True Tales of Arctic Heroism in the New World

by A. W. Greely

Meanwhile their coal house with the floe was drifting south slowly, with the coast of Greenland in plain sight, distant from five to fifteen miles. Their safety, always the subject of daily talk, seemed assured until the coming spring, for they were on an immense floe-berg whose area of about four square miles was dotted with hills and vales, while sweet-water lakes gave abundant water for drinking and cooking, a great boon. It was known that surrounding floes were daily grinding huge pieces of ice from the edge of their own, and that the ice-pressures were steadily turning it around, so that one week they saw the rising sun from their single window and the week following noted the setting sun therefrom. At first this floe rotation was completed in twelve days, but later, with reduced size, stronger currents, and high winds, the floe-berg made a full rotation in four days.

At times there were welcome additions to their slim larder of fresh meat. One day a seaman rushed in breathless to say that he was sure there was a walrus near by. All were instantly astir, and soon a walrus was located, a black spot on the clear white of an adjoining floe. With great celerity and caution the whale-boat was launched in the intervening lane of open water, and with notable skill the steersman, Hildebrant, manœuvred the boat within rifle range without disturbing the rest of the sleeping animal. The first shot wounded the walrus so badly that he could move away but slowly. On the approach of the hunters he struggled with great fury, breaking through the young ice and attempting to strike down the hunters as they approached to give him his death wound.

Covered with hide an inch thick, the walrus was so colossal that it took the united strength of ten men, using a powerful pulley, to raise the carcass from the water to the main ice. Under the outer hide was a layer of fat three inches thick, which was almost as acceptable for fuel as was the meat for food to men who had for so long a time been confined to salt and canned meats as their principal diet.

The odor of the burning walrus fat seemed to attract bears from long distances. One inquisitive bruin, sniffing at the meat in one of the boats, fell through the tightly stretched canvas covering, and scrambling out growled at the night light by the outer door of the house and passed on safely. A second animal was wounded but escaped. The third, whose acute hunger brought him one dark night to the house in search of the odorous walrus fat, was received with a volley and was found dead the next morning.

The quiet Christmas holidays, celebrated with German earnestness, had brought to their hearts an unusual sense of confidence, peace, and hope, based on their providential preservation, excellent health, and physical comfort. This confidence was soon rudely dispelled, giving way to deep anxiety at the devastation wrought by a frightful blizzard that burst on them with the opening new year.

Then the crew realized that there was a possible danger of perishing in the pack, since at any time their immense floe-berg might break into countless pieces in the very midst of the polar cold and the winter darkness. With the violent wind arose an awful groaning of the ice-pack, due to the tremendous pressures of the surging ocean beneath and of the crowding floes around. So violent were the movements of the floe itself, and so great the noise of crashing bergs, that they feared to longer remain in the coal house, and in terror of their lives they sought refuge in the open. Although the snow-filled air made it impossible for any one to see a dozen yards, yet at least there was a chance to escape if the floe split under their feet, which was felt to be possible at any moment. They made ready for the worst, though escape from death seemed quite hopeless. Rolling up their fur sleeping-bags and clothing, they filled their knapsacks with food. Forming a human chain they ran safety lines from the house to the several boats, well knowing that in the blinding blizzard one could not otherwise find his way to the boat to which each one had been told off for the final emergency. They then set a watch of two men to note events, and, intrusting their souls to God, the rest of the party crawled into their sleeping-bags for such needed rest and for such possible sleep as might come to the most stolid.

When the gale broke two days later they found that they had escaped death as by miracle. Three-fourths of this seemingly stable floe had disappeared, broken into huge, shapeless masses. Barely a square mile of the floe remained intact, with the coal house perilously near the edge instead of in the centre.

Scarcely had order and comfort been restored, when ten days later an even more furious blizzard burst upon them, actually bringing them face to face with death. In the middle of the night the watch cried out loudly, "All hands turn out!" With their furs and knapsacks now kept ready for instant action, they rushed out and stood in place, each by his allotted boat. The hurricane wind made movement most difficult, snow filled the air, their floe was quivering from awful pressures, while the howling gale and groaning ice-pack made a deafening tumult. Nothing could be done but to stand and wait!

Suddenly the captain cried out, "Water is making on the next floe!" An adjoining floe-berg of great size and thickness had split into countless pieces, and where a moment before had been a solid ice surface was a high sea tossing broken ice-masses. Huge pieces of their own berg now broke off, due to the action of the sea and to collision with the crowding pack. While looking with a feeling of despair at the high waves, now gnawing at and rapidly wasting the edges of their floe, they were greatly alarmed to hear a loud, sharp report as of a cannon-shot. Before any one could stir, even had he known where to go, their floe burst with a fearful sound midway between the coal house and the wood-pile. Within a dozen yards of the house now appeared a huge chasm, quickly filled with huge waves which tossed to and fro great ice-blocks which beat against the floe remnant on which the dismayed men stood. Though all seemed lost the crew without exception acted with courage and celerity. By prompt work they dragged up on the sound ice the whale-boat which barely escaped dropping into the sea. Aware that they could not launch and handle in such a storm the largest of their boats, Hegemann told off the men to the two small boats. In the pandemonium death was thought to be close at hand. With this thought they gave a last handshake to each other and said a final farewell as they separated and went to their alloted stations by the boats. The physical conditions were so utterly wretched that some even said that death would be welcome. The roaring of the pack was unceasing, the hurricane-like winds continued, while the temperature was forty-two degrees below freezing. The sharp, cutting snow-pellets of the blizzard not only blinded the vision, but the clothes were saturated with the sand-like ice particles driven through the fur to their very skin, where they were melted by the heat of the body. Food was not to be thought of, save a bit of biscuit which was eaten as they stood.

For ten hours they stood fast by their boats in shivering misery and in mental anxiety, knowing that any moment they might be thrown into the sea. But by God's protection, in a providential manner, after being reduced to a diameter of one hundred and fifty feet their floe held together.