeks, while open water was not to be expected within three hundred miles.

On May 29, 1832, the British colors were hoisted, nailed to the mast, duly saluted, and the Victory abandoned. With the true military spirit Ross was the last to quit his ship, his first experience in forty-two years' service in thirty-six ships.

The prospects were dismal enough, with heavily laden sledges moving less than a mile an hour, while the party were encumbered by helpless men: these were moved with comfort by rigging up overhead canvas canopies for the sledge on which a man could be carried in his sleeping-bag.

The midsummer month of June opened with the sea ice stretching like solid marble as far north as the eye could reach. The change from forecastle to tent, from warm hammocks and hot meals to frozen blankets and lukewarm food, told severely on the worn-out sledgemen whose thirst even could be but rarely quenched until later the snow of the land began to melt. Now and then a lucky hunter killed a hare, or later a duck, still in its snowy winter coat, which gave an ounce or two of fresh meat to flavor the canned-meat stew.

Six days out the seamen, demoralized at their slow progress, sent a delegation asking the captain to abandon boats and food so that travelling light they might the earlier reach the Fury Beach depot. Ross with firmness reprimanded the spokesman and ordered the men to take up the line of march. He knew that food could not be thus wasted without imperilling the fate of the party, and that boats were absolutely essential. While striving to the utmost with the crew, coming a week later to a safe place he cached both boats, and taking all the food sent his nephew ahead to learn whether the boats at Fury Beach were serviceable. After a journey in which young Ross displayed his usual heroic energy and ability, he brought the glad news that although a violent gale had carried off the three boats and seriously damaged one, yet he had secured all so that the boats of the Victory could be left behind.

July 1 brought the party to Fury Beach, where despite orders and cautions some of the hungry seamen gorged themselves sick. But the ice was still solid. Ross therefore built a house of canvas stretched over a wooden frame, and named the habitation Somerset House, as it was on North Somerset Land. Work was pushed on the boats, which were in bad shape, and as they were of mahogany they were sure to lack the fine flotation qualities of those left behind. Ross fitted his two boats with mutton sails, while the nephew put in sprit-sails.

Fortunately the food at Fury Beach had escaped the ravages of arctic animals, though the clever sharp-nosed foxes had scented the tallow candles, gnawed holes through the boxes, and made way with them all.

Everything was arranged for a long sea trip, each boat being loaded with food for sixty days and had assigned thereto an officer and seven seamen. The ice opening suddenly and unexpectedly, they started north on August 1, moving by oar-power, as the water lanes were too narrow and irregular for the use of sails. On the water once more, the crew thought their retreat secure. They had hardly gone eight miles before they were driven to shore by the moving pack, and were barely able to draw up their boats when the floes drove violently against the rocks, throwing up great pressure-ridges of heavy ice and nearly destroying the boats. The men had scarcely begun to congratulate themselves on their escape from death in the pack when they realized that they were under conditions of great peril. They found themselves on a rocky beach, only a few yards in width, which was a talus of loose, rolling rocks at the base of perpendicular cliffs nearly five hundred feet high. As the ice which cemented the disintegrating upper cliffs melted, the least wind loosened stones, which fell in numbers around them, one heavy rock striking a boat's mast. Unable to escape by land, hemmed in by the closely crowding pack, they passed nine days unable to protect themselves, and fearing death at any moment from some of the falling stones, which at times came in showers. They were tantalized by the presence of numerous foxes and flocks of game birds, but they did not dare to fire at them, fearing that the concussion from the firing would increase the number of the falling rocks.