4. Ellesmer: Echoes of History

Ellesmere Island, the southerner of the American continent is a fundamental piece in the board where the most important games of the history of arctic exploration have been played. For the pioneers that opened the routes to the North Pole, Ellesmere was the starting point, base camp, test laboratory and, y some cases, their grave. Nowadays, the north coast of the island marks the beginning of the Canadian route to the Pole – exactly, the one chosen by José and Hilo for this stage of his project. Before, nevertheless, the expedition members want to follow the traces left by those great sailors and explorers 150 years ago.

Wild Arctic

The third biggest island of Canada and one of the most mountainous, Ellesmere represents as just a few places can, the paradise and hell of the Arctic: its landscapes and wildlife richness makes of it an ideal framework to record spectacular documentaries; but the intense cold, its rugged orography and the history of those who left their lives between its mountain ranges and glaciers make of the island a real challenge.
In words of the adventurer Jerry Kovalenko, one of the best present connoisseurs of the island, there is not just one Ellesmer, there are a lot. “Crossing its west coast is easy: coastal winds sweeps and harden the ice surface, which let a fast progression with skis and pulkas”, Kovalenko states. “More complicated is to climb the East coast where, to avoid getting lost between the cracks of the glacier spits, it’s necessary to come out to the sea ice far away from the earth line, but there the conditions of the ground suddenly changes and ice broken and water areas are frequent.

The North coast, covered with the biggest glaciers of the island, in which frequently develop ice caves, is austere and cold. Mountains throw areas of perpetual shadow and the humidity of the environment, specially on spring, sticks on the clothes in shape of frost. The south coast has part of the other three, and it also has a small human settlement: Grise Fiord Village, one of the most beautiful places that never hold a city of the Arctic.

Deeds and tragedies

Ellesmere was discovered by Sir Edward Inglefield, which caught sight of it from the deck of his ship, the Isabella, in 1852. Since then, it’s been the scenario of several scientific and exploratory expeditions. Among them, none as outstanding as the “Lady Franklin Bay Expedition”, commanded by Adolphus Greely. And the point is that this American project, that pretended to develop astronomical and meteorological studies coinciding with the celebration of the first international polar year, ended up as one of the biggest disasters of arctic exploration history.

Veteran of the Secession War and with no experience in arctic regions, Greely left Greenland in 1881, on board of the Proteus ship. After travelling all along of the Northeast coast of Greenland, the expedition sailed up to Ellesmere and went through the island form east to west with dog sleighs. Nevertheless the ship was useless and its occupant trapped.
Besides serious indiscipline problems among the crew arose and the desperation of knowing they were prisoners of ice, cold and hunger, as long as they did not know if rescue expeditions would be sent or not, and in positive case if they could find them. The truth is that they did arranged searching teams, thank above all to the insistence of Greely’s wife, Henrietta.
After two vain attempts, finally two ships got to reach the island and find the group. But for that time three years had passed. 19 of the 25 members of the expedition died because of the cold or starvation – except of one, a skimo guide that was executed by Commander’s order. Another one passed away during the trip back. The survivors were in the beginning welcomed as heroes but their history sooner darkened with rumors that they practiced cannibalism during the shortage periods.
Later, other expeditions went across the island and the sea ice platforms of the surroundings. Among them, parties led by Robert Peary and Frederic Cook, who during their whole lifetimes contested being the first in reaching the North Pole. Peary made a series of reconnaissance trips using Ellesmere and its surroundings as point of provisions deposit. Cook spent the winter in Devon’s Island (in the coast of Ellesmer), back, supposedly, from the North Pole.

After Cook’s steps

Cook’s claims, who assured reaching the North Pole a year before Peary, have never been confirmed. Studious experts were never convinced by the information, incomplete and in some occasions improbable, offered by the explorer. In any case, his trip to North was an interesting crossing. Cook and his team left to the North Pole from Annoatok (78º 33´N and 72º 30´W) in Greenland. After, as he assured, reaching the North Pole, went back to Canadian lands. Despite a few incongruities en the described itinerary, it’s well known that he came by the Amund RIngne’s Island (south of Axel Heiberg’s Island), and then he took refuge on Devon’s Island (next to Ellesmere) during five months to spend the winter. After that, they came back to Greenland, crossing Annoatok and Etah, and from there to Upernavik, in the south of the island.
Exactly, Mijares and Moreno are planning to follow that stretch of Cook’s travel. The expedition’s members will start the crossing near the ruins of the underground refuge that Cook and his crew built to spend the winter in Devon’s Island. From there, they will go along the East Coast of Ellesmer by glacier and fragile layers of ice, up to Pim Island – another famous winter refuge of the first explorers of the region, including the mentioned before Greely and Peary, and Norwegian Otto Sverdrup, one of the most important Norwegian explorers of all times, fellow team member of Nansen, who explored Ellesmere throughout four expeditions, each of one with winters included.
Adopting skimo methods to survive in those lands, Sverdrup and his crew managed to chart a total of 260.000 square km, more than any other polar expedition. Thank to them there are so many points in the Canadian Arctic with Norwegian names.