The ice line was reached July 15. “After a foggy day, a light southerly breeze got up, the sails filled, the ship answered the helm once more, and we moved in a north-westerly course between small floes and brashes. A practised ear might now notice a peculiar distant roar, which seemed to come nearer by degrees. It was the sea singing against the still hidden ice.
“Nearer and nearer comes the rushing noise. Every man is on deck; when, as with the touch of a magic wand, the mist divides, and a few hundred yards before us lies the ice, in long lines like a deep indented rocky coast, with walls glittering blue in the sun, and the foaming of the waves mounting high, with the top covered with blinding white snow. The eyes of all rested with amazement on this grand panorama; it was a glorious but serious moment, stirred as we were by new thoughts and feelings, by hopes and doubts, by bold and far-reaching expectations.”
ADRIFT ON THE ICE FLOE
Up to this time the Germania and Hansa had stood well together with occasional separation in the fogs, and on the 18th of July the officers of the two ships exchanged hospitalities. The next day, through a fatal misunderstanding of signals, the Hansa separated from the Germania, and they never met again.
Jan Mayen Island
On the 28th of July, the Hansa stood in 72° 56´ north latitude and 16° 54´ west latitude. The dark rock coast of East Greenland was visible for the first time from Cape Broer Ruys to Cape James.
By sailing, towing, and warping, the Hansa made slow progress through the ice. The captain and two officers and two sailors made an attempt to land on August 24, but were obliged to return to the ship without having accomplished their mission. On the 25th of August the Hansa reached within thirty-five nautical miles of Sabine Island. The ship was continually subjected to dangerous ice pressure, and often forced southward by the drifting ice-fields. By the 6th of September, she lay between two promontories of a large ice-field, which eventually proved a raft of deliverance. By the 14th of September, she was completely frozen up in 73° 25.7´ north latitude and 18° 39.5´ west latitude. At the mercy of the drifting currents, the Hansa stood in imminent peril of total destruction. Between October 5 and 14 the drift had carried the ship seventy-two nautical miles to the south-southwest. The nights were cold, sometimes 4° F. below zero. The only sign of animal life to be seen were ravens, which were doubtless wintering on the coast; once a gull and a falcon made the ship a visit. A severe storm from the north-northwest on the 19th brought disastrous pressure upon, the Hansa.
“Shortly before one o’clock, the deck seams sprang, but still she seemed tight. Mighty blocks of ice pushed themselves under the bow, and, although they were crushed by it, they forced the ship up no less than seventeen feet. The rising of the ship was an extraordinary and awful, yet splendid spectacle, of which the whole crew were witnesses from the ice.”
Realizing the gravity of the situation, Captain Hegemann at once ordered clothing, nautical instruments, and stores to be removed from the ship to a safe distance. The pumps were put in action to free her from water, but to the horror of all, it was discovered before many hours that the Hansa was doomed.