Eskimo

Leaving Camp Daly on the 10th of February I arrived at Marble Island on the 14th. I shall not dwell long on the various commonplace incidents encountered, the kindnesses of the officers of the whaling ships, the wonderful but pleasant change to a civilized abode once more. However, it was a suffocating feeling which first accompanied that change, as I had left the temperature of the igloo for that of the ships, generally kept at about 77 * F. I found a great deal of scurvy, that bane of the Arctic sailor, prevailing among the ships and the large number of crews. 

The greater variety of animal life in the frigid zones over the vegetable (the latter having hardly an edible representative in the whole arctic flora) makes it the main dependence on which the polar voyager must rely to secure exemption from that disease. Every exertion should be made to make the procurement of game as certain as possible by being well provided with the very best of arms, ammunition, and hunting implements and above all good native hunters. 

Sir John Ross thought scurvy was produced by the want of fresh bread, yet my party was without fresh bread for two years, and nearly a year without bread of any kind, certainly a fair enough test to exclude it from any of the essential causes. Still the use of fresh bread as an auxiliary prophylactic can not be too strongly dwelt upon. Sir Edward Perry believed that scurvy's principal cause was in the clammy moisture of the ships' quarters, especially when the crew were compelled to sleep in damp bedding. Yet I found no dampness whatever in most of the whaleships suffering with the disease. Innumerable cases where large parties of men have been long subjected to this inconvenience without incurring it makes it a mooted question whether such value can be attributed to it as was by such eminent authority as Sir Edward. 

In the employment of a fresh animal food in the Polar zones a great obstacle is the antipathy with which such a diet of fish- eating animals is received. The flesh of the reindeer and musk-ox is at once acceptable, but the walrus, seal and polar bear, have peculiar flavors which with some people it is almost impossible to overcome. The most tenacious epicures are to be found in the forecastle. The educated officer, whose mess table in the past may have been a animated market report, can, with an honorable incentive ahead of him, more readily relinquish his bill of fare than can the foremast hand with his hard tack, salt junk and bitter coffee, to which he is so firmly wedded.

CHAPTER V 

THE LONG SLEDGE JOURNEY BEGINS 

As everything was ready for the start quite a number of days before the day set- April 1, 1879 - we waited with a strange, lonesome anxiety for that date. All the stulf that was to remain had been boxed up carefully and Ahmow, its custodian, was removing it to his igloo on Depot Island. Life in a half deserted house is enough to set one half crazy, but living in a half deserted igloo is amply sufficient to fill an insane asylum. 

Let us take a hurried look at the party before it starts. The officers were: Lieutenant Frederick Schwatka (myself) and Colonel William H. Gilder, second in command. Frank Klutshak, our scientist and Frank Melms, the only one of us white men who had previously lived in the Arctic, completed the white members in our party. The Esquimaux included Joseph Ebierbing ("Esquimaux Joe") who, as has been stated, had been with Captain Hall and Captain Hayes on their Arctic journeys, and his wife Nipschank or Hannah; Toolooah, hunter and chief sledge driver, and his wife Tooloohalek or Susie, and their two-vear-old boy Iyow- kawank, or Jack; Ikqueesik, our chief guide; (Nachilluk Joe) and his wife, Lizzee and three-year-old daughter Koodleuk; Ishoowark (Jerry) and his wife, and two Innuit boys, brothers of Ikqueesik, aged eighteen and fourteen, named Milkolilluk and Awanak respectively. An Iwilli boy, aged twelve, named Koomunah, completed the party of eighteen souls. 

We had three large sledges, well shod with the bone from the jaw of a whale, and forty-four very good dogs. Our arms consisted of 

• two Remington breech-loading muskets, 

• two repeating Winchester carbines, 

• one breech-loading Sharp's sporting rifle, 

• one heavy breech-loading Sharp's sporting rifle, 

• one heavy breech-loading Whitney (Greedmoor pattern) rifle, 

• one 26-shot repeating sporting rifle, 

• (Evans patent), 

• two Smith & Wesson revolvers, 

• and some muzzle-loading muskets. The latter were to be used for trading purposes, if necessary, among the natives whom we expected to encounter. 

Our ammunition supplies were far beyond the greatest ever taken before upon an Arctic sledge journey. But our provisions were extremely limited for so large a party over the nine or ten months we would be absent, so that our caisson was none too large. Dependent as we would soon become upon the game of the country, we had fair reasons to believe such existed in sufficient quantities to support us and our dogs if our hunters were only vigilant. 

Our ammunition boxes showed [turned to bulleted list for readability and unintended pun]

• 700 rounds of Remington cartridges, of 50 calibre and 70 grains powder; 

• 700 rounds Winchester cartridges, cal. 45., 75 grs. powder: 

• 300 rounds Sharp's cartridges, cal. 40., 70 gr, powder; 

• 450 rounds Evans cartridges, cal. 44., 55 grs. powder;

• 220 rounds Whitney cartridges, cal. 44, 95 grs. powder. 

• besides 200 rounds for the Smith & Wesson's revolvers 

• and 100  bullets, 2000 caps and 25 lbs. of powder for the Springfield muskets. 

• I must not forget to mention a breech-loading Remington shotgun, with 100 rounds of filled cartridges,

•  a muzzle loading shotgun with a box of (25 lbs.), duck power and 25 lbs. shot. 

• A sum total shows fifteen guns and about 4000 rounds of ammunition. 

Our only anxiety now was to be able to transport such a heavy load and to find sufficient game upon which to throw it away. 

Without giving an uninteresting list of the provisions with which we burdened ourselves, suffice it to say, counting as a day's ration, three pounds a day for an adult and proportionally less for the others, we had a trifle less than a month's supply. But it was not the intention to depend upon this until it was eaten up and then live upon the country, but to stretch it out as far as possible by the assistance of reindeer meat, as soon as we entered the hunting country. Two thousand pounds of Kow (walrus hide) and our bedding gave our sleds quite a heavy and formidable looking appear ance, as we started, but most of the load was of a nature that stead- ily decreased as the time advanced. 

As the world turned round it brought our appointed date, April 1, 1879, and found us already to start, but like all other first-day starts it was a late one. It was nearly noon as we pulled out on the salt water ice near Camp Daly and, shaking hands, bid our trusty Inuit friends good-bye. We stopped a second to take a last look on that dreary cheerless mass of snow domes that had so long been our home, and seemed doubly like a home now that we were parting with it for a still less cheerless and dreary journey. 

There is something peculiarly depressing in starting upon a long unknown venture, especially if a person has upon his mind all the cares and duties of a commander to warn him that, in case of misfortune, he alone does not suffer. And this was to be an expedition where misfortune might easily befall us. With less than one month's provisions, we were separating ourselves by an icy desert of eight and nine leauges from all chance of rescue, with eighteen human and forty-four brute mouths to be fed in a country reported destitute of game. And in this forbidding land we were to spend possibly a year - under the most favorable cireumstances not less than nine months - to make an extended and laboriously thorough search to determine the sad fate of those that had died here. it brought up the most solemn thoughts to one responsible for the lives and comfort of those who thus willingly joined in this unselfish effort to accomplish such a task. 

My triangulation cairns around Depot Island had not yet faded completely from sight as we stopped for our first camp, about ten miles north of Camp Daly, on the eastern shore of the Winchester Inlet. The weather had been exceedingly fine during the day and the oft-repeated injunctions of our Innuits, that the weather about this time of year was nearly always like this, was cheering news. 

We built two large double igloos, the four white men and Toolooah's family occupying one, and the remainder of the Innuits the other. The next night, however, this latter igloo was again divided. Joe and Jerry, with their respective families, occupying one and Ikqueesik the other. Thereafter this arrangement was continued until we reached King William Land.

...asdog meat was low, it was decided that the morrow should be used in securing as many as possible of these longhaired monsters.

On the morning of the 29th a heavy fog threatened to spoil our sport. We managed to get away at 8:30 A.M., with the two light sleds leading and all the dogs, as the thick clouds seemed to be lifting. At 11 o'clock in the forenoon, after we had been wandering around in the drifting mist, guiding our movements as much as possible by the wind, we came on the trail of some six or seven of the animals apparently not ten minutes old. Great fears were entertained that the musk-oxen had heard our approach and were now probably doing their level best to escape. The dogs were rapidly unhitched from the sled and from one to three given to each of the eleven men and boys present. Taking their harnesses in their hands or tying them in a slip noose around their waist, they started at once on the trail, leaving the sleds and a few dogs with two Innuit women. The dogs, many of them old musk-ox hunters and with an appetite sharpened by hard work, and a diminishing ration, tugged like mad at their harnesses and hurried along at a rate that threatened a broken neck many a time over the rough gorges. We soon came upon them and dispatched ten, including calves. 

The musk-ox of the Arctic is about two-thirds the size of the American bison, but in appearance is nearly as large owing to immense heavy coat of long weeping willow-like hair that covers him down to the knees, as if he was carrying a load of black brush The musk-ox calves are readily captured by dogs. However, it is impossible to furnish them with proper nourishment to sustain life and I believe there are no cases on record where these most curious animals have been exhibited at a museum. 

Again we were compelled to camp without water. The elevated country was getting quite sandy and destitute of the numerous lakes we had been accustomed to travel upon. The first two days of May, prophetic of the month, kept us snugly confined to our igloos while a fierce northwest storm raged without. On May 3rd we found a small lake which promised water and we were not disappointed, although we had to dig through the thick ice to a depth of eight feet and four inches. Reindeer were also getting scarcer through this apparently waterless country and but a few scattering ones were to be seen or secured. Our musk-ox meat came in a very fortunate nick of time.

Chapter VI

Voices from the Past - The Old Eskimaux's Story 

The morning of May 14 1879, began a day which was introduced an unusual situation and ended by becoming one of the most fateful days in our journey. We were continuing our way along the river [Hayes River, named by Schwatka in honor of the president] when we sighted a large herd of reindeer, some two hundred of them. Our sleds were well loaded with meat and so we allowed them to trot by within rifle range without a shot being fired. Singularly curious, they would run a few paces towards us, then halt like a company of cavalry coming into line, gazing at us until one of their more nervous ones would snort and send them off by the flank with measured trot, like well-drilled troopers. 

At two o'clock that afternoon our moment of fate commenced its development. It began with the discovery of a recently upturned block of snow, and soon we came upon an igloo - deserted - but close by were two caches of musk-ox meat and furs. A trail, formed by dragging a musk-ox skin loaded with belongings of these unknown people, led us on. Our natives pronounced this trail as being two days old, and believed that on the morrow we would come upon the trail-makers. 

Bright and early on the morning of May 15 we broke camp, being well on our way for some time when, rounding a sharp bend in Hayes River, we came suddenly in full sight of three igloos, about a mile distant. 

As we approached, a number of the occupants who were standing around fled to their igloos and persistently remained there. According to the custom of the country (as Joe explained it) we armed ourselves, leaving the women and children with the sleds, and marched in line to within about a hundred yards of the igloo. 

Ikqueesik now went forward and commenced shouting at the top of his voice. His words must have reassured them as it had the desired effect of bringing the affrighted occupants out into sight. They formed a line, with bows, arrows and spears or knives and, as we moved up to within a few feet, they began a general stroking of their breasts, calling "Munnik-toomee"(Welcome).

After their fears had somewhat subsided the women and children came peeping out of the igloos and soon afterwards mixed with the throng. Our drivers returned and brought up our sleds and we were soon building igloos alongside, with the help of our new acquaintance. 

They proved to be a band of Ooquesik-Salik Esquimaux, numbered seven or eight men and probably twice as many women. The head man, Ikinnelik-Puhtoorak, an Ookjoolik, was the leader of a once powerful band inhabiting the northern and western shores of the Adelaide Peninsula and adjacent shores of King William land.  Famine and inroads of neighboring bands had reduced the tribe to a handful. Their land was now in the possession of the Netchilluks and Kidnelik Esquimaux. Of the latter they had great fear and had mistaken us for this band when we first appeared.

We were the first white men these natives had ever seen with the exception of the two oldest men in the tribe - and the great importance of this latter fact will soon be shown. Youngsters and adults crowded about us, then staring eyes following every motion that we made. They told us that the river on which we now were travelling would take us two days journey to the northward then, bending directly backwards on its course, would take us two days farther southeast before we would reach Back's River. From the great bend they explained we could reach Back's River in two days by traveling directly westward, and reach it at a point much nearer to Montreal Island, our first objective point. 

In our anticipation of meeting the natives of this unexplored section we hoped to depend upon them for dog food and oil. But now the tables were turned. These natives were so sadly in need of food that, instead of being receivers, we were obliged to give them some of our own. They had had a very severe winter, one old man of the tribe having died about a month before of starvation. They had no oil and their igloos were cold, clammy and cheerless on the extreme. Their food in the summer and early winter is furnished by the numberless shoals of salmon which ascend the smaller river and are speared as they run the gauntlet of the rapids, while the flesh of the musk-ox, which they secure with dogs, bows, and arrows and spears, gives them a precarious substence during the remainder of the year. They were not able to kill enough deer during the summer to supply them with food or clothing. The noise made in crawling up towards them close enough to shoot with bow and arrow (as the twang of the bow travels more rapidly than the arrow) allow the active deer time in jumping out of the way at any distance beyond twenty-five yards.

 

 Of the sources available (including the formal report of the commander, Lieutenant Patrick Henry Ray), the best description of the people is the account by the anthropologist John Murdoch: “Ethnological Results of the Point Barrow Expedition,” published in the Ninth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution(Washington, D.C., 1892). 

In addition to agreeing generally with Simpson's dietetic observations of the 1850's, Murdoch amplifies in the 1880's:

“The food of these people consists almost entirely of animal substances ... We saw and heard nothing ... of eating the half-digested contents of the stomach of the reindeer ... As far as our observations go these people eat little, if any more fat than civilized man; and, as a rule, not by itself ... It is usually supposed, and generally stated in the popular accounts of the Eskimos, that it is a physical necessity for them to eat enormous quantities of blubber in order to obtain a sufficient amount of carbon to enable them to maintain their animal heat in the cold climate which they inhabit. A careful comparison, however, of the reports of actual observers shows that an excessive eating of fat is not the rule ...

“We saw these people eat no vegetable substances, though they informed us that the buds of the willow were sometimes eaten [especially in time of famine] ... Food is generally cooked ... Meat of all kinds is generally boiled ... and the broth thus made is drunk ... Fish are also boiled but are often eaten raw ... Meat is sometimes eaten raw frozen ... When living in winter houses they ... have no regular time for meals, but eat whenever hungry and have leisure. The women seem to keep a supply of cooked food on hand for anyone to eat ... They are large eaters, some of them, especially the women, eating all the time ...” Elsewhere Murdoch relates that during winter the Barrow women stirred around very little, did little heavy work, and yet “inclined more to being sparse than corpulent.”