Spitsbergen

“ The exclusive right to fish for whales in the waters of Spitsbergen and Greenland was claimed by the English on the ground of Hugh Willoughby's alleged discovery of Spitsbergen in 1553. The Dutch would not admit any such claim, and asserted that Heemskerk was the first to visit the archipelago, and that he planted in 1596 the Dutch flag on the shores of the island, to which he gave the name of Spitsbergen. In 1613 James conferred the monopoly upon the English Muscovy Company, who sent out a fishing fleet [pg.124] with orders to drive off any interlopers ”

“ Climate.—The sea around Spitsbergen is shallow, and the ice readily accumulates round the shores. Although the glaciers of Spitsbergen do not give origin to icebergs so huge as those of Greenland, the smaller bergs and the pack-ice are thick enough to prevent access to the shores except for a few months in the year. However, the warm drift from the Atlantic sends a branch to the western shores of Spitsbergen, moderating its climate, and leaving an open passage which permits vessels to approach the western coast even under the most unfavourable conditions of ice in the arctic regions. ”

“ Finally, in the Lower Carboniferous we find in Spitsbergen the tree-like Calamites, Lepidodendra, tree-ferns; in short, the same flora as that of the great coal-deposits of the Upper Carboniferous of Europe, which, in the judgment of those best qualified to form an opinion, was tropical. Therefore the climate of Spitsbergen must have been at that period about 30° C. higher than to-day.
This enormous variation of climate from a tropical to a polar one immediately suggests a displacement of the poles and of the equator, and therefore of the whole zonal system of climates. ”

“ In 1919 the Supreme Council conferred the sovereignty of Spitsbergen, including Bear I., on Norway. The signatories of the treaty were Great Britain and the British Dominions, France, Italy, the United States, Japan, Holland, Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The rights and territories of nationals other than those of Norway are safeguarded, and Norway is not allowed to show preferential treatment to Norwegian mining companies or to levy taxes except for expenditure on the administration. ”

“ In 1897 and subsequent years a party led by Sir Martin Conway explored the interior of Spitsbergen. Dr A. G. Nathorst, the Swedish geologist, explored the eastern coast and off-lying islands, and made important observations on North-East Land, circumnavigating the Spitsbergen archipelago in 1898. In 1899 Nathorst visited the north-east coast of Greenland in search of Andrée’s balloon expedition, and here he mapped Franz Josef Fjord and discovered the great King Oscar Fjord in waters that had never been navigated before. ”

“ When the learned Frederik Martens of Hamburg made a voyage to Spitsbergen in 1671, on board a whaling ship called the Jonah in the Whale, he found Smeerenburg quite deserted. His history of the voyage contains the first detailed account of Spitsbergen, with notices of the fauna and flora106. Although Smeerenburg was so early abandoned, the Dutch fishery continued to flourish for another century, enriching the communities of the Netherlands with products annually yielding great wealth. In 1709 their fishery in Davis Strait was commenced. ”

“ Hence all this whaling was confined practically to the western harbours of West Spitsbergen, the largest of the group of islands. The next largest, North East Land, was never much visited except from Hinlopen Strait, though the Russians from time to time took some interest in the north and east harbours, and would have taken more, for it abounded in reindeer, if the ice had not made the landing an enterprise of some difficulty. ”

“ The equipment necessary for Spitsbergen mountaineering need not be very elaborate. The temperatures to be faced will not exceed those of an ordinary English winter, and clothes will therefore not require to be of the Arctic character we associate with Polar expeditions. But a man does need to be really warmly clad with plenty of thick underclothing and thoroughly strong garments. For when the wind blows and the snow drives on the higher levels it is cold enough even at Midsummer, though on rare occasions in still air the warmth of the sun may be felt to a quite surprising degree. ”

“ In 1858 a Swedish expedition under Otto Torell started from Hammerfest for Spitsbergen. He was accompanied by A. Quennerstedt and Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld. They explored Horn Sound, Bell Sound, and Green Harbour. In Bell Sound they dredged with great success for mollusca; they made a botanical collection, chiefly of mosses and lichens, found tertiary plant fossils, and, in the North Harbour, carboniferous limestone beds with the tertiary plant-bearing strata above them—in short, Nordenskiöld entered upon his long and fruitful study of Spitsbergen geology. ”

“ Nansen lifted the veil, and his expedition was the most important in modern times. It was discovered that there was a deep ocean to the north of Spitsbergen and Franz Josef Land, extending beyond the Pole, and the whole of the vast annual harvest of ice which drifts south between Spitsbergen and Greenland comes from the north of the Fram’s track. Nansen345 fixed the position of the Siberian continental shelf and found that beyond it there was an ocean with a depth of 2000 fathoms, which is covered with a continual breaking and shifting expanse of drift ice. ”

“ Neither Barents Land nor Edge Island carries ice-sheets, and both are practically devoid of glaciers down their western coasts, but have large glaciers reaching the sea on the east. To the north-east of West Spitsbergen, separated from it by Hinlopen Strait (7 to 60 m. in breadth) lies North-East Land, with an area of about 6,200 sq. m. Its western and northern coasts are indented by several bays and fjords. ”

“ Here, too, the waters of Wybe Jans Water were disclosed with the sunshine lying brightly upon them, and the long east coast of Spitsbergen leading in that direction. Everywhere else were only peaks rising like golden islands out of a silver sea. A row of such, the tops of a range of hills, ran close by us down the middle of the land towards the South Cape. In the north was a chaos of peaks, those near at hand lying in north and south rows, but the remoter ones dotted about on no discoverable plan. ”

“ In consequence of the smallness of the peaks, a greater number of them exist in a given area than elsewhere in the snowy Alpine regions. This makes the foregrounds in the summit views more complex. As the scale does not obtrude itself, the eye magnifies it, and the result is an imposing effect. A similar effect of complexity struck me in Spitsbergen, where the peaks are very much smaller still, and group themselves so closely together that they seem to form a spiny tangle at once puzzling to the topographer and pleasing to the lover of mountain varieties. ”

“ This western coast of Spitsbergen, first made known by Henry Hudson, is well described by Scoresby. He tells us how its cliffs rise by steep acclivities from the very margin of the ocean to a stupendous height, the masses of purest snow contrasting with the protruding dark-coloured rocks. The valleys, opening towards the coast, terminate inland with a transverse line of ice-field showing an unbroken surface for many leagues in extent. On the southern part of the coast there are isolated mountains with conical or ridged summits, occasionally terminating in sharp peaks. ”

“ The neck of Spitsbergen, which may be defined as bounded on the north by a line from the mouth of Nordenskiöld Glacier to Wiche Bay, and on the south by the Sassendal and the depression across to Agardh Bay, is a district that would well repay exploration, and is easily accessible from the Post Glacier at the head of Temple Bay. Nowhere are better illustrated than here the phenomena of mountain formation by plateau degradation under the action of rivers and glaciers. In the east are the remains of an ice-sheet; in the west are deep and wide glacier and river valleys. ”

“ Spitsbergen and Franz Josef Land appear never to have had native inhabitants. Along the coast of Siberia there is no continuous population, except in the land of the Chukchis in the extreme east between the Kolyma river and Bering Strait, but small settlements of many tribes of pagan hyper bore ans occur here and there. ”

“ The ski expedition thus described shows that the inland ice of West Spitsbergen differs considerably from that of North-East Land as well as of Greenland. It consists in this (at least at the time of year when we undertook our expedition) , namely, a perfectly level tract covered with snow without any of the crevasses and mounds which generally make expeditions over glaciers and inland ice so dangerous and difficult. Glacier-rivers, fountains, and glacier-lakes, which are so often met with in Greenland, are here altogether absent. ”

“ In the rise of the country from the sea it seems to have come up as a plain which did not reach the level of perpetual snow, so that as it rose it was cut down into valleys in the usual way by the agency of water pouring off from the plateau over its edge down a frost-split rock-face, the valleys gently sloped, the head necessarily steep owing to the face of the cliff being stripped off as the waterfalls cut their way back.
Since Nordenskiöld's first expedition we have learnt 48much of the geology and physical features of Spitsbergen; and we hear no more of the poverty of its flora and fauna. ”

“ They live on shrimps, many of which I took from the stomach: their voice is singular, resembling the forced laugh of punch in a puppet-show.
May 16. This morning I came on deck at four o'clock, and was much gratified by a remarkable bright land blink, and by the sight of our destined northern object, Spitsbergen, which was to the eastward of us, about thirty or forty miles. ”

“ Feilden notes as suggestive that, though the explorers have not met with this formation on the northern shores of Greenland, yet it was observed that a continuation of the direction of the known strike of the limestones of Feilden peninsula, carried over the polar area, passes through the neighbourhood of Spitsbergen, where the formation occurs, and contains certain species identical with those of the Grinnell Land rocks of this horizon. ”

“ In 1596 an expedition with Barents as pilot discovered Spitsbergen, and one80 of the ships proceeded eastward to Novaya Zemlya, where Barents died; but the rest of the party withstood the winter and won their way back to the Lapland coast in boats. It was found that Russian trading vessels were making regular journeys to the Ob and the Yenisei, and in the two following centuries the Russians were chiefly instrumental in extending knowledge of the northern coast of Asia. In 1648 Simon Dezhnev may have passed through the strait which afterwards bore the name of Vitus Bering. ”

“ All our baggage had to be packed for transfer to the Lofoten, in which we were to sail for Horn Sound that evening. At the inn were two Swiss artists and Professor Wiesner of Vienna, come to take observations on the intensity of the light. Presently a tourist steamer arrived and carried the artists away. People were coming and going all the time; it was the culmination of the tourist season.
I have read in the London press that Spitsbergen, nowadays, is “overrun” with tourists. ”

“ They reached 81° 24′ north. In the same year the first tourist steamer visited the archipelago. In 1872 a great polar expedition under Nordenskiöld set out to winter on Spitsbergen with the intention of attempting in the spring to advance towards the pole on sledges drawn by reindeer. But the expedition encountered a series of misfortunes. The ships were beset in the ice very early in Mussel Bay, and, six Norwegian fishing vessels having been likewise overtaken and shut in, the expedition had to feed the crews on its provisions and thus to reduce the rations of its own men. ”

“ In the summer Leigh Smith arrived in the Diana and supplied the crews with fresh provisions. The Swedish expedition returned to Tromsö on August 6th, 1873.
One other Spitsbergen expedition must be mentioned. Lieut. Payer, who had been the moving spirit in the sledge journeys of Koldewey’s expedition, was bent on continuing his Arctic explorations. He found a coadjutor in Lieut. Weyprecht of the Austrian Navy, an officer of very high scientific attainments. ”

“ The general result of this inland excursion was highly satisfactory, notwithstanding our misfortune with Svensen. It enabled us to record in outline [56] the general structure of the area included between Wijde Bay, Dickson Bay, Ice Fjord, Wybe Jans Water, and Hinloopen Strait. Before the recently undertaken exploration of the interior, Spitsbergen was supposed to be covered, like Greenland, with a big icesheet. There were known to be some mountains, but they were described as nunataks—islands of rock poked up through the enveloping ice. The nature of the Greenland icesheet is well known ”

“ Captain Nils Johnsen succeeded in landing on one of these islands, and named a lofty cliff Cape Nordenskiöld. In 1872 Captain Nilsen in the Freia also sighted the Wyche Islands, naming a high mountain Harfagrehangen, it being the thousandth anniversary of Norway’s union into one kingdom.
The scientific researches of the Swedes in Spitsbergen were begun in 1858. They were undertaken to institute a preliminary survey for measuring an arc of meridian, and also for geological and biological collections. ”