THREE YEARS IN THE ARCTIC

Evening Post, Volume XCVII, Issue 128, 3 June 1919, Page 8

THREE YEARS IN THE ARCTIC

WITH STEFANSSON'S EXPEDITION

DR. JENNESS RETURNS TO WELLINGTON.

Since the cataclysm which burst upon the world in August, 1914, undreamt-of adventure has fallen to the lot of thousands o£ New Zealand's young men, who but for tho outbreak of war would possibly have never set foot outside their home country; but be their experiences as varied and -adventurous as they may they pale somewhat beside those of Dr. Diamond Jenness, a young New Zealander who arrived at Auckland by the Niagara on Friday last after spending over three years in the frozen wastes of the north of Canada, and, after a brief respite, a year with the Canadian troops in Northern France. Dr. Jenness, a son of Mr. 6. L. Jenness, afc^one time in business as a watchmaker and jeweller in Willis-street, where Cooper's Buildings now stand, was liorn in 1886, and received his primary education at Lower Hutt, whither his parents moved when he was about five years of age. At the Lower Hutt School ho gained a junior scholarship, and passed on to tho Wellington Boys' Col- j lege, where he won a senior scholarship, and later a junior University scholarship, j His scholastic career at Victoria University was consistently brilliant. A senior University scholarship was gained by him, and later his M.A. degree with honours in classics and a special classical scholarship at Oxford University. Dr. Jenness entered the great English University in 1908, and studied there till 1911, carrying off the Oxford B.A. with honours in literae humaniores (the classical school), and' later his Oxford M.A. It was not, however, in the classics that Dr. Jenness was to make his great success, but in the study of anthropology, which ho first took up at Oxford in addition to his classical studies. He gained a diploma in anthropology, and in 1912 was sent by the Oxford University to carry out a, year's field work among the | natives of New Guinea. The first report on that work is now in process of publication by the Clarendon Press, Oxford. From Papua Dr. Jenness returned to New Zealand in the beginning of 1913, and in February of that year received a cable from the Canadian Government asking him to join the Canadian Arctic and Stefansson Expedition. INVITATION ACCEPTED. The invitation was accepted, and Dr. Jenuess sailed with the expedition from Esquimault on 13th June, 1913, in an old whaling steamer, the Karluk. At Nome, a mining centre on. the Alaskan coast, tho scene of a gold rush shortly after the great Klondyke rush, two gasolene schooners were purchased, and the Karluk was equipped with sleds, provisions, and the paraphernalia required for a long sojourn in the Arctic. The expedition bad a two-fold purpose, to explore the Beauford Sea in search of new land ;uid to carry out detailed scientific work, mapping the coastline and making a study of zoology, biology, etc., in the almost unknown regions of Coronation Gulf. The expedition therefore divided into a northern party, under Stefansson, to explore Beauford Sea, and a southern party, of which Dr. Jenness was a member, and whose work was to make a special study of the Eskimos. Stefansson sailed north ■in the Karluk, leaving the schooners with the southern party for the time being. THE ILL-FATED KARLUK. Tho Karluk, however, was fated not to return, 'for she was jambed in the ice, and after drifting about the whole winter till February she was crushed and lost about 80 miles distant from Wrangell Island, off the Siberian coast. The majority of those on board managed to reach the island, but of the 6ix scientists with that party three perished during the terrible journey over the ice, and two more succumbed to disease after the island had befln gained. Of the1 crew of twenty-three two men died, one on the ice and the other on the island. Tho Karluk being lest, Stefansson resolved to carry on hfo exploration by eledge, and therefore organised a new part}', and set off for the Beauford Sea-, where he remained four years to the west anci north of Prince Patrick Land. Thousands of miles were covered by this party, and three new islands were discovered far up in the north. No names: have yet been assigned these islands, which are at present known as Nos. 1, 2, and 3. An extensive survey was also made of a" great stretch of" unknown coast-line. TERRIBLE HARDSHIPS. Meanwhile, the remainder of the party marooned on Wrangell Island were experiencing terrible hardships, the food supply, scant at first, dwindled to practically nil. Captain Bsxtlett, one of the party, who had been Peary's captain when the American explorer reached the North Pole, set out aci'oss the ice to the shore, and then made his way to an isolated Russian settlement with news of the terrible plight 'of "the remainder of the party. Nothing could be done till the following summer, when the ice fields broke up. Hejp was then despatched by sea, and tho ship-wrecked men on Wrangell Island were rescued. For a year the two cchooners carrying the southern party were held fast in the ice in Camden Bay, off the northern coast of Alaska, where the explorer Collinson wintered in 1851 while searching for Sir John Franklin, but in tho summer of 1914 tho vessels wsnt on their way to Coronation Bay, whore', said Di'. Jenness, "We spent two fairly peaceable years, a little cold at times." There specimens of plants, animals, and insects were collected, and Dr. Jenness took up his study of Eskimo life and customs. The geologist with that party discovered enormous deposits of copper, not coppar ore, but 99 per cent, pure copper, somewhat similar to the great Lake Superior deposits. Dr. Jenness made a comprehensive collection of specimens in the Coronation, Gulf region, taking back some eighty cases to Canada. NO NEWS. The party worked on in blissful and complete ignorance of the fact that the decision of the German warlords had set the world afUme till November, 1916, when one of the party returned to the depot after "sjoing for the mail" to Herechol Island, a North-West Mounted Police post over 750 miles distant over barren Arctic /wastes. Fifteen hundred miles for the mail ! Tho Coronation Gulf party turned homeward early in 1916, with one schooner, the- other having- been in tho meantime .despatched north to Stefansson. The voyage was an exciting one, and several times the vessel was forced ashore by the ice, though, fortunately, | the ice fia'lds prevented anything in the nature of ;; heavy sea. When at last the vessel hat/i crushed her way free of the ieo sho v.'ns found to bo unseaworthy, and was therefore put in to Nome. There tho party remained until the arrival of a steamer from Seattle. Stefansson did not return till 1918. and is now advocating a scheme for establishing the reindeer in Northern Canada, as has be/)ii done with signal success in Alaska.,, which has of late commenced tlm nwpot'tnUft'ii '<A veimlnei' niwil-. Tliu caribou and musk-ox Jive in iho North- 1

em Canadian wastes, but it is considered by^ Stefansson that the introduction of reindeer would turn the barren, timberless region into a productive region. A BUSY WINTER, Dr. Jenness spent the winter of 1916 in' Canada classifying the specimens collected by him on behalf of the Canadian Government, and in the following spring volunteered as a member of the Canadian artillery reinforcements, and landed in France with the rank of gunner in September, 1917. He served in that capacity until the beginning of October, 1918, and just prior to the signing of the armistice was transferred to the topographical branch of the Canadian Survey Corps, and was in Mons when the armistice was signed. Dr. Jenness returned to Canada in ApTil last, and is now visiting New Zealand, with Mrs. Jenness, on three months' leave granted by the Canadian Government. He intends to return to Canada in July next, and will then commence his written reports on the Coronation Gulf expedition, which work he expects will occupy some three years.