The North Pole / by Robert E. Peary ; with an introduction by Theodore Roosevelt.

  • Robert Peary
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The North Pole / by Robert E. Peary ; with an introduction by Theodore Roosevelt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    mately, and thus the first to report the strange experience of seeing the compass needle pointing due south. So great was Parry’s success that the British government sent him out in command of two other expeditions in search of the North-west Passage. In explorations and discoveries^ the results of these two later expeditions were not so rich, but the experience in ice work so obtained gave Parry con- clusions which revolutionized all methods in Arctic navigation. Hitherto all attempts to approach the Pole had been in ships. In 1827 Parry suggested the plan of a dash to the Pole on foot, from a base on land. He obtained the assistance of the Government, which for the fourth time sent him to the Arctic provided with well-equipped ships and able officers and men. He carried a number of reindeer with him to his base in Spitzbergen, purposing to use these animals to drag his sledges. The scheme proved impracticable, however, and he was compelled to depend on the muscles of his men to haul his two heavy sledges, which were in reality boats on steel runners. Leaving Spitzbergen on June 23 with twenty-eight men, he pushed northward. But the summer sun had broken up the ice floes, and the party repeatedly found it necessary to take the runners off their boats in order to ferry across the stretches of open water. After thirty days’ incessant toil Parry had reached 82° 45', about 150 miles north of his base and 435 geographical miles from the Pole. Here he found that, while his party rested, the drift of the ice was carrying him daily back, almost as much as they were able to make in the day’s work. Eetreat was therefore begun. Parry’s accomplishments, marking a new era in polar explor- ations, created a tremendous sensation. Knighthood was immediately bestowed upon him by the King, while the British people heaped upon him all the honours and applause with which they have invariably crowned every explorer returning from the north with even a measure of success. In
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