Chapter Thirty Four.
Captain Hall’s Voyages.
Doctor Hayes’ voyages—Captain Hall’s experiences—The Polaris expedition—High latitudes—Illness and death of Captain Hall—The catastrophe on the ice—Skating on the floe—A perilous journey—Saved—Fate of the Polaris.
We must pass rapidly by Doctor Hayes’ voyages undertaken to survey Greenland. He fully believed in the theory of the “open Polar Sea,” and he had been a member of Kane’s party. He left Boston in 1860, and entered Baffin Bay in August of that year. After much delay from ice, he started with sleighs across Smith’s Sound to Grinnel Land. He encountered tremendous difficulties—most of his party turned back, but Hayes, with three men, persevered, and succeeded in reaching Grinnel Land. He still pushed on, then with only one companion, and reached the most northerly point attained, whence he could see water covered with soft ice. This he states is the open Polar Sea in the summer. He saw a headland farther north—“the most northerly land known.” But having no boat he was obliged to return to his companions, and they reached Boston in 1861. The American Civil War prevented him from trying again for some years, but he subsequently explored Greenland, more for pleasure than in the interests of science, in 1869.
We now come to the voyages of Captain Charles F. Hall, which culminated in the Polaris expedition. In 1860, however, Captain Hall had made an attempt to find some traces of the Franklin expedition; but meeting with an accident, he returned. In 1864 he sailed again, and reached Hecla Strait. He carried home many Franklin relics, and ascertained that Sir John had actually discovered the North-West Passage, and established the melancholy truth that most of Franklin’s men died of starvation in King William’s Land, where their bones lay bleaching in the snowy waste. After five years’ residence amongst the Esquimaux he ascertained that Captain Crozier, of the Terror (and he believed a companion), were living amongst the Esquimaux in 1864.
In September, 1869, Captain Hall returned to America, having discovered the site of Frobisher’s settlement three hundred years before; but it was not until 1872 that he was enabled to start in the Polaris to find the North Pole. On the 29th of June he sailed from New York. Doctor Bessel accompanied the ship as naturalist, and at least one member of Kane’s expedition also went. Captain Tyson, who figures in the narrative, joined the Polaris at Godhaven, and Hans, the hunter, at Upernavik.
On the 21st of August the Polaris continued her voyage, and followed Kane’s route. Captain Hall reached the spot where the Advance had been quitted, and pushing on steadily, reached the channel which had been thought was the “open Polar Sea.” He proceeded up to latitude 82 degrees 16 minutes North; but here the Polaris was beset in the ice at last; hitherto all had been plain sailing. They reached winter quarters in September, and named the place “Thank God” Bay, latitude 81 degrees 38 minutes North, longitude 61 degrees 44 minutes West.
The winter was fatal to Captain Hall. After his return from a few days’ sledging journey, he was suddenly taken ill. In this exploration, which he undertook with the Esquimaux and his first mate (Mr Chester), he reached a place he named Newman’s Bay, in latitude 82 degrees North. When the illness first attacked him it was not deemed serious; but he became partially paralysed, and on the 8th of November he expired, leaving Captain Buddington in command. Captain Hall was buried on the morning of the 11th of November, the darkness of the Polar night being faintly illuminated by ship’s lanthorns and the weird boreal gleam of the stars in the atmosphere.