After Carlsen, Barents' winter haven was visited in the year 1875 by the Norwegian walrus-hunter, M. GUNDERSEN, who among other things found there a broken chest containing two maps and a Dutch translation of the narrative of Pet's and Jackman's voyages, and in the year 1876 by Mr. CHARLES GARDINER, who through more systematic excavations succeeded in collecting a considerable additional number of remarkable things, among which were the ink-horn and the pens which the Polar travellers had used nearly three centuries ago, and a powder-horn, containing a short account, signed by Heemskerk and Barents, of the most important incidents of the expedition. Gundersen's find is still, as far as I know, at Hammerfest; Gardiner's has been handed over to the Dutch Government to be preserved along with the other Barents relics at the Hague.
In 1872 the state of the ice both north of Spitzbergen and round Novaya Zemlya was exceedingly unfavourable,[180] and several of the scientific expeditions and hunting vessels, which that year visited the Arctic Ocean, there underwent severe calamities and misfortunes. Five of the best hunting vessels from Tromsoe were lost in the ice; the Swedish expedition, which that year started for the north, could not, as was intended, erect its winter dwelling on the Seven Islands, but was compelled to winter at the more southerly Mussel Bay; and the Austrian expedition under the leadership of Payer and Weyprecht was beset by ice a few hours after its campaign had commenced in earnest. It is well known how this carefully equipped expedition afterwards for two winters in succession drifted about in the Polar Sea, until it finally came to a standstill at a previously unknown land lying north of Novaya Zemlya, which was named after the Austrian Emperor, Franz Josef. These two expeditions, however, did not touch the territory of the Vega's voyage, on which account I cannot here take any further notice of them.[181] But the same year a wintering took place on the west coast of Novaya Zemlya, of which I consider that I ought to give a somewhat more detailed account, both because in the course of it one of the most gallant Polar voyagers of Norway met his fate, and because it shows us various new, hitherto untouched sides of winter life in the High North.
SIVERT TOBIESEN was one of the oldest and boldest of the Norwegian walrus-hunting skippers; he had with life and soul devoted himself to his calling, and in it was exposed to many dangers and difficulties, which he knew how to escape through courage and skill. In 1864 he had sailed round the northeastern part of North-east Land, and had been very successful in hunting; but as he was about to return home, his vessel was beset by ice near the southern entrance to Hinloopen Strait, where the same fate also overtook two other hunting sloops, one of them commanded by the old hunting skipper MATTILAS, who in the winter of 1872-73 died in a tent at Grey Hook, the other by the skipper J. ÁSTROM. They were compelled to save themselves in boats, in which they rowed through Hinloopen Strait to the mouth of Ice Fjord, where the shipwrecked crews were met and saved by the Swedish expedition of 1864. He passed the winter of 1865-66 happily, in a house built for the purpose on Bear Island, and communicated to the Swedish Academy of Sciences a series of valuable meteorological observations, made during the wintering.[182] After 1868 he had made several successful voyages to Novaya Zemlya, some of which were also remarkable from a geographical point of view, and in 1872 he was also on a hunting expedition to the same regions.
As he could not enter the Kara Sea, he sailed up along the west coast, where in the middle of September he was beset in the neighbourhood of the Cross Islands. Hence seven of the crew travelled south in a boat to seek for a vessel, but Tobiesen himself, his son and two men, remained on board. Their stock of provisions consisted of only a small barrel of bread, a sack of corners and fragments of ship biscuit, a small quantity of coffee, tea, sugar, syrup, groats, salt meat, salt fish, a few pounds of pork, a couple of tin canisters of preserved vegetables, a little bad butter, &c. There was abundance of wood on board and on the land. Notwithstanding the defective equipment they went on bravely and hopefully with the preparations for wintering, gathered drift-wood in heaps on the beach, threw a tent of
sails over the vessel, threw up snow about its sides, covered the deck with, the hides of the seals and walruses that had been captured during summer, did what could be done to bring about good ventilation on board, &c. A large number of bears came to the winter station at the commencement of the wintering, affording an abundant supply of fresh bears' flesh. So long as this lasted, the health of the party was good, but when it came to an end at the new year, their food for three weeks consisted mainly of ill-smelling salt bears' flesh. Tobiesen and one of the men were now taken ill. The cold sank to -39-1/2°C.[183] On the 29th April, 1873, Tobiesen died of scurvy. In the month of May his son was also attacked, and died on the 5th July. The two men also suffered from scurvy, but recovered. They rowed south in the month of August, and were rescued by a Russian hunting-vessel.
The seven men, the harpooner Henrik Nilsen, Ole Andreas Olsen, Axel Henriksen, Amandus Hansen, Nils Andreas Foxen, Johan Andersson and Lars Larsen, who rowed away in autumn, had an exceedingly remarkable fate. When they left the vessel they could only take with them fourteen ship biscuits, six boxes of lucifers, two guns, with ammunition, a spy-glass, a coffeepot and an iron pot, but no winter clothes to protect them from the cold. At first, in order to get to open water, they had to drag the boat about seven kilometres over the ice. They then steered southwards along the land. The journey was made under circumstances of great difficulty and privation. The darkness and cold increased, as did the storm, and what was worst of all their stock of provisions was very soon consumed. On the second day, however, they wore fortunate enough to shoot a bear; afterwards they also succeeded in killing a pair of seals. Finally, after having partly rowed and partly sailed about three weeks (they had no almanac with them), and travelled nearly 400 kilometres, they came to two small hunting or store houses, which the Russians had built on the north side of Gooseland. In order to have at least a roof over their heads the exhausted men settled there, though in the house they found neither food, clothes, nor hunting implements. They were all much enfeebled by hunger, thirst, cold, and the long boat journey; their feet were swollen and partly frost-bitten.
They remained in the house three weeks, and during that time shot a seal, two white foxes, and four reindeer, with which they kept in their lives; but as it appeared that there were no more reindeer to be had, and there were no more opportunities of shooting seals or reindeer, they determined to leave the house and endeavour to get to Vaygats Island. When they broke up, Ole Andreas Olsen and Henrik Nilsen took the guns and ammunition, while the other five commenced the journey with some small sledges they had found at the house, on which they loaded what they had of clothes and other articles. The boat was left behind. Soon after they left the house Ole Andreas Olsen and Henrik Nilsen were separated in a snowstorm from the others who drew the sledges. The latter now agreed to determine by lot whether they should return to the house or continue their journey, and when the lot fell for the latter they allowed it to settle the matter, and so went south.[184]
Their position was now desperate in the extreme. When they left the house they had about half a pound of reindeer flesh and a little blubber remaining. The weather was dreadful; they were badly clothed, and they wanted water. In consequence they could make only very short days' marches. At night they buried themselves in the snow, and while the rest slept, one man kept constant watch, to prevent the others from being snowed up and to keep the bears at a distance. They all held out till the sixth night. Then Amandus Hansen died. The rest were compelled to leave him in the snow and continue their journey as well as they could, but they had by degrees become so weak and exhausted that, after having traversed probably about 100 kilometres, for the most part along the coast, they had to leave even the sledges and the most of what they had with them. The seventh or eighth day they caught sight of a little pile of fuel, and the track of a sledge in the snow. By following this track for about ten kilometres they found a small house, inhabited by Samoyeds, who immediately gave them a friendly reception, and entertained them in the most hospitable way. In particular they showed much kindness to Nils Andreas Foxen, whose toes were frost-bitten, and who was in other respects much enfeebled.