In many ways Markham’s journey was one of the most extraordinary on record. Instead of advancing at a steady walk, more than half of each day was spent by the whole party facing the sledge and dragging it forward a few feet at a time. The maximum rate of advance was 2¾ miles a day, the mean rate being 1¼, while, though the distance from the ship to their farthest point was only 73 miles, on the outward and homeward journeys they actually covered no less than 521 miles.
Aldrich’s expedition also suffered severely from scurvy, but succeeded, nevertheless, in doing excellent work, by exploring the northern shores of Grinnell Land for 220 miles, that is to say, as far as lat. 82° 16′ N., 86° W. Fortunately Nares, becoming anxious about Aldrich’s safety, sent out Lieutenant May and two sailors to relieve him. It was as well that he did so, for he found that only Aldrich and one man were in a fit condition to haul, and the whole party would probably have perished if it had not been for his timely aid.
Lieutenant Beaumont’s expedition from the Discovery also very nearly ended in disaster from the same cause. He was especially detailed to explore the coast of Greenland to the north, and so well did he fulfil his mission that he far outdistanced all his predecessors, and succeeded in reaching lat. 82° 20′ N., 51° W. The homeward journey was a long and stern fight against disease, which seemed likely to end in disaster when, on reaching Robeson Channel, he found the ice too rotten to permit them to cross to the Alert. Fortunately Rawson and Dr Coppinger arrived just in time to save all of the party but two.
There were now no fewer than thirty-six cases of scurvy on the Alert alone, and Nares decided to return as soon as he could break out of winter quarters. He was released at the end of July, and in October both ships reached England in safety, after a remarkably successful voyage, in which great tracts of entirely new country had been opened up.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE GREELY TRAGEDY
Valuable as were the immediate results of Lieutenant Charles Weyprecht’s voyage in the Tegetthoff, its indirect results were greater still, for he came back from his adventurous journey full of plans for revolutionising the manner in which Arctic exploration had been conducted. Up to that time each nation or each group of individuals had gone on its own way, practically regardless of the scientific or geographic work of the others, and there had been no attempt to solve the mysteries of the Arctic regions by concerted action. In an address delivered before the German Scientific and Medical Association of Gratz in 1875, however, Weyprecht suggested that the chief of the nations engaged in Arctic research should establish a number of stations round the Pole, whereat a series of simultaneous observations should be made. As a result of this address, Bismarck appointed a commission of leading men of science to consider Weyprecht’s proposal, and this commission came to the conclusion that the work would be of the greatest value, and that the united action of several nations was essential to its success. Out of these beginnings gradually grew the International Circumpolar Conference of 1879. Its first meeting, which was held at Hamburg, was principally devoted to the discussion of business, and eleven nations promised their support. The second conference, which met at Berne in August 1880, decided definitely on the plan of action to be employed, and adopted a scheme of observations, obligatory and optional, for use at the fifteen stations which it was proposed to establish.
Of the fifteen stations ultimately established, Denmark, Germany, Russia and the United States occupied two each, while Austria-Hungary, Finland, France, Great Britain, Holland, Norway and Sweden established one each. In addition, thirty-four permanent observatories promised their co-operation, with the result that during several succeeding years important observations were being simultaneously conducted by competent men of science at forty-nine different stations, all of them either actually in or in the immediate neighbourhood of the Polar regions.
With the work of most of these expeditions we need not concern ourselves at all. It was of a purely scientific nature, and the curious may find it all set forth in the thirty-one quarto volumes of the International Polar Scientific Publications, a set which contains by far the greatest collection of scientific Arctic data extant. The only party of the fifteen which we need follow, indeed, is that which America sent out, under the command of Lieutenant A. W. Greely, to establish a station in Lady Franklin Bay, on the east coast of Grinnell Land, in the district visited by Nares in 1875.
The plan of the expedition, briefly put, was as follows: Greely, who was a lieutenant in the Signalling Department of the United States Army, was to sail on the Proteus, a sealer of 467 tons, with a party of twenty-five, in the spring of 1881. The Proteus was to make direct for Lady Franklin Bay, where he was to land the expedition and then return home. It was arranged that a vessel should visit the station with supplies in 1882 and again in 1883. In the event of her being prevented from reaching the headquarters of the party, she was to cache quantities of supplies on the east coast of Grinnell Land, and to establish a depot on Littleton Island. If no vessel succeeded in reaching Lady Franklin Bay in 1882, the ship sent out in 1883 was to remain in Smith Sound so long as the conditions permitted, and, before leaving, was to land a party with everything necessary for a winter’s stay on Littleton Island. It was hoped that thus the safety of Greely and his men would be assured.
Unfortunately, it seems that the cabinet minister who was responsible for the equipment of the party was not too well disposed towards it. The funds placed at its disposal were quite inadequate, with the result that Greely was obliged to exercise the most rigid economy in purchasing his stores, while, owing to a number of vexatious and quite unnecessary delays in the delivery of papers and so forth, he had to rush through his final preparations in an inconveniently short space of time. Eventually, however, the equipment was completed on an adequate, but by no means liberal scale, and the Proteus set sail from St John’s, Newfoundland, on July 7, 1881. It was not until she reached Hall Basin, and when she was actually in sight of her destination, that she was first delayed by ice. Fortunately, however, she was equipped with steam, so that she soon charged her way through the barrier and landed the members of the expedition in Discovery Harbour, the place finally selected for their headquarters.