SLEDGE-TRAVELING
Sledge-traveling is the other twin of ice navigation, the two together
forming polar exploration. The purpose of sledge-traveling is the
transformation of food into miles, and the test of its perfection
is the maximum number of miles for the minimum amount of food.
Sledge-traveling may be of several kinds. It may be over the frozen
surface of polar seas, or along a coast line, or over the elevated snow
surfaces of the great interior ice-caps of Greenland and the antarctic
continent.
In the attempts to reach the north pole the first of these methods was
among the first to be attempted, the effort to sledge north from a
ship. Then the second came into favor. The fourth method was the last
to be exploited, and in this the writer feels he has some claim to
having developed a new departure in polar sledging, through his years
of Greenland ice-cap journeys.
In considering the two great prizes of polar exploration, the north
pole and the south pole, the attainment of the former was dependent
upon proficiency in sledging over the surface of a polar ocean; while
the latter--in fact all antarctic sledge work--is of the fourth kind,
the traverse of the continuous permanent interior ice-cap of the
antarctic continent.
Still considering these prizes, the great distinction and contrast
between north polar and south polar sledge-traveling must be clearly
and constantly borne in mind. In the north polar game the last stage of
the journey--from 500 to 600 miles, according to the route selected,
whether Grant Land or Greenland or Franz-Josef Land--is over the frozen
surface of the Arctic Ocean. This ocean breaks up every summer, the
great fields of ice drifting under the influence of wind and tide to an
eventual exit into the North Atlantic; and at any time of year, even
the depth of the severest winter, a storm will rift the icy surface in
many places with cracks and lanes of open water, and throw up great
ridges of ice-blocks by the pressure of the ice-fields. No place on
the frozen surface of the ocean can be counted upon to be in the same
locality a month later.
From these facts result the following fundamental circumstances in
north polar sledge-travel: first, that the sledge-journey must be
undertaken in the very coldest part of the year, so that the sea ice
may be most firmly cemented together, and that open water, if it does
appear, may be most quickly frozen over again by the extreme cold.
Second, that no caches or depots of provisions can be deposited on the
outward journey, to be picked up on the return, thus lightening loads
and increasing speed, because there would not be one chance in ten of
ever finding them again. Everything used on the journey, therefore,
must be carried the entire distance, and the objects of the journey
must be accomplished within the limits of a single sledging season,
from the time a little light returns in February to the breaking up of
the ice in June, or the whole thing must be done over again.
The average layman will probably consider the first of these
conditions, the extreme cold, as the most serious. As a matter of fact,
the second is the most vital, and is the one which has caused the
discovery of the north pole to drag along through hundreds of years,
while the south pole was attained twice within thirteen years after the
first sledge-journey in that region.
In the south polar game the last stage of the journey--from 700 to 800
miles--is over the eternal surface of the glaciers and the interior
ice-cap. On this surface a depot of provisions put down to-day will be
found in the same place to-morrow or next month or next year or ten
years from now. From this fact result unique and ideal conditions for
the establishment of caches to any extent desired, so that a returning
party may come dashing back the entire distance with nearly empty
sledges. A journey of any length in that region is only a matter of
time.
Second, sledge-travel in the antarctic can be carried on in the summer
season of greatest warmth and continuous light.
On the other hand, sledge-traveling to the south pole encounters the
serious disadvantage of the pronounced altitude, 10,000 to 11,000 feet
in the last stages of the journey, with its decrease in efficiency in
men, dogs, or ponies.
My knowledge of conditions to be encountered in overland sledging was
gained in numerous short trips in Greenland and two long journeys of
1200 miles each across northern Greenland’s ice-cap, the “inland ice.”
To the average reader the expression “inland ice” suggests a surface of
ice. This idea is erroneous. Greenland is a great glacial country, with
an area of 740,000 or 750,000 square miles, fully four fifths of which
are covered by the inland ice, the only portion of it that could be
called land being a ribbon of mountains, valleys, and deep fiords along
the coast. This narrow strip of land is for the most part from five to
twenty-five miles wide, but there are several places where it is sixty
or eighty miles.
[Illustration: HUGGING THE SHORE TO GET AROUND HUGE ICE FIELDS
Note the yacht-like lines]
[Illustration: PARTY LEAVING THE “ROOSEVELT” FOR CAPE COLUMBIA]
The interior of Greenland, or the inland ice, is so cold that it gets
virtually no rain, and the snow does not have a chance to melt in the
long summer day. So the snow has accumulated century after century
until it has filled the valleys, and not only leveled them with the
tops of the mountains, but the highest of these mountain-tops have been
gradually buried hundreds and even thousands of feet deep in ice and
snow. To-day the interior of Greenland, with its 1500 miles in length
and some 700 miles in maximum width, rising from 4000 to 9000 feet or
more above sea-level, is simply an elevated and unbroken plateau of
compacted snow.[2]
On this great frozen Sahara of the North the wind never ceases to blow.
It invariably radiates from the center of the ice-cap outward, blowing
perpendicularly to the nearest portion of the coast land, except when
storms of unusually large proportions sweep across the country. Such a
regular thing are the winds of these regions, and so closely do they
follow the rule of perpendicularity to the coast, that it is always
easy to determine the direction of nearest land. A sudden change in
the wind indicates the presence of large fiords, and the crossing of a
divide can be detected by the area of calm or changeable winds which
prevail, and which are followed by winds blowing from the opposite
direction.
Sweeping along the most direct path to the coast, and with greater
or less velocity, the wind always carries with it a flying mass of
snow, which, on reaching the mountains, settles in the valleys or goes
swirling over the cliffs into the sea. When there is only a light
breeze the snow is very fine and flies only a few feet in the air; but
the stronger the wind, the coarser the whirling snow becomes, and the
greater the depth of its current. In blizzards on this desert of snow
this drift surpasses in fury the sand-storms of the African Sahara, the
snow rising in the air hundreds of feet in hissing, roaring, blinding
torrents, which make it almost impossible for one to breathe, and which
bury anything stationary in a short time. It penetrates like water, and
on stepping into the drift its surface is very nearly as tangible and
sharply defined as that of a pool of water of like depth.
The continuous transportation of vast quantities of the snow by the
wind is a most important factor in retarding the increase in the
depth of the ice-cap, and in my opinion is a factor equaling possibly
the effects of evaporation, melting, and glacial precipitation all
combined. Only investigations carried on for a period of years can
definitely determine whether this snow deposit is increasing or
decreasing as the years pass.
Undoubtedly the coldest spot in the world is to be found in the center
of the great ice during the polar night, where at an altitude of one or
two miles it gets the full benefit of the frigid polar air; is several
hundred miles from the polar seas, and is insulated by a mile or more
of ice and snow from any radiation of heat from the earth beneath.
During the winter months the whole surface of the inland ice is covered
with a layer of fine, dry snow. The noonday sun of the late spring
causes the snow along the edge of the ice to become soft, and the
freezing of this at night makes a thin crust. As this layer of crust
creeps into the interior with the approach of summer, the snow on the
edge of the ice-cap turns to slush and finally melts, forming pools and
streams which eat into the ice, opening up old crevasses and new ones
as well. This condition likewise extends into the interior in the wake
of the crust and the summer heat, and eroding streams, working on the
border of the cap, make it so rough as to be in places quite impassable.
Traveling into the interior for fifteen or twenty miles, one finds that
the mountains along the coast have quite disappeared under the landward
convexity of the ice-cap, and the surface, which near the coast is
composed of many hummocks, gradually merges into long, flat swells,
which in turn merge into a gently rising plain and finally into a level
surface.
In my journey across the ice-cap of northern Greenland in 1891 I was
continually turned from my course on the upward march by numerous
crevasses and steep slopes which occur along the edge of the inland
ice. These crevasses sometimes cover a tract several miles wide, and
are usually marked by peculiar ice-mounds two or three feet in height.
Covered with a light crust, the crevasses are difficult to detect, and
one must be constantly on the alert to avoid getting into them. At
times it is necessary to reconnoiter for hours before safe snow-bridges
across these treacherous places can be found, and on several occasions
I nearly lost all our provisions and dogs when the sledges broke
through.
Determined to avoid such conditions on the return trip, I traveled
well inland. Here, however, deep, soft snow makes sledge-traveling
difficult; so on my second journey across Greenland, in 1895, I chose
an intermediate route, hoping to avoid crevasses and slopes and
slippery ice as well as soft going. This route proved to be by far the
best one, the surface being much better, and the distance a few miles
less than by either of the other two routes.
In addition to the wind there is another peculiarity of the inland
ice which adds to the difficulties to be encountered in this work.
That is the extreme intensity of the sunlight, which can be realized
only by those who have experienced it. During the summer months the
sun shines continuously, and this continuous brilliancy is intensified
a hundredfold by the reflection from endless fields of glistening,
sparkling snow, unrelieved by a single object. The strongest eyes can
stand such a blinding glare only a few hours without protection. We
always wore heavy-smoked glasses, and when in camp found it impossible
to sleep without still further protecting our eyes by tying a narrow
band of fur about them to exclude the light. Only when a storm is
brewing does this intense light become subdued. At such times, however,
the sky and snow take on a peculiar gray, opaque light which is even
more trying than the sunlight.
To direct a course across unbroken fields of snow, with absolutely
nothing to guide or fix the eye, is a task which requires a good deal
of experience. And to force a team of dogs dragging a heavy sledge-load
into blank nothingness is still more difficult. During dull or foggy
weather the work of keeping a direct course becomes particularly
arduous. For days I have traveled into gray nothingness, feeling, but
unable to see, the snow beneath my snow-shoes, and the long days and
nights of marching when it was almost impossible to see the length of
the sledge were among the most trying experiences I had on the inland
ice.
On both my journeys across the ice-cap I was accompanied by only one
man, and with compass in hand one of us would take the lead, go ahead
as far as it was possible without losing sight of the party, (and at
times this would be only a matter of a few yards), put himself on
the course, and then wait for the other to come up with the dogs and
sledges. At other times we devised a wind-vane and used the wind as a
guide, taking a compass direction of it every quarter- or half-hour,
keeping the wind-vane at the proper angle, and in this way making a
fair course. The endeavor to keep a direct course for any length of
time under such conditions imposes such a strain on mind and body that
travel sometimes becomes impossible. In addition to this, the feeling
of fatigue and heaviness which are the result of the fog and altitude
make traveling still more difficult.
A severe and protracted storm is one of the most disagreeable features
of sledge-traveling whether over land or sea ice, and preparations
should be immediately made to camp as soon as one is seen to be
approaching. If the equipment does not include a tent, a snow igloo
should be built as quickly as possible. If there is not time for this,
then a dugout can be made in a snow-bank or a snow-wall erected as a
shelter from the wind and driving snow. Everything possible should
be carried inside the tent or igloo, and the dogs securely fastened
outside. Storms on the ice-cap are so severe that, when possible, the
dogs should be protected from them by a snow-wall. I have been confined
to tent or igloo for days at a time by these storms, but the most
accursed hours I ever spent on the ice-cap were those spent in a small
tent six long days and nights, five thousand feet above sea-level,
during a furious storm which I knew was destroying my last chances for
finding a ton and a half of supplies, including all my pemmican and
alcohol, which I had cached the year before for my spring work in 1895.
Any one seeing our camp at the end of one of these storms would believe
us buried alive, the only signs of our presence being the snow-mounds
covering us and the dogs.
[Illustration: OVER A PRESSURE RIDGE]
[Illustration: A HALT ON THE MARCH]
One storm will play more havoc with the dogs and their harnesses and
traces than the work of two weeks’ continuous traveling. To get the
sledges and the dogs and tent dug out, to say nothing of untangling and
repairing the dogs’ traces, which become terribly twisted and tangled,
is enough to keep two men busy for hours. After almost every snowfall
we had to help the dogs drag the sledges. For this purpose a long line
of walrus hide was tied to the front of the sledge, running out over
the dogs, so that one of us could attach it to our shoulders and pull
in advance of the team. To the side of the sledge a short line was
fastened enabling the other man to pull and drive the dogs at the same
time. Dragging the sledges through soft snow is very disheartening
work for the dogs, and every expedient that ingenuity can devise or
that is known to the Eskimos must be used to urge them forward. Only
one thing can make traveling harder on the inland ice, and that is a
precipitation of frost, which, covering the surface like sand, makes
the sledges drag like so many loads of lead. Dogs that in ordinary
going can haul two sledges at a fair rate of speed require the combined
assistance of two men to move one. For this condition of snow even
icing the runners seems to do but little, if any, good.
This process of covering sledge-runners with a coating of ice, taught
me by the Eskimos, is most interesting, and wonderfully increases the
tractive power of a sledge in low temperatures.
A long strip of thick walrus skin, which, when frozen, is the toughest
and most unbreakable of all substances, the same width as the runner
and from which the hair has not been removed, is first applied to
the bottom of each runner, being fastened by lashings of rawhide run
through slits in the edges of the walrus hide. After this has been
allowed to freeze solid the entire length of each runner is covered
with soft snow which has been dipped in warm urine. This is pressed and
shaped with the hand until it is three-quarters of an inch, perhaps
an inch, thick. When this has been given time to freeze solid it is
chipped and made smooth with the aid of a knife, and rubbed over by
hand with water. As the dogs get tired and the going becomes harder,
the ice coating on these shoes should be renewed nearly every day on
inland ice cap-work. The effect of high elevation is very perceptible
upon men and dogs, and it is difficult to force dogs to go faster
than at the rate of two miles an hour. At such times we iced the
sledge-runners twice a day.
The routine on our long marches was for the most of the time about
as follows: The work of caring for the dogs, harnessing them in the
morning and unharnessing and tying them to stakes at night and feeding
them at the end of the day’s march, was my special work. During the
march my companion took charge of them while I kept the course, except
when to vary the monotony we exchanged duties. My companion always
built the snow shelter at night which served as a kitchen, and we took
turns acting as cook. The man on duty in the kitchen slept there all
night, and stood ready to re-secure any dogs which might break away
during the night.
In my first trip across the ice cap of Greenland I used a considerable
number of Eskimo dogs which had just been purchased from the natives
and were entirely unacquainted with us and we with them.
Naturally our unusual size, strange complexion and stranger language
were at first a source of terror to them and in the earlier stages
of the journey when a dog got loose at night it was sometimes quite
an effort to secure him again. Before the journey was over we had no
trouble with any of our dogs.
Other parties using Siberian dogs for the first time may have the same
experience.
To catch a loose dog sometimes requires more or less time and ingenuity
and may result in a few bites. Our usual method of capturing one of
these polar wolves was to coax him within reach by throwing out morsels
of meat to him, then throw ourselves upon him and quickly bury his head
in the snow. We soon became expert enough in this to avoid more than
a few bites. Sometimes a dog is too wily to be caught in any such way
and has to be lassooed and choked almost senseless before he can be put
back in harness.
Up to 1895 the basic principle of polar sledging was that overland
traveling was not practicable, that the only highway lay along the
sea-ice off the coast. Therefore the journey I mapped out--the crossing
of the inland ice-cap of northern Greenland--was an unprecedented one
in point of distance to be covered without caches or supply depots.
The successful carrying out of this plan has shown the practicability
of the inland ice for a road, and since that time Greenland has been
crossed by Nansen and Spitzbergen by Conway. The capabilities of
overland traveling having been about exhausted in 1895, the invaluable
experience gained in my Greenland work was concentrated upon a
persistent effort to solve the polar question.
In this connection the following grouping of material may be of
interest:
“My comprehensive scheme for work in Greenland, based upon the
utilization of the Inland Ice for overland sledge journeys, and
my subsequent development and execution, in actual practice, of
methods, means, and details, justify me, I think, in claiming
to have originated a new departure in Arctic work. Since my
origination of that departure, Nansen has crossed Greenland; Conway
has crossed Spitzbergen; and if our present idea of conditions in
the Antarctic be correct, _it is entirely within the possibilities,
that the conqueror of the South Pole will achieve success by
adopting my methods and equipment_.”--Peary in “Northward Over the
Great Ice,” 1898, Vol. I, page lvii.
“The North Pole is reached.”
In a flash the news spread over the world. The goal of which so
many had dreamed, for which so many had labored and suffered and
sacrificed their lives, was attained. It was in September, 1909,
that the news reached us.
At the same instant I saw quite clearly that the original plan
of the _Fram’s_ third voyage--the exploration of the North Polar
basin--hung in the balance. If the expedition was to be saved,
it was necessary to act quickly and without hesitation. Just as
rapidly as the message had traveled over the cables I decided on my
change of front--to turn to the right-about, and face to the south.
The North Pole, the last problem but one of popular interest in
polar exploration, was solved. If I was not to succeed in arousing
interest in my undertaking, there was nothing left for me but to
try to solve the last great problem--the South Pole.
The British expedition was designed entirely for scientific
research. The pole was only a side-issue, whereas in my extended
plan it was the main object.
If Peary could make a record trip on the Arctic ice with dogs, one
ought, surely, with equally good tackle, to be able to beat Peary’s
record.--Amundsen in “The South Pole,” 1913.
[Illustration: SLEDGE PARTY ON THE MARCH WITH GOOD GOING]
[Illustration: HARD GOING]
My despatch telling of the discovery of the north pole was dated
September 6, 1909. Amundsen sailed for the south pole in June, 1910.
In the nine months before that time the details of my work were known
everywhere. In Amundsen’s journey to the south pole he used dogs
exclusively for traction; pemmican was his mainstay for food; his
clothing was fur; he had one object, the south pole.
Many are under the impression that the ice of the polar sea is smooth
as glass and that explorers simply ride to their destination on dog
sledges. In reality the only smooth ice to be found is while still
on the glacial fringe, an ice-foot which extends along the northern
coast of Grant Land and Greenland, varying from one-half to five miles
in width. Parts of the outer edge of this fringe rise and fall with
the tide, and sometimes large areas of ice will separate from it and
float off to sea, but as a body it is stationary. Outside the fringe
is a shore lead, or tidal crack, which opens under the stress of
offshore winds or ebb-tides in the spring, and shuts under the effect
of northerly winds and spring-flood tides. The constant battle which
occurs here between this glacial fringe and the heavy, detached floes
smashes the ice into all shapes and sizes, and piles it up in great
pressure ridges which may be a few feet or a few rods high and several
rods or a quarter of a mile wide.
Farther out huge floes are hurled against one another by the wind and
tides, thus forming more pressure ridges. Between these series of
ridges old floes are found which at times are comparatively smooth.
The ice of the polar sea during the summer is constantly moving, large
fields of ice ranging from ten or fifteen to over one hundred feet in
thickness, break away from glaciers, crushing the thin ice and smashing
against other fields, splitting them and forming new ridges until the
surface, when it again hardens in the winter, is simply a chaos of
broken ice. Nine-tenths or more of the distance between northern Grant
Land and the pole is composed of these floes, the rest being ice,
formed by the sea-water freezing during the autumn and winter months.
Continued northerly winds during the autumn, when the masses of ice
are gradually freezing together, will force the heavier ice toward the
shore while farther out the edges of the ice-floes where they meet pile
up in regular series of ridges. If, however, the winds are not strong
during the autumn many large ice-fields separate from other floes,
and between these masses of ice new ice, fairly smooth, and never over
eight or ten feet thick, will form. This remains until summer unless
violent winds occur to crush it up.
The difficulties and hardships of travel over these ragged and
mountainous pressure ridges must be experienced to be appreciated. A
trail oftentimes must be hewed out with pick-axes, and the heavily
loaded sledges pushed, pulled, hoisted, and lowered over the hummocks
and steep acclivities, even unloaded, and the equipment carried over on
one’s back. On our return from farthest north in 1906 we encountered
a seemingly endless and indescribable chaos of broken and shattered
ice at the place where we had been held up by the big lead on our
upward march, and it took hours of grim and exhausting work to carry us
through it.
Bad as the pressure ridges are for sledge-traveling, however, they are
not as dangerous or trying as the lead or lanes of open water caused
by the action of wind and tides on the ice. These are in some cases
mere cracks running across the floes in almost straight lines. In other
cases they take an irregular course across the ice, and are just wide
enough to prevent crossing. Again they will be as large as rivers, a
mile or two wide and many miles long. For a polar-sea explorer these
leads are an omnipresent nightmare. When or where they will occur is
impossible to tell. It may be with a loud report directly ahead of a
party, cutting off their advance northward or cutting off their return
to land on the way back. It may be directly in the midst of camp. With
every northward march on my last two sledge journeys fear of impassable
leads increased, and I would find myself hurrying toward every pressure
ridge, fearing it concealed a lead beyond it. Arriving at the summit
and finding no lead ahead, I would catch myself hurrying on in the same
way at the next one.
The best way to cross wide leads is learned only by long experience.
Sometimes a detour east or west will result in finding a place narrow
enough to permit long sledges to be bridged across. In very cold
weather it may be found practicable to wait until new ice forms thick
enough to allow a sledge to be rushed across, or a lead may show signs
of closing, in which case a party can wait until it is quite close
together.
Occasionally large pieces of floating ice are to be found in a lead,
forming a sort of pontoon-bridge across it. One member of the party
goes ahead to pick the way, jumping from one cake to another, and
making sure the weight of dogs and sledge will not tilt the cake, then
encouraging the dogs to go forward while the driver of the sledge
steers it and at the same time balances the cake of ice to keep it from
overturning.
To make dogs leap across a widening crack is work which requires an
expert dog-driver. Some can do it without any trouble by use of the
whip and voice, others have to go ahead of the dogs and coax them
to make the jump by holding their hand low and making a pretense of
shaking a morsel of food. Leads which are too wide to jump the dogs
and sledges across can be ferried by hacking out a cake of ice large
enough to bear the weight of dogs and sledges. It sometimes happens
that in crossing a narrow lead it will open before the entire party has
crossed. This occurred on my last trip north, an Eskimo with his sledge
and dogs being left on the other side. An impromptu ferry-boat was cut
out of the ice on our side of the lead, two coils of rope were fastened
to each other, and slipped around the cake. Two Eskimos boarded it; a
line was thrown across the lead to the other Eskimo while one on our
side held that end. Then the two men on the ice-cake took hold of the
rope and pulled the raft across the lead. The dogs and sledge and other
Eskimo were taken upon the ice-cake, and we hauled them across to our
side.
Leads which assume the proportions of rivers, such as the one we
encountered on the way north in 1906 and on our way back the same
season, are a different matter, and the only thing one can do is to
wait until young ice forms strong enough to afford a passage.
To know how to travel safely over young newly formed ice is one of the
most important items of knowledge and training for a polar explorer.
Prof. Marvin of my last expedition was drowned by breaking through
young ice while returning in command of one of my supporting parties,
and one of Captain Cagni’s supporting parties was totally lost in the
same way.
Members of my expedition had frequent narrow escapes in spite of
every precaution, and my entire party had a very close call in 1906
while crossing a two-mile wide stretch of extremely thin ice. Only
the utilization of every known trick and method brought us through in
safety.
That there were not more fatal accidents was due largely to my
previously gained experience and the careful and repeated training and
cautioning which my men received.
Snowshoes are a most necessary adjunct of such travel. The distribution
of a man’s weight effected by a good pair of six-foot snowshoes will
enable him to travel safely over ice which would not support him for an
instant without them.
The Eskimos of Whale Sound as a result of their seal hunting on newly
formed ice in the autumn, and their spring walrus hunting on young ice
at Cape Chalon, have the art of traversing thin ice down fine.
They need to. It is often a matter of life or death to them.
When young ice is encountered which sinks and buckles under the feet at
each step, the first precaution is to spread the feet--travel wide--and
slide them along as evenly and rapidly as possible without lifting them
from the ice.
The Eskimos say that the polar bear does this when stalking seals on
thin ice. If this is not enough the next move is to get down on all
fours with both hands and feet spread wide apart and then shuffle along
without lifting hands or feet from the ice.
When an Eskimo does this in the seal hunt, he usually has his
seal-spear in one hand and his lance in the other, both extended on the
ice and sliding with the hands.
The distribution of weight resulting from this is very effective.
With the polar explorer two ice lances form a good substitute for the
Eskimo spear and lance.
The final position is to lie flat with arms and legs extended and
squirm and wiggle slowly along. If two pair of six-foot snowshoes are
available to still further increase the bearing area and distribute the
weight, it is possible to negotiate surprisingly thin ice.
Bartlett on his remarkable retreat from the crushed and foundered
_Karluk_ in Bering Sea, would never have made his astonishing traverse
of the more than a hundred miles of thin moving ice in Long Strait
between Wrangel Island and the Siberian coast, but for his experience
and training with thin ice while with me.
Nor would he have brought his crew to Wrangel Island in safety but
for his extended experience with me in negotiating the apparently
insuperable pressure ridges of the polar ocean.
The authority for these statements is Bartlett.
Low temperatures, ranging anywhere from twenty to sixty degrees below
zero, keeping a party’s brandy solid; having to march all day in the
face of a blinding snow-storm, with the wind piercing every opening in
the clothes, and then having to build an igloo for shelter at the end
of the day, are other hardships. During some sledge journeys the wind
scarcely ceases to blow for an hour. Its infernal rush and assault cuts
and blisters faces and sets eyes stinging with pain, and at the end
of every day’s march in the field faces are rubbed with vaseline, and
sometimes wine of opium applied to the eyes.
Another ever-present danger in sea ice-work is that of breaking through
young ice and getting wet. A mishap of this kind is to be dreaded, for
even if a man is able to get out of the water quickly he would soon
freeze in such low temperatures with no igloo and change of clothes at
hand.
For a sledge-journey of any length across the polar sea the method of
advance and supporting parties has proved the most effective. A pioneer
party was introduced for the first time in my work, and while
supporting parties had been used before in polar work, they had never
been utilized on such a scale as on my last expedition.
[Illustration: CROSSING NARROW LEAD]
[Illustration: THROUGH A CAÑON OF THE POLAR OCEAN]
The pioneer party was made up of four experienced and energetic
men, with lightly loaded sledges and the best dogs in the pack.
This division left Cape Columbia under the leadership of Bartlett
twenty-four hours ahead of the main party. In all kinds of weather and
regardless of every obstacle except impassable leads, a march was to be
made every twenty-four hours (later when the sunlight was continuous
during the twenty-four hours the advance party kept only twelve hours
ahead of the main division), breaking the way and in fact setting the
pace for the main party, which, having to waste no time in choosing and
breaking a trail, could cover the same distance as the reconnoitering
party in less time, even with more heavily loaded sledges. Bartlett
traveled ahead of his division, usually on snow-shoes, picking a trail.
My main party was large enough to permit the withdrawal of the men
from the advance party to the main party as they became exhausted by
the hard work and lack of sleep; and the sending out of fresh men to
continue the work. This enabled me to conserve the strength of those
who were to make the final dash for the pole.
The advantages of supporting parties cannot be too strongly emphasized.
It is impossible for a party, either large or small, to drag food
and fuel enough to sustain life in themselves and their dogs for a
distance of some nine hundred miles across the polar sea. Just as soon
as a party consumes the provisions of one or two sledges the drivers
and dogs, (being just so many superfluous mouths), should be sent back
to headquarters with their empty sledges. When another sledge-load or
two of provisions have been depleted, their drivers and dogs should
likewise return. In all, four supporting parties were sent back one
after another, the last one in command of Captain Bartlett, leaving me
near the 88th parallel. Up to this point I had traveled in the rear of
my party to see that everything was going smoothly. On sending back
Bartlett’s division, however, I took my place at the head of the party
which was to make the final dash. This was of necessity a small group
and most carefully chosen, consisting of Henson and four of my best
Eskimos.
The second important duty of the supporting parties is to keep the
trail open so the main party can return rapidly. That this is no
slight consideration is shown by the fact that in twenty-four hours
or sometimes in twelve hours the fierce winds of the North will start
the jamming of the ice-floes, throwing up pressure ridges and causing
leads. Ordinarily, though, the ice will not change much in eight or
ten days, and a party returning follows the outward trail, patching
up any faults or breaks which have occurred in it since it was broken.
The next party, returning a few days later from a point still farther
north, knits together the broken places in its own trail, and, coming
to that of the first returning party, smooths over any breaks which may
be found. The next party does the same, and so on until the main party
on its return has simply to follow the trail of the supporting parties
instead of having to reconnoiter and make a new one. With no trail to
make and the dogs eager to follow a beaten track leading homeward, the
speed of the main party on my last expedition was greatly increased
on its return march, the upward journey having been accomplished in
twenty-seven marches while the return was made in sixteen. In addition
to the advantage of having a well broken trail to return by, the
returning division uses the snow igloos which were built on the way
north, thus saving time and energy which the building of a new igloo at
the end of each long march would mean.
As far as the polar dash was concerned, the work of each supporting
party was finished as soon as it reached land. Each of these parties,
consisting of four men, was entirely independent, having its own
provisions and a complete traveling outfit. With the exception of the
kitchen box containing the alcohol-stove and cooking-utensils, each
sledge was complete. In the event of a mishap and the loss of the
cooking-outfit, the division losing it would have to double up with
another division.
The number of miles covered in each march was first determined by dead
reckoning; that is, by taking the compass course for direction and the
mean estimate of Marvin, Bartlett, and myself for distance traveled.
At intervals of several days this was verified by observations for
latitude, and proved to be satisfactorily approximate to the results
obtained by our astronomical observations.
For tractive power I have always used the Eskimo dogs, and believe they
are the _only_ motor for polar work. Eight dogs are required to haul
the standard load, but with an extra load or for fast traveling I have
sometimes used ten or twelve good dogs. The dogs are attached to the
sledges fanwise, the king dog of the team taking the lead, and there
is no peace among the dogs of each team until it has been definitely
settled among themselves which animal is the best or strongest of
the lot. The Eskimos make their harnesses of sealskin, but when the
dogs are living on short rations they will eat anything made of this
material, and to prevent this I have used a special webbing or belting
two and a half inches wide. Instead of making the traces of rawhide, as
the Eskimos do, I have substituted braided linen sash-cord for it. My
dog harnesses were made on the same pattern as the Eskimos’, two loops
of belting, through which the dog’s forelegs pass, attached by a cross
strip under the throat and another back of the neck. The ends of the
loops are brought together over the middle of the dog’s back, and the
trace fastened to them, making a flexible harness which will permit
a dog to pull to the full extent of his strength without cramping or
chafing him. The art of guiding a team of lively Eskimo dogs by the
voice and rawhide whip twelve or eighteen feet in length is something
which requires long time and great patience to master.
Other explorers, British and Norwegian, have smacked their lips in the
pages of their narratives and reveled in their “hoosh” and pemmican
stew, even though there were lumps of ice in it. In all my expeditions
after the first one, when some members of the party made themselves
sick by eating too much pemmican stew, no attempt has been made at
cooking or even warming the pemmican ration. It has invariably been
eaten like a piece of cake or pie, just as it came out of the tin. In
this way much economy of time and fuel has resulted.
Pemmican is the most satisfying food I know of. Many times I have
reached camp feeling as if I could eat my own weight, and the one
half-pound ration of pemmican has seemed painfully small. But by the
time I had finished I would not have gone out of the igloo for the
finest spread New York could furnish.
The snow house, or igloo, of the Eskimos has a value and a meaning in
the scheme of a serious polar sledge-journey far beyond its superior
comfort as compared with a tent.
The igloo and suitable fur clothing permit discarding tent and
accessories and sleeping-bags. These items are among the so-called
“constants” of a sledge-load, that is, those items which remain the
same throughout the journey as distinguished from the food, which is
constantly diminishing.
As a matter of fact, tent and sleeping-bags do not remain a “constant”
weight, but _increase_ in weight with steadily accumulating frozen
moisture. On the British North Pole Expedition of 1875–76 the weight of
tent outfit for a sledge-party, and its increase in weight during the
journey, are given as follows. (“Voyage to the Polar Sea,” Nares, Vol.
1, page 172.):
Before Starting On Return
Tent 31 pounds 14 ounces 55 pounds
Sail 9 pounds 1 ounce 17 pounds
Coverlet 21 pounds 1 ounce 48 pounds
Lower robe 18 pounds 4 ounces 40 pounds
Floor cloth 11 pounds 4 ounces 29 pounds
------------------- ----------
Total 91 pounds 8 ounces 189 pounds
Sleeping-bags increased in weight from 8 pounds 2 ounces to 17 pounds.
That, however, is somewhat beside the main point, which is this: The
elimination of tent, accessories, and sleeping-bags means the ability
to carry an additional amount of pemmican equal to the weight of tent
and bags, and pounds of pemmican mean miles of travel. The definite and
vital application is this: Shackleton in 1909 was obliged to stop when
within ninety-seven miles of the south pole and return because his food
was not sufficient to take him there and back to his ship.
Shackleton’s tent and sleeping-bag outfit for his southern party of
four men weighed, _when dry_, one hundred pounds.
Two tents, with poles and floor cloths, each weighing complete 30
lbs. Four sleeping bags, each weighing 10 lbs. when dry.--“The
Heart of the Antarctic,” Shackleton, Vol. I, p. 249.
If in place of his tent and bags he had had one hundred pounds of
pemmican, he could have made the distance and could have won the pole.
One hundred pounds of pemmican represents twenty-five days’ rations for
four men.
During the winter of 1905–06, on board the _Roosevelt_, Marvin and I
worked out very thoroughly, first with pencil and paper, and afterward
graphically with the assistance of a long twelve-inch-wide board
and a twelve-foot graduated measuring-rod, match-boxes for sledges,
and percussion caps, of which I had a large number, for rations,
an arrangement for a continuous post-road transportation service,
with snow igloo stations at convenient distances. This system, with
my men and my equipment, could be kept in commission regardless of
temperatures or the darkness of the winter night, barring only those
occasional blizzards during which both man and beast must seek and
remain in shelter.
By this arrangement an advance party could be pushed ahead, kept
provisioned, and its communication with the rear kept intact during any
season of the year and for any distance with the regularity of a Maine
winter lumber-camp tote-road--granted a permanent surface.
I found that this method, attractive as it was, could not be utilized
on the uncertain surface of the frozen north polar sea, and it was
given up for that region.
It is entirely practicable in the antarctic region, where the surface
is permanent and unchanging from year to year, and by utilizing it some
future explorer of that region can travel at will as far as and in any
direction he may desire.
In the active working out of a polar advance there are numbers of
details of practical technic. If the line of march lies through deep,
soft snow, an active man in the lead, with broad packers’ snowshoes,
can tread a trail that greatly reduces the labor of the following dogs.
If there are two men to put in advance, the road is still further
improved. Such a road, once made by snowshoes and sledges, can be
detected even in the darkness of the winter night by its distinctly
firmer consistency.
Sledges should always travel in single file so as to utilize to the
utmost the trail-breaking of each sledge. Of course the brunt of the
work comes on the leading sledge. The next sledge finds it somewhat
easier, the next easier yet, until the last sledge has a firmly beaten
trail over which to travel. To equalize work, I had the leading sledge
at the end of each hour drop back to the rear. In this way each driver
and team of dogs had an equal share of the work.
Contrary to popular opinion, a trail across sea ice or inland ice made
by the passage of a party of several sledges and teams of dogs can be
recognized and followed by those who have the training and knowledge,
weeks or even months afterward. A snow-storm does not obliterate a
trail for any considerable consecutive distance. In these latitudes a
fall of snow is usually soon followed by wind, and while this wind may
drift and pack snow over one section of the trail a few hundred yards
in length, in other places it will scour the snow away and leave the
straight lines of the sledge-runners, the print of a man’s moccasin,
or the five-leaf clover-like impression of a dog’s foot standing up
in relief from the surrounding surface. Every effort, however, was
made in my work to strengthen the marking of the trail, and thus make
it easier to follow on the return march, because retaining the trail
was such a vital matter in the interests of speed and conservation of
energy. Tins of pemmican emptied at each camp in feeding the dogs and
members of the party--these tins being painted bright red or blue--were
cut in half and left on a pinnacle of ice or sticking up in the trail
every half-mile or so of the next march.
Tired dogs near the end of a march can be brightened up and enticed
over the last mile or two if the leader of the party snow-shoeing in
advance of the sledges, indulges in the Eskimo pantomime of sighting,
following, and creeping up upon an imaginary seal, polar bear, or
musk-oxen. In crossing comparatively narrow lanes of very thin young
ice, where a driver was obliged to cross in another place than the
sledge in order not to concentrate the weight too much, and where
it was vital that the dogs should go across at full speed and not
stop until the load was across, for if they did, the sledge would
go through, I sent one man across in advance to a place fifty or a
hundred feet on the firm ice beyond the other edge of the lead, and
then in plain sight of the dogs he would stoop down and chop up an
imaginary piece of walrus meat, at the same time giving the food-call
to the dogs. As a result of this deception, the dogs could hardly be
restrained, and when at the proper moment they were allowed to start,
nothing short of an earthquake could stop the team till it had reached
the man on the other side. On one or two occasions the sledge partly
breaking through before the other side was reached, was rushed out of
the water and to safety by the dash and impetus of the dogs. This same
method is also practicable in crossing the snow-bridges of the masked
crevasses of the great ice of Greenland and the antarctic regions.
CONCLUSION
At the request of friends I have turned away briefly from other work to
take up the threads of the past and write this book.
That other work which has been demanding my attention has a very
pronounced bearing on polar exploration, and in fact upon all
exploration.
Five years ago at the annual dinner of the Explorers’ Club I
ventured the prophecy that in a few years the polar regions would be
reconnoitered and explored through the air. The last three years of
warfare abroad have forced the development of the aeroplane to such
a degree that the time is now very near when aeroplanes will have
such extended radius of certain flight as will make the preliminary
reconnaissance of the unknown areas in the north and south polar
regions a matter of a few weeks instead of several years.
The sheltered inlets of Bowdoin and McCormick Bays in Whale Sound,
Greenland, are readily accessible every summer to a ship like the
_Roosevelt_ and an ice master like Bartlett. In these inlets during
August there are days and days of brilliant, calm, warm weather, with
temperature above the freezing point, and it is continuous daylight
throughout the entire twenty-four hours all through the month.
Four hundred miles due north--four hours’ aeroplane flight--is Cape
Columbia, the most northerly point of the North American world segment,
and less than 500 miles from the pole.
A squadron of aeroplanes starting from Bowdoin or McCormick Bays would
reach Cape Columbia in a few hours with the whole panorama of Grant
Land and the American gateway to the pole passing beneath, could alight
on the firm level “glacial fringe” at Cape Columbia, unload their
supplies and gasoline, and the supporting machines be back at their
base in less than a day.
From Cape Columbia it is less than 1400 miles in a straight line
directly across and over the pole to Cape Chelyuskin on the Siberian
Coast, the most northern point of Eurasia. To Wrangel Island across
Crocker Land and the entirely unexplored region between the pole and
Bering Strait it is about 1500 miles.
From Cape Columbia to Spitzbergen, it is 900 miles, to Franz Josef Land
less than 1000 miles, and to Point Barrow about 1400 miles.
The present average speed of aeroplanes is about 100 miles per hour. By
the time this meets the reader’s eye continuous flights of 1000 miles
or more will be a matter of record. In the near future, continuous
flights of 2000 miles will be made.
A squadron of aeroplanes with base at Cape Columbia, flying in pairs
and making simultaneous trips could with good fortune make the
reconnaissance indicated above in two weeks, then return to Bowdoin or
McCormick Bays and take their ship home.
From the base in Bowdoin or McCormick Bays a week of successive flights
northeast, east and southeast, would clear up all the interior features
of the great island continent of Greenland.
In the South Polar regions with a base at McMurdo Sound in Ross Sea,
south of New Zealand,--the favorite base of Scott and Shackleton,--a
flight of 1800 miles across and over the South Pole would reach the
known portion of Weddel Sea on the opposite side, and flights of 2000
miles would command the entire Antarctic continent.
In the very near future the biting air above both poles will be stirred
by whirring aeroplane propellers, and when that time comes the inner
polar regions will quickly yield their last secrets.
Looking forward to this certain materialization, it is a source of
satisfaction that the two last great physical adventures, the winning
of the North Pole and the South Pole,--the feats which clinched and
made complete man’s conquest of the globe,--were accomplished without
the aid of such modern devices and inventions.
It seems entirely fitting that these tests of brute physical soundness
and endurance which have engaged the attention of the world for
several centuries, should have been won by brute physical soundness and
endurance, by the oldest and most perfect of all machines--the animal
machine--man and the Eskimo dog.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The sixth of the month is a date of rather special interest to the
writer. To begin with, it is his birthday. Then it is the day on which
the _Roosevelt_ steamed north on the successful quest for the pole; the
day on which the pole was reached, and the day on which the wireless
message of success was flashed over the world from the bleak Labrador
station. Later it was the day on which the writer was made _grand
officier_ of the Legion of Honor by the President of France, the day
on which he began his efforts for air preparedness for this country,
and the day (ninth anniversary of discovery of the pole) on which this
country, by the President’s signature, formally entered the greatest of
all wars.
[2] Greenland is the largest island in the world. Its total length
from Cape Farewell, its southern extremity in 60° N. latitude, to Cape
Morris K. Jesup, its northern extremity in 83½° N. latitude is in round
numbers 1500 miles, almost exactly the same as the length of the United
States on the 97th meridian, from the mouth of the Rio Grande to where
our northern boundary crosses the Red River of the North. The greatest
width of Greenland is about the name as the distance from New York to
St. Louis.
In regard to its area, the figures of various authorities vary widely.
It may be sufficient to say that as regards area it can be grouped in
size with the United States east of the Mississippi; Alaska; Mexico;
Columbia; Persia; Portuguese West Africa; Turkey in Asia. Its interior
is covered with a great sheet of ice rising to elevations of probably
10,000 feet in places and several thousand feet in thickness. The
available ice-free land is a strip of varying width along the coast,
intersected by numerous deep fiords.
Geographically, Greenland belongs to North America and the Western
Hemisphere, over which we have formally claimed a sphere of influence
by our Monroe Doctrine. Its possession by us will be in line with the
Monroe Doctrine, and will eliminate one more possible source of future
complications for us from European possession of territory in the
Western Hemisphere. Will turning Greenland over to Denmark now mean
our repurchase of it later, or will obtaining it now mean closing the
incident and placing Greenland where it must ultimately belong?
Greenland is comparatively near to us. For years American ships have
conveyed cryolite from the Ivigtut Mines to Philadelphia. There is
coal and cryolite, probably graphite and mica, possibly gold, in its
rocks. Danish capital has apparently not been sufficient to exploit the
country’s resources. With our unlimited means, it may, like Alaska,
prove a sound and most valuable business investment.
The abundance of native coal and the numerous glacial streams which
come tumbling into the southern fiords from the great interior ice
sheet represent enormous potential energy, which might be translated
into nitrate and electrical energy, to make Greenland a power-house for
the United States.
Greenland represents ice, coal, and power in inexhaustible quantities.
And stranger things have happened than that Greenland, in our hands,
might furnish an important North Atlantic naval and aeronautical base.
A North Pacific naval base for the United States in the Aleutian
Archipelago is a recognized possibility. Why not a similar base in
the North Atlantic? Cape Farewell in Greenland is but little north
of Sitka. It is in the same latitude as St. Petersburg; Christiania,
Great Britain’s naval base in the Orkneys, and the northern entrance to
the North Sea, which Great Britain has incessantly patrolled with her
war-ships summer and winter for two years.
There are fiords in southern Greenland which would hold our entire
navy, with narrow, deep water, impregnable entrances.
Thirty-hours steaming due south from Cape Farewell by thirty-five-knot
war-craft would put them in the transatlantic routes midway between New
York and the English Channel.
With the rapid shrinking of distance in this age of speed and
invention, Greenland may be of crucial importance to us in the future.
--From Peary letter, September, 1917, suggesting Denmark give the
United States Greenland with the Danish West Indies.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs
and outside quotations. In versions of this eBook that support
hyperlinks, the page references in the List of Illustrations lead to
the corresponding illustrations.
Page 7: Caption reading “October, 1904” corrects a misprint of
“October, 1914”.