In the earlier period of the occupation of Siberia by the Russians, the Arctic portions were discovered by Cossack leaders engaged in the reduction of northern native tribes, the Samoyeds, Ostiaks, Tunguses, and later the Tchuktches. As early as 1610 a Cossack had reached the mouth of the Yenisei. In 1636 the Lena and the mouth of the Yana were discovered, and by 1644 the Cossack Stadukhin was on the banks of the Kolyma, and gave the first account of the Tchuktches. Two years afterwards Issai Ignatieff and some fur-hunters made the first attempt to navigate beyond the mouth of the Kolyma.
Simon Deshneff was the most enterprising of the Cossack pioneers. With another Cossack named Ankudinoff, he built two small vessels in the Kolyma and faced the icy Siberian sea. Ankudinoff was wrecked, but Deshneff fought a battle with the Tchuktches, and navigated his little craft through Bering Strait into the Gulf of Anadyr. For six years Deshneff was a prominent figure in establishing Russian ascendancy in those distant regions. He is last heard of in 1653, but his ultimate fate is unknown.
It was in 1734 that trained and educated explorers first began to take the place of pioneer Cossacks. Where English and Dutch had failed, Russian officers, after persevering attempts and the loss of more than one vessel, succeeded. They made the voyage from Archangel to the Obi. Then vessels were built at Tobolsk, and after one failure, when his vessel was wrecked, Lieutenant Owzin reached the mouth of the Yenisei in 1737. He was succeeded by Lieutenant Minin, who surveyed the course of the Yenisei from Yeniseisk to the mouth, and sent Sterlegoff on a voyage northward, who reached a latitude of 75° 26′ N.
It was the object of the Russian Admiralty to examine the whole of the Siberian coast either in sailing vessels or by the use of sledges, and for this purpose they divided the coast into sections to be undertaken by different expeditions. Vessels called kotchys were built in the Siberian rivers, but the most successful work was done by sledge travelling. The native methods were adopted, and the narti of the Tunguses and Tchuktches became the exploring sledge of Russian officers. The runner of a Siberian narti of the best construction is 5 feet 10 inches long, its width 1 foot 9 inches, height of runner 10¼ inches. The runners are of birch-wood, and the upper surface of the sledge of willow shoots, woven together. All the parts are fastened with hide thongs. Before use the sledges are turned over and water is poured on the runners to produce a thin crust of ice which glides easily over the snow. In summer these ice runners (wodiat) cannot be used and whalebone is sometimes substituted. A well-loaded sledge requires a team of 12 dogs, and they will drag 1260 lb. in spring, but 360 lb. is a heavy load in the intense cold of winter.
The earliest attempt to round the extreme northern point of Siberia from the east side was made by Lieutenant Prontchishcheff, who sailed down the Lena from Yakutsk in 1735, accompanied by his wife. Hampered by ice, they were obliged to winter at the mouth of the Olenek. In the next season Prontchishcheff forced his way nearly to the extreme point, but he found the ice quite impenetrable. He and his wife died at their winter quarters, leaving the command to the mate Chelyuskin, who returned.
The Government at St Petersburg was still bent on rounding the extreme northern point of Siberia. Lieutenant Cheriton Laptef was appointed to command a second expedition, with Chelyuskin as his mate. They sailed from Yakutsk in July, 1739, descended the river Lena, and reached Cape St Thaddei in 76° 47′ N., but they were stopped by the ice, and forced to winter at a permanent settlement of Tunguses at the mouth of the Khatanga river. Convinced of the impossibility of rounding the cape, Laptef resolved to return to the Lena, but his vessel was caught in a furious gale, she sprang a leak, and when the wind went down, the crew escaped to the land with much difficulty. The vessel drifted away and probably sank. Laptef and his people were left without resources, and underwent the most dreadful sufferings. Many died of hunger and cold. At length they reached the old wintering-place on the banks of the Khatanga. In April, 1741, Chelyuskin was sent with sledges to trace the coast line and discover its northern point, which is in 77° 30′ N. In this he succeeded, and this extreme northern point of Asia has since been known as Cape Chelyuskin. Laptef explored the Taimyr peninsula, and traced the river from its rise in the Taimyr lake to the sea. The whole party reached the Yenisei, and arrived at Yeniseisk at the end of August.
In the period from 1760 to 1766 a fur-trader named Shalaroff made two expeditions and sighted the Liakhov islands, but his vessel was ultimately destroyed by the ice, and he died, with his crew, of cold and misery. He was the first to examine the great inlet called Chaun Bay.
Bering’s Voyage from Kamschatka to North America.
(From a chart of 1741 drawn by a member of Bering’s expedition; it contains one of the few original drawings of the extinct sea-cow.)