CHAPTER XX
Nansen.—The man.—First Arctic experience.—Plans the crossing of Greenland.—Carries out his great undertaking.—Voyage on the Fram.—Drifting with the current.—Life aboard.—Nansen and Johannesen start for the Pole.—Difficulties of travel. The “Farthest North.”—The retreat.—A winter on the Franz Josef Land.—Attempt to reach Spitzbergen by kayak.—The meeting at Cape Flora with Frederick Jackson.—Home in the Windward.
The character of the explorer Nansen is best summarized in the brief paragraph explaining his plan for the first crossing of Greenland.
“My notion,” he says, “was that if a party of good ‘ski-lobers’ were equipped in a practical and sensible way, they must get across Greenland if they began from the right side, this latter point being of extreme importance. For if they were to start, as all other expeditions have done, from the west side, they were practically certain never to get across. They would have the same journey back again in order to reach home. So it struck me that the only sure road to success was to force a passage through the floe-belt, land on the desolate and ice-bound east coast, and thence cross over to the inhabited west coast. In this way one would burn all one’s ships behind one, there would be no need to urge one’s men on, as the east coast would attract no one back, while in front would lie the west coast with all the allurements and amenities of civilization. There was no choice of route, ‘forward’ being the only word. The order would be: ‘Death or the west coast of Greenland.’”
Between these lines one sees the fibre of this man, who deliberately stakes out his course and invites a race with Death to the goal of victory; who carefully curtails to the minimum the possibility of failure; who thoughtfully removes from weaker companions all temptations that might jeopardize his chances of success, and who carries through a plan scoffed at by the world as the impracticable scheme of a madman.
There is an indescribable charm about this bold Norwegian, “who was a terrible one for falling into brown studies,” as a child; of whom his masters wrote, “He is unstable, and in several subjects his progress is not nearly so satisfactory as might have been expected”; who combines a gentle, childlike disposition with an indomitable will, never doubting for an instant that he is right and the world wrong, and who steadfastly goes to work to prove his point. Born in 1861 near Christiania; educated in the university of his native city; fond of all the sciences; trained as a zoölogist; a natural athlete, an expert “skilober,” a good hunter, with the spirit for adventure, which is totally careless of all creature comforts, Fridtjof Nansen, at twenty-one, stood on the prow of the Viking, a Norwegian sealer, bound for Arctic seas, ready to meet a foe worthy of his mettle.
FIRST ARCTIC EXPERIENCE
This trip to East Greenland waters for the purpose of gathering zoölogical specimens was followed by his appointment the same year as curator in the Natural History Museum at Bergen.
The return of Nordenskjöld in 1883, from his second remarkable journey to Greenland, determined Nansen upon a similar journey, the success of which he carefully planned. Nordenskjöld had made fifteen marches on the inland ice from Sophia Harbor south to Disco Bay, and reached an altitude of forty-nine hundred feet, sending skilled Lapps on skis a farther distance of one hundred and forty miles, where they reached an elevation of sixty-six hundred feet, on the marvellous ice-cap which still rose before them.
Accompanied by three Norwegians, Otto Sverdrup, Lieutenant Oluf Christian Dietrichson, of the Norwegian army, and Kristian Trana, and two Lapps, Balto and Ravna, Nansen sailed on the Danish steamer Thyra from Scotland, May 9, 1888. The Thyra was to carry the little band of explorers the first stage of their journey to Iceland. At the Faroe Islands, Nansen learned of the extremely bad condition of the ice round Iceland. The east coast of the island was reported inaccessible. By May 17 the Thyra stood off the Vestmanna Islands, and later she passed Reydjanaes, which carries the only lighthouse Iceland possesses.
Anchoring off Thingeyre, the party took leave of the Thyra, and, warmly welcomed by Herr Gram, the merchant of Thingeyre, they awaited the Jason, which was to convey them to the coast of Greenland. On the morning of June 3, the expectant party sighted a little steamer slowly working inwards. As she came nearer, she was found to be the Isafold of the Norwegian Whaling Company. She anchored and sent a boat on shore amid increasing excitement. “I had begun to suspect the truth,” says Nansen, “when, to my astonishment as well as joy, I recognized in the first man who stepped ashore Captain Jacobsen of the Jason. Our meeting was almost frantic, but the story was soon told. He had reached Isafjord, and, not finding us there, had thought of coming on to Dyrafjord with the Jason. But with the strong wind blowing it would have taken his heavily rigged ship a whole day to make the voyage, and, as the Norwegian Company’s manager most kindly offered to send the Isafold to fetch us, he had taken the opportunity of coming too.
“Farewells were hastily said; willing hands transferred the baggage, which consisted, in addition to the usual Alpine outfit, of Canadian and Norwegian snow-shoes, instruments, food, fuel, and sleeping gear, a load of twelve hundred pounds for their five sledges; and a restive and unwilling pony bought of Herr Gram, and the Isafold steamed out of the fiord and to the northwards.”
For six weeks the Jason made fruitless attempts to land the impatient explorers on this barren coast of Greenland, when, July 17, 1888, Nansen and his party attempted by boat to make Cape Dan, from which they were separated by an ice stream ten miles wide.
“When Ravna saw the ship for the last time,” writes Balto, the Lapp, “he said to me: ‘What fools we were to leave her to die in this place. There is no hope of life; the great sea will be our graves!’”
Sleeping upon the floes at night, dragging or rowing their boats by day, the journey to the coast was perilous and dangerous in the extreme. After several days they found themselves being carried south upon the floe and “straight away from shore, at a pace that rendered all resistance completely futile.”
“July 20,” says Nansen, “I was roused by some violent shocks to the floe on which we were encamped, and thought the motion of the sea must have increased very considerably. When we get outside we discover that the floe has split in two not far from the tent. The Lapps, who had at once made for the highest points of our piece of ice, now shout that they can see the open sea....
“The swell is growing heavier and heavier, and the water breaking over our floe with ever-increasing force. The blocks of ice and slush, which come from the grinding of the floes together and are thrown up round the edges of our piece, do a good deal to break the violence of the waves. The worst of it is that we are being carried seawards with ominous rapidity.”
Taking refuge upon a stronger and larger floe, the party awaited the issue with courage and resignation, though it must be confessed the poor Lapps were not in the best of spirits. “They had given up hope of life, and were making ready for death.” A night of fearful promise succeeded a day of imminent peril. Sverdrup took the watch and paced alone the sea-washed floe. Several times he had stood by the tent door prepared to turn his comrades out.
“Once he actually undid one hood,” says Nansen, “took another turn to the boats, and then another look at the surf, leaving the hood unfastened in case of accidents. A huge crag of ice was swaying in the sea close beside us, and threatening every moment to fall upon our floe. The surf was washing us on all sides.... The other boat, in which Balto was asleep, was washed so heavily that again and again Sverdrup had to hold it in its place.”
A second time he came to undo the tent hood, but just as things looked their worst, the floe changed her course and as if directed by an unseen hand, sailed toward land, and took refuge in a good harbour. On July 29, the fates were kind, and they made a landing at Anoritok, 62° 05´ N., nearly two hundred miles south of Cape Dan. Following the shore to the north, they fell in with natives near Cape Bille.
The ice journey commenced from Ninivik 64° 45´ N., which was reached August 10, after pursuing their journey up steep, irregular slopes, covered with soft snow and beset with dangerous crevasses; they made only forty miles inland after seventeen days of most arduous travel, and reached an elevation of six thousand feet.
PLANS THE CROSSING OF GREENLAND
“It was now late in the year,” writes Nansen, “and the autumn of the ‘inland ice’ was not likely to prove a gentle season, so the fact that it was considerably shorter crossing to the head of one of the fiords in the neighbourhood of Godthaab to Christianshaab was an argument that had its weight.... I consulted the map again and again, made the calculations to myself, and finally determined upon the Godthaab route.... The point where I thought of getting down was that which we actually hit, and which lies at about latitude 64° 10´ N.... The rest of the party hailed my change of plan with acclamation. They seemed to have already had more than enough of ‘inland ice,’ were longing for kindlier scenes, and gave their unqualified approval to the new route.”
CARRIES OUT HIS UNDERTAKINGS
Sails had been rigged to the sleds, and with the terrific winds which swept the ice-cap, advance was assisted by this means, the men marching on skis. So frightful were the storms that raged over these desolate snow fields that at night it seemed as if the tent would be torn to shreds, and before a start could be made in the morning, the sledges had to be dug out of the drifts and unloaded so that their runners might be scraped clean of snow and ice, “a task which we found anything but grateful in the biting wind, ... but the cruellest work of the whole day was getting the tent up in the evening, for we had to begin by lacing the floor and walls together; as this had to be done with the unprotected fingers, we had to take good care not to get them seriously frozen.” “One evening when I was at work,” says Nansen, “I suddenly discovered that the fingers of both my hands were white up to the palms. I felt them and found they were as hard and senseless as wood. By rubbing and beating them, however, I soon set the blood in circulation and brought their colour back.”
The Lapps suffered from snow-blindness, and all were burned by the sun’s rays. This was largely due to the want of density in the air, and the reflection of the rays from the level expanse of snow.
“About ten in the morning of August 31,” writes Dietrichson, “we saw land for the last time. We were upon the crest of one of the great waves, or gentle undulations in the surface, and had our final glimpse of a little point of rock which protruded from the snow. It lay, of course, far in the interior, and for many days had been the only dark point, save ourselves and the sledges, on which our eyes could rest.”
At an altitude of nearly eight thousand feet, they toiled on for days over the interminable desert of snow; there was no break in the horizon, no object to rest the eye upon, and a course was laid out by the diligent use of the compass alone. From the second week in September the party had been anxiously looking for the beginning of the western slope. On September 19, Balto’s joyful cry of “Land ahead!” greeted the advancing sledge fleet. The ice conditions had become more formidable in character, the gradual descent treacherous in the extreme.
“It was a curious sight for me to see the two vessels coming rushing along behind me,” says Nansen, “with their square Viking-like sails showing dark against the white snow fields and the big round disk of the moon behind. Faster and faster I go flying on, while the ice gets more and more difficult. There is worse still ahead, I can see, and in another moment I am into it. The ground is here seamed with crevasses, but they are full of snow and not dangerous. Every now and then I feel my staff go through into space, but the cracks are narrow and the sledges glide easily over. Presently I cross a broader one, and see just in front of me a huge black abyss. I creep cautiously to its edge on the slippery ice, which here is covered by scarcely any snow, and look down into the deep, dark chasm. Beyond it I can see crevasse after crevasse, running parallel with one another, and showing dark blue in the moonlight. I now tell the others to stop, as this is no ground to traverse in the dark, and we must halt for the night.”
The joy of having crossed the ice-cap and the prospect of successfully passing the inland ice to the more congenial soil of the western coast caused the little band to meet cheerfully the most arduous labour in a perilous descent over crevasses and glacier, mountain, and valley into the promised land, of which old Ravna spoke with enthusiasm:—
“I like the west coast well; it is a good place for an old Lapp to live in; there are plenty of reindeer; it is just like the mountains of Finmarken.”
Having reached the coast, it became essential to reach civilization as well, and to expedite the journey it was found desirable to go by sea. The lack of a boat was a small consideration to men who had boldly sailed sledges across the Greenland ice-cap—for though wood, tools, and materials were lacking, there was the tent and plenty of willow bushes around, some six or seven feet in height. “Ribs made of these would not be as straight as we could wish,” says Nansen, “and would not stretch the canvas very evenly, but the main thing was to get her to carry us.... By the evening the boat was finished. She was no boat for a prize competition, indeed in shape she was more like a tortoise-shell than anything else.”
In this crazy little craft Nansen and Sverdrup rowed away to get relief from the inhabitants of Godthaab. Their companions remained in Ameralikfjord, in charge of the sledges and equipment. Great was the rejoicing in Godthaab when the explorers reached there and immediate preparations were made to succour the remainder of the party. These had slowly moved in the direction of Godthaab and gratefully welcomed the Eskimos who met them with supplies.
Unfortunately the party missed the last European vessel that left port that season and were obliged to spend the winter in Greenland. Letters and despatches, however, had been carried by the Eskimos down the coast to the Fox, M’Clintock’s old vessel, in his famous search for Sir John Franklin, and this veteran little craft carried the thrilling news of the “First crossing of Greenland” to Europe. The winter passed, and on April 15 “the settlement rang with the single shriek—‘The ship, the ship.’—Joyfully the brave band of explorers received news from home, and almost sorrowfully prepared to leave their hospitable friends of Godthaab.”
On May 21, 1889, Nansen and his companions made their triumphant entry into Copenhagen—and, concludes Nansen, “May 30 we entered Christiania Fjord, and were received by hundreds of sailing boats and a whole fleet of steamers.... When we got near the harbour, and saw the ramparts of the old fortress and the quays on all sides black with people, Dietrichson said to Ravna: ‘Are not all these people a fine sight, Ravna?’ ‘Yes, it is fine, very fine;—but if they had only been reindeer!’ was Ravna’s answer.”
Previous to his famous journey across Greenland, in one of his many conferences with Dr. H. Rink, that veteran explorer of Greenland, Nansen was addressed by Mrs. Rink, who said to him: “You must go to the North Pole, too, some day,” and without hesitation he answered her emphatically, as though his mind had long ago been made up on that point, “I mean to.”
From his twenty-third year, Nansen had bent his mind and energies upon that great journey into the Polar regions, upon which he did not embark, however, until nine years later.
In the meantime, he was appointed curator in the Museum of Comparative Anatomy at the Christiania University.
In the Danish Geographical Journal for 1885, Mr. Lytzen, Colonial Manager at Julianshaab, gave an interesting account of certain relics of the ill-fated Jeannette expedition picked up by Eskimos on the west Greenland coast. Among these articles was a list of provisions, signed by Captain De Long, a manuscript list of the Jeannette’s boats, a pair of oil-skin breeches marked “Louis Noros,” the name of a member of the Jeannette’s crew, the peak of a cap with F. C. Lindemann, or Nindemann, written on it.
It was plain to Dr. Nansen that these articles had drifted no less than twenty-nine hundred miles and in a period of eleven hundred days, nor could he escape the conviction that a current passes across or very near the Pole into the sea between Greenland and Spitzbergen. Upon this hypothesis Dr. Nansen urged his plan to take a well-provisioned ship, “built on such principles as to enable it to withstand the pressure of ice—for on this same drift-ice, and by the same route, it must be no less possible to transport an expedition.”
In spite of the madness of his scheme, its condemnation by many of the most eminent Arctic authorities of Europe and America, the Norwegian government extended its patronage, and the “Storthing” granted eleven thousand two hundred and fifty pounds toward the expenses of the expedition, the remainder being collected by private subscription.
The Fram, eight hundred tons displacement, was built with especial attention to the construction of the shape of the hull, so as to offer the greatest possible resistance to the attacks of the ice. She carried requisite provisions for dogs and men for five years, and coal for four months’ steaming at full speed.
The navigation of the Fram was given to Captain Otto Sverdrup; Lieutenant Sigurd Scott-Hansen, of the Norwegian navy, was tendered the management of the meteorological, astronomical, and magnetic observations. Dr. Henrik Blessing, physician and botanist, Chief Engineer Anton Amundsen, Lieutenant in the Reserve, Frederick Johannesen, whose eagerness to accompany the expedition led him to accept the position of stoker, and seven others, made up the personnel of the expedition.
VOYAGE ON THE “FRAM”
The Fram left Norway in June, 1893, skirted the north coasts of Europe and Asia, and put into the Polar pack ice near the New Siberia Island, September 22, 1893.
Frozen fast in the ice three days later, the Fram stood off northwest of Saunikof Land in 78° 50´ N., 134° E. It now behooved the company to ship rudder, clean the boilers, and prepare for winter. No idle moments could be spared, rigging must be cared for, sails inspected, provisions of all kinds got out from the cases down in the hold, and handed over to the cook, and the smithy called upon for his offices in repairing bear traps, hooks, knives, etc.
A busy life is a happy one, and the Fram’s company lived in harmonious good-fellowship and drifted leisurely with the great ice-pack, just as Nansen had predicted they would, with only occasional visits from bears to break the monotony of complete isolation.
In December, Nansen, who had read Dr. Kane’s fearful experiences in the Arctic night, with insufficient food for dogs and men, suffering from the ravages of scurvy, compares his own condition in the comfortable warm quarters on board the Fram. No ageing or depressing effects had been felt by any member of his party. The quiet, regular life seemed to agree with them, and with good food, in profusion and variety, a warm shelter, plenty of exercise in the open air, and cheerful diversions in the shape of instructive books and amusing games, the men kept up a cheerful balance of good health and spirits. Nevertheless, the patience of all on board was sorely tried before the cruise was over.
The drift of the ship during the thirty-five months of her besetment, was uneven and irregular; her zigzag course as she receded or approached her goal, encouraged or disheartened her enthusiastic crew. She met bravely and withstood in a remarkable manner threatened disaster from the ice pressures. Wild enthusiasm greeted the slightest advance, such as was found February 16, 1894, when the observations showed 80° 1´ north latitude, a few minutes north of the observations taken the week before. And a corresponding depression is noticed when contrary winds retard or actually force the Fram to retrace her hard-earned progress.
It is not surprising that Nansen’s adventurous spirit grew restive under the enforced inactivity of the Fram’s uncertain drift. Early in the year 1894 one finds his mind working upon deep-laid plans to force the issue with the enemy, and eventually he announced his intentions of attempting one of the most daring and hazardous sledge journeys in the annals of Arctic adventure. His plan was to leave the ship with one companion, advance over the frozen polar ocean, as far as possible, and without making an effort to rejoin the ship, retreat by way of Franz Josef Land and Spitzbergen, back to Norway. February 26, 1895, he officially informed the crew that after his departure, Captain Sverdrup was to be chief officer of the expedition, with Lieutenant Scott-Hansen second in command.
On the 14th of March, 1895, the Fram stood in 84° 04´ N., 102° E., and amid a parting salute with flag, pennant, and guns, Nansen’s third and final sledge dash to the north was taken. Johannesen, who had been chosen as his companion for this arduous undertaking, was in all respects qualified for the work—an accomplished snow-shoer equalled by few “in his powers of endurance,—a fine fellow physically and mentally.”
NANSEN AND JOHANNESEN START FOR THE POLE
Off they went, accompanied for a short distance by several of the crew. Three sledges drawn by twenty-eight dogs were loaded with two kayaks, and provisions for one hundred days for the men and fifty days’ dog-food. Nansen and Johannesen, fully confident that fifty days would see them at the Pole, plunged into the unknown and met bravely the pitiless foe. Hummocks and ridges, lanes and slush, cold and exhaustion, these were the impediments to progress.
It was Nansen’s rule to march nine or ten hours, broken by a midday halt for a little rest and a bit to eat. These stops were a bitter trial to the men exposed to the merciless winds without fire or shelter, to be followed by the uncomfortable task of disentangling the dogs’ traces, before they were able to take up the march again. On March 29, they were “grinding on, but very slowly”; the dogs were showing signs of weakening—there was endless disentangling of the hauling ropes.
On April 3 they were making their desperate way over ridges and lanes which had frozen together with rubble on either side. It was impossible to use snow-shoes, there being too little snow between the hummocks. Thick weather, with deceptive mists making all things white, added to their miseries; irregularities and holes and the spaces between, so that the men and dogs stumbled blindly on, crashing into pitfalls and cracks and running the grave risk of broken bones.
On April 6 the ice grew worse and worse; after an advance of only four miles Nansen and Johannesen were in despair.
The following day, the limit of patience was reached—a world’s record made—Nansen found himself in 86° 13.6´ N., about 95° east longitude; a distance of one hundred and twenty-one geographical miles from the Fram, with two hundred and thirty-five miles between himself and the Pole. Twenty-three days had passed; Nansen and Johannesen turned their backs upon a veritable chaos of ice-blocks, stretching as far as the horizon, and prepared for their retreat to Cape Fligely.
On this remarkable journey southward, confidently expected by Nansen to extend over not more than three months, but which in reality lengthened to one hundred and fifty-three days, the courage and ability of these men was tested to the utmost. Frightful gales, which disrupted the pack, and thick fogs, which made advance almost impossible, added to their discomforts and privations. The dogs reduced in strength from exhaustion and lack of food, died one by one or were killed and fed to the survivors. The work of hauling became heavier and heavier, as their numbers diminished. The men had the misfortune to allow their watches to run down, thereby making their longitude observations uncertain, the result of which was that they travelled far out of their course in search of the land, which persistently remained hidden.
Early in June it became necessary to curtail the rations, and although they steadfastly kept to weights, in order that their remaining provisions would last, they were reduced, June 18, to a frugal supper of two ounces aleuronic bread and one ounce butter per man—and crept into their sleeping-bags hungry and exhausted.
The capture of a seal relieved a situation that threatened to become very serious. At last, on July 24, the tired eyes of the travellers rested upon something rising above the never-ending white line of the horizon, and the joyful cry was raised of “Land! Land!” Progress to the happy hunting-ground was exasperatingly slow and not without its startling adventures. Johannesen was attacked by a bear, and without the prompt action on the part of Nansen would doubtless have proved its victim.
Open water was reached August 6, 1895, and, by dint of paddling and hauling up on the floes to advance by sledge, on August 16 they stood on the dry land of Houen Island. Continuing on their journey they soon realized that the rapid approach of winter would make the effort to reach Spitzbergen impossible, so they encamped on one of the outlying islands off Franz Josef Land and, building themselves a stone hut covered with walrus hides, prepared to spend the winter. Bears and walrus were plentiful and supplied them with abundant food; other game was occasionally shot. The cold Arctic night found them, on the whole, quite comfortable in their hut. The train-oil lamps kept the temperature in the middle of the room about freezing. For nine months Nansen and Johannesen hibernated thus, with no variation to their existence but the taking of the most necessary meteorological observations.
DIFFICULTIES OF TRAVEL
With the return of spring the two “wild men” made every preparation for their journey to Spitzbergen. This was no easy matter, considering they lacked everything, and the few reserve stores of flour and chocolate had mildewed and spoiled during the winter. On May 19, 1896, the sledges stood loaded and lashed and after leaving inside the hut a short report of their journey and adventures, Nansen and Johannesen started for Spitzbergen. Though the winter had been long and monotonous, adventure greeted them frequently in their advance. Nansen nearly lost his life by falling into a water-hole. They were delayed by a gale, during which they nearly lost their kayaks. Seeing these frail crafts, with all they possessed on board, drifting rapidly away from their moorings, Nansen sprang into the icy water and made a desperate attempt at rescue. Meanwhile, Johannesen paced restlessly up and down the ice in an agony of suspense. With strokes growing more and more feeble, the swimmer realized the desperate situation and, putting forth his last benumbed energies in a final stroke, grasped a snow-shoe which lay across the end. All but frozen, Nansen had great difficulty in getting into the kayak and still more trouble in paddling to land. Numb and shivering, the wind biting his very marrow, he yet had courage to fire at two auks which he secured for a warm and welcome supper.
In the meantime, their meat was nearly gone. The outlook was anything but promising. In these frail, weather-worn, canvas-covered kayaks, twelve feet long, about two and one half feet wide and hardly more than one and one fourth feet deep, there was yet a journey of two hundred miles of ocean, more or less encumbered by ice, which intervened between them and Spitzbergen, where their only hope lay in being taken aboard one of the small vessels, which visit these shores every summer. The future for Nansen and Johannesen was indeed desperate, but a happy chance brought them timely deliverance, and the dramatic meeting with Frederick G. Jackson, June 17, 1896, in the isolated regions of Franz Josef Land terminated one of the most brilliant retreats in Arctic history.
Mr. Jackson and his companions, who for two years had been making most valuable scientific observations and collecting specimens in all departments of natural science which the islands and surroundings seas afforded, welcomed the wanderers with open arms, brought them to the house, fed, and warmed them, and, best of all, gave them news from home and letters. It was not surprising that the first night was spent in reading home letters, which Jackson had faithfully carried for them into these desolate regions, and in talking over the strange adventures now so happily ended. For at last their work was done, and, as Nansen said, “he didn’t want to sleep, he felt so happy.”
So the days passed rapidly until the Windward came, which brought yearly supplies to Jackson and carried home the adventurous explorers. They reached Vardo Haven, August 13. All that was needed to complete the happiness of the home-coming was news of the Fram, and this was not long withheld. On August 20, 1896, the joyful tidings of the arrival of the Fram reached Nansen in a brief telegram sent from Skyaervo, Kraenangem Fiord.
She had pursued her monotonous drift to her highest point to the west-northwest, 85° 57´ N., 60° E., changing to a south-southeast direction, to 84° 09´ N., 15° E., where she remained nearly stationary from February until June, 1896. The open summer permitted Captain Sverdrup to push through her ice barrier, and, by the judicious use of explosives, blast her way to the open water, August 13, 1896, north of Spitzbergen.