THE NINETEENTH CENTURY AND AFTER: THE POLES
_(a) Arctic_
Following the new enthusiasm for Arctic exploration undertaken for
purely scientific purposes, the British Government despatched three
expeditions between 1773 and 1779. The first, under Captain Phipps,
was stopped by ice off the north-west of Spitsbergen; the second, that
of James Cook with the vessels _Discovery_ and _Resolution_, sent to
search for either a north-west or a north-east passage by the Bering
Sea route, met, as has been seen (Chapter VIII.), with a measure of the
success characteristic of his work, but his death at Hawaii put an end
to the hope that further research in the Arctic lay before him, and the
voyage continued under the command of Captain Clarke was carried only a
little north of the 70th parallel in the ice-bound Bering Strait, where
Clarke also died. Till 1815 little was done to elucidate the still
unsolved question of the north-west passage, owing to the disturbed
state of Europe and America, but the offer of a reward (the result of
the exertions of Sir John Barrow in 1818) of £20,000 for the discovery
of the passage and £5,000 for reaching 89° N., led to the sailing of
expeditious to the American Arctic region under Lieut. J. Franklin,
Captain Ross, and Lieut. E. Parry. Ross on his first voyage took
Baffin Bay and Lancaster Sound to be land-locked on the north, and thus
missed his chance of forcing the passage.
Parry in two voyages, on the results of which he gained the £5,000
reward, succeeded in passing through Lancaster Sound, and reaching and
naming Melville Island, thus proving Baffin’s discoveries. Meanwhile
Franklin attempted to reach the north shores of America by land;
he explored 550 miles of the coast and discovered and named Cape
Turnagain, though he and his party suffered great privations on the
return journey. Then the energies of explorers were directed towards
combining the results obtained by Parry and Franklin; further stretches
of the north coast of America were explored, and Point Barrow was
reached in Bering Strait. In 1829 an expedition was undertaken by
Captain John Ross and his nephew James Clark Ross; the opening of the
passage was again missed (though the most northerly part of America
was passed), and it was not discovered till 1851 by Kennedy on his
search for Franklin. J. C. Ross, however, fixed the position of the
north magnetic pole on this voyage of five years’ duration, and other
valuable observations were made. The work of tracing the northern
shores of America was nearly finished by 1847, chiefly by travellers in
the Hudson Bay Company’s service. During this period the north coast of
Siberia had also been traced almost in its entirety by the Russians,
though they had not succeeded in rounding the most northerly point.
In 1845 Sir John Franklin started on the voyage from which neither
he nor any of his companions returned. It is not known exactly what
he achieved before he was lost, but he came nearer to accomplishing
the north-west passage than anyone before him. The expeditions of
Sir John Richardson, Dr. John Rae, and others, sent by land in search
of his party, filled in the last gap in the northern coast-line of
America. The different expeditions, under McClintock and others, sent
by sea in the fifties for the same purpose not only decided the fate
of Franklin’s party and extended knowledge over a vast area, but also
at last rounded the north of America. The passage found by Kennedy in
1851 was traversed in 1853 by McClure, though part of the journey was
made by travelling over the ice. An expedition under Captain Inglefield
determined the northern point of Smith Sound. Elisha Kent Kane extended
the knowledge of Grinnell Land and Greenland towards the north, and
opened the way to others who followed the waterways he discovered.
In 1871 Charles Hall sailed 250 miles up Smith Sound and reached the
hitherto inaccessible polar sea; he touched a more northerly point than
had previously been reached by any ship (82° 11´ N.).
Stirred to action by these fine achievements of the Americans, England
sent out the important expedition under Captain George Nares in
1875 which obtained very valuable scientific observations, taken on
the frozen polar sea, and under Albert Markham reached the furthest
point north yet attained--83° 20´ N.--after battling with immense
difficulties caused by bad conditions of the ice and scurvy. Meanwhile
much good work had been done in the Arctic from the old world. A purely
scientific expedition had been sent to the Spitsbergen seas as early
as 1827 from Norway; but from then till 1858 the work of exploration
was chiefly carried on by the men engaged in the seal-hunting and
fishing, in the interests of their trade. Before 1872, however,
several Scandinavian expeditions which visited Spitsbergen and
Greenland brought back valuable scientific results. The most noteworthy
expedition of this period, however, was Austrian; it was captained
by Lieutenant Julius Payer, who had previously been on an expedition
in Greenland. He and Lieutenant Weyprecht sailed in 1871 to search
for the north-east passage. They were beset by ice off Novaya Zemlya,
and drifted till they came to a mountainous country which they called
Franz Josef Land. They believed it to consist of two large masses of
land, instead of perceiving it to be an archipelago, and much of the
country they thought they saw has been since proved not to exist. Franz
Josef Land was not visited again till 1880, when a large part of it
was surveyed by the Englishman Leigh Smith. The north-east passage
was made in 1879 by A. E. Nordenskiöld, who accomplished the journey
which led so many before him to failure without loss of life or vessel,
and almost in one season. He had made several previous voyages in
Greenland and Spitsbergen; he had also twice successfully reached the
Yenisei through the Kara Sea. Captain Joseph Wiggins, an Englishman,
also made several voyages through the Siberian seas, which, together
with Nordenskiöld’s accomplishment of the north-east passage (1878–9),
proved the route to the mouth of the Yenisei to be practicable from a
commercial standpoint. Fired by Nordenskiöld’s example, the Danes made
several remarkable journeys to the interior of Greenland.
A new interest was given to polar research by the establishment of
the international circumpolar stations in 1883. The idea was mooted
first by Weyprecht, and eventually twelve expeditions of various
nationalities were sent out to erect observatories at different
points within the polar circle, so that simultaneous and continuous
observations might be taken. A great deal of valuable work was done.
An American expedition, led by Lieutenant A. W. Greely (1881–4), to
Grinnell Land almost perished from starvation.
Greenland was crossed for the first time by Fridtjof Nansen in 1888. In
1886, and again from 1892 to 1895, Robert E. Peary, an American civil
engineer, made several brilliant journeys in Greenland, and extended
the knowledge of the country more than two degrees to the north. It
was Nansen and Peary who were destined to draw the veil from the great
polar area itself, towards which so many fruitless journeys were made.
From 1817 onwards many voyages were undertaken with the object of
reaching the pole--as by Parry, Scoresby, Markham, and Jackson from
England, Nordenskiöld from Sweden, and Koldewey from Germany. These
explorers mostly started from Spitsbergen; but Nansen worked on an
original plan--that of utilizing the drift of ice, which had been
proved to take place right across the polar sea, to carry his ship with
it. The plan was so far successful that the _Fram_ passed from the New
Siberian islands right over to Spitsbergen in three years, without,
however, reaching a higher latitude than 85° 55´ N. Nansen, with
Lieutenant Johansen, made a dash northwards from this point, reaching
86° 5´ N., the “farthest north” attained up to that date; he met with
Frederick Jackson’s expedition in Franz Josef Land, and returned
safely to Norway. This brilliant journey led to no discovery of land
in the polar basin, which proved to consist of a sea of great depth,
increasing towards the pole. The Duke of Abruzzi’s expedition in 1899
reached 86° 34´ N.
Meanwhile much good work was being done in other directions in
extending Arctic research. Franz Josef Land was explored, chiefly
by Austrian, British, and American expeditions. Nathorst, a Swede,
circumnavigated the Spitsbergen archipelago in 1898, and discovered and
mapped King Oscar Fjord in Greenland in the following year. Sverdrup,
Nansen’s friend and companion, sailed up Jones Sound and charted many
previously unknown parts in 1899 and the following years. The story of
a continent existing to the north of Bering Strait and extending right
across the pole to Greenland, which was believed by many explorers,
was disproved by De Long in his ill-fated voyage in the _Jeannette_ in
1879, during which the whole party perished, though the ship’s books
were afterwards found. This voyage and the journeys of the ships sent
in search of De Long proved that north of Siberia lay an ocean dotted
with islands. Much work was done in exploring the New Siberian Islands
by the Russian, Toll, who lost his life in an effort to reach the most
northerly and unknown portion of the group. In 1903–4 Amundsen in the
_Gjöa_ undertook an expedition to the North Magnetic Pole, where he
carried out a continuous series of observations for two years with
important scientific results. He returned by Bering Strait, thus for
the first time completing the navigation of the North-west Passage.
The Danes worked hard at charting the east coast of Greenland, and the
outline of the north-eastern extremity of the country was accurately
delineated for the first time by the expedition of L. Mylius Erichsen
(1905–07), on which he and his companions perished, though their
splendid records and observations were found by a relief expedition.
The crowning achievement of reaching the pole itself was accomplished
in 1909 by Peary, after several previous journeys. He had spent four
consecutive winters in the Arctic regions exploring Smith Sound and
the north of Greenland, from 1899 to 1902; and in 1905 he had again
attempted to reach the pole by Smith Sound and Grant Land, touching
87° 6´ N. At or near the pole there was no land to be seen, and the
sea was 1,500 fathoms deep. Thus there remains no Arctic problem of
the first magnitude to-day. The main outline of the Arctic region as a
great and deep sea surrounded by the northern shores of Europe, Asia,
America, and Greenland, is known, though there is still a large portion
of the polar basin north of Alaska as yet untouched by explorers. Here,
however, some high authorities believe that a considerable extent
of land remains to be discovered beyond the Beaufort Sea. Even now
maps show a doubtful coast-line some fifty miles due north of Point
Barrow, and in 1913 an expedition left Canada under Stefansson with the
solution of this problem as its main object.
_(b) Antarctic._
In the Antarctic an important voyage, which supplemented Cook’s work,
was undertaken in 1819 by Fabian von Bellingshausen. He succeeded in
sailing half round the Antarctic circle, keeping to high southern
latitudes all the way, and voyaging within the circle for considerable
distances. He found the first land seen within the Antarctic circle,
Peter Island, and, later, Alexander Island; he discovered the Traverse
Islands, and on his return in 1821 touched at the South Shetland
Islands, and met there sealers, by one of whom, William Smith, the
islands had been discovered in 1819. In the next year, 1822, the
South Orkney Islands were found and named by another sealer. The
next voyager was James Weddell, who reached the highest latitude yet
attained, 74° 15’ S., in 1823. At his highest latitude he had clear
sea before him, but was forced to turn back by the approach of winter,
and returned with many interesting observations and collections. A
courageous journey was also made in 1831 by John Biscoe, a sealer, who
started out to search for land from the Sandwich Islands, and succeeded
in sailing for some months within the Antarctic circle in a higher
latitude than Bellingshausen, and sighted land which he named Enderby
Land. In spite of the sufferings he had endured and the death of the
greater number of his crew, he started again in the following year from
New Zealand, discovered Biscoe Islands, and took possession for England
of the land which he could see lying behind them; this was subsequently
named Graham Land. Biscoe was in the employ of an enterprising London
firm, the Enderby Brothers, and after the remarkable results which he
had achieved, they were encouraged to pursue their policy of directing
their captains to embrace every opportunity of exploration. In 1833 one
of them, John Kemp, found land to the east of Enderby Land, and in 1839
John Balleny discovered the islands named after him.
About 1835 general interest was aroused in Antarctic problems, and
three expeditions were prepared in England, France, and America to make
magnetic observations, and to explore as far as possible the southern
continent, now at length defined within reasonable limits. The French
expedition, under Dumont d’Urville, was the first to start in 1838, but
achieved little beyond the exploration of some land south of the South
Shetland Islands, which was called Louis Philippe Land. After wintering
in Tasmania, however, d’Urville decided on making a great effort to
reach the south magnetic pole, and though he failed in this, he found
a mountainous land which he named Adélie Land. The American expedition
under Charles Wilkes did not meet with any great success, hampered as
it was by quarrels among the officers and by unseaworthy ships; but
land was several times sighted at a distance, and on Wilkes’s return
controversy arose as to whether the honour of the discovery of this
southern continent belonged to the French or the American expedition.
The British expedition under Sir James Ross was the last to arrive on
the scene (in 1841); but it had the advantage of the others, in that
it had been specially equipped for Antarctic exploration; Ross’s ships
could brave dangers from which Wilkes and d’Urville had been compelled
to turn aside. He forced his way through the pack, and found a range
of high mountains trending southwards, which he called Victoria Land.
Following the land he came to the twin volcanoes, named Erebus and
Terror after his two ships, and was stopped at length by the great
ice barrier, running eastwards. During this remarkable journey Ross
reached latitude 78° 4´ S., the highest yet attained. He made two
further journeys, neither so successful as the first, though in 1842 he
sighted the land which was rediscovered, and named King Edward Land,
in the following century. After this no attempt worthy of mention was
made on the south polar region for thirty years. The _Challenger_
expedition in 1874 was not concerned with the attempt to penetrate very
far south (Chapter XIV.). The voyage in Antarctic waters, however, was
important from the information obtained as to the depth of the southern
ocean and other results which helped to prove the existence of a
considerable mass of land in the Antarctic region. This information
was supplemented by the observations of two of the international
circumpolar stations (to which reference has been made), which were
established in Tierra del Fuego and South Georgia in 1882; but it was
not until many years later that scientific interest was widely aroused
in the problem of the Antarctic continent, and from 1874 to 1898 the
only people to cross the Antarctic circle were sealers and whalers; but
in 1895 C. E. Borchgrevink landed from one of these vessels for the
first time on southern continental land near Cape Adare.
In 1898 three expeditions started south. The first, a Belgian
undertaking on board the _Belgica_, explored the coast to the north of
Graham Land, and brought back valuable collections; the second, from
Germany on the _Valdivia_, re-discovered Bouvet Island, whose position
had long been lost; the third, from England, under Borchgrevink on the
_Southern Cross_, landed the first party to winter in the Antarctic,
reached Mount Terror, and sailed along the Great Ice Barrier, reaching
latitude 78° S. In 1901 the problem was attacked for the first time
by means of land-exploration; a well-equipped expedition leaving
England in that year under Captain R. F. Scott voyaged along the
ice-barrier, and found and named King Edward Land, first seen by Ross.
Scott then proved Mount Erebus and Mount Terror to be on an island,
and wintered on shore. In the following southern summer Scott, with
Wilson and Shackleton, pushed southward and reached the latitude of
82° 17´, where the Great Ice Barrier reaches the foot of the lofty
plateau on which the south pole is placed. Other parties traversed the
ice-barrier in various directions, and much valuable scientific work
was done in geology, biology, meteorology, magnetism, and glaciation.
While Scott was in the Antarctic to the south of New Zealand, a German
expedition, under E. von Drygalski, on board the _Gauss_, was working
to the west of him, and had discovered and named Kaiser Wilhelm II.
Land. Two private expeditions were also in the Antarctic at the same
time, and the large number of synchronous meteorological and magnetic
observations thus taken formed a valuable contribution to the knowledge
of the southern continent. In 1903 a voyage was made by W. S. Bruce on
the _Scotia_, which is important for the exploration of an entirely
unknown sea lying between the tracks of Weddell and of Ross; the
latitude of 74° 1´ was reached. Though the land could not be attained,
its existence was proved by occasional glimpses and by the dredging up
of continental rocks, and the name of Coats Land was given to it. In
1904 J. B. Charcot, a French scientist, cruised along Graham Land and
found a new line of coast, which he named Loubet Land. Thus between
1902 and 1904 new land had been discovered in all the four quarters of
the Antarctic circle--King Edward Land by Scott, Kaiser Wilhelm Land by
Drygalski, Coats Land by Bruce, and Loubet Land by Charcot.
Lieutenant (afterwards Sir) E. H. Shackleton, who had accompanied
Scott, led an expedition to the south in 1908–9, which landed at the
foot of Mount Erebus. That mountain was ascended by Professor T. W. E.
David, who also, with Dr. D. Mawson, reached the south magnetic pole
in 72° 25´ S., 155° 16´ E. Shackleton himself led the famous march
which brought him to 88° 23´ S., 162° E., a great advance towards the
south pole itself, which might actually have been attained but for the
lack of food. The scientific results of the expedition were of high
value, and revealed the desirability of prosecuting researches in the
same field; and in 1910 Scott led a second expedition, with a larger
scientific staff than had ever been taken before, the main party of
which was landed at Cape Evans, McMurdo Sound. Of two other parties,
one was landed on the west side of the sound; another, which worked
at first from Cape Adare, was subsequently transferred to Terra Nova
Bay, Victoria Land. A considerable area was thus covered on this part
of the Antarctic coast, while Scott’s march upon the pole was designed
to follow Shackleton’s route. The splendour of success was outshone by
the splendour of disaster: Scott and four companions, having reached
the pole, died bravely on the return journey, overcome by adverse
conditions. The work of the expedition as a whole, taking that of the
other parties into account, was a brilliant scientific triumph.
The honour of first reaching the pole, however, fell to a Norwegian
explorer, Captain Roald Amundsen, who, leading a small but admirably
equipped expedition, succeeded in his endeavour at the end of 1911,
and he and Scott thus left the way open to research on the Antarctic
land-mass unhampered for the future by the natural desire to reach a
certain point upon it. In the same year expeditions (not specifically
concerned with the attainment of that point) were led south by the
German Lieutenant Filchner, whose immediate goal was Coats Land, in
the “Weddell” (or South American) quadrant, and by Dr. Mawson, whose
objective was Adélie Land, on the opposite flank of the continent,
while various projects are also under the consideration of other
voyagers, British and American. There is room for the work of all
these and more--the Antarctic region is now known as a vast land-area
fringed by deep seas separating it from the other continental masses.
Amundsen’s observations would seem to prove it a single homogeneous
mass, and not to be divided into two, or to consist in part of an
archipelago. It still remains to investigate the nature of any
geological relation between it and the other continents, to study the
extension and physiography of the great mountain ranges which are
known, and their relation to the polar plateau, and to deal with the
many other problems such as are suggested by observations already made
on the climate, the ice conditions, and the distribution of flora and
fauna--notably, in the last connection, the problem of the resemblances
which have been observed between Antarctic and Arctic forms of life.