Sledge journey

“ In the spring of 1873 Phelander and I with nine men made a sledge journey round Northeast Land. In the course of this journey a great many bears were seen and killed. When a bear was seen while we were dragging our sledge forward, the train commonly stood still, and, not to frighten the bear, all the men concealed themselves behind the sledges, with the exception of the marksman, who, squatting down in some convenient place, waited till his prey should come sufficiently in range to be killed with certainty. ”

“ On March 10th a sledge was sent to communicate with the Investigator in the Bay of Mercy, a distance of 160 miles.
M’Clintock’s two large sledges, when loaded, weighed 2000 lb., or 228 lb. per man on starting. Of the sledge crew of 1851 Salmon was still well and hearty. George266 Green, ice quartermaster, was captain of the sledge, an excellent man; Henry Giddy, boatswain’s mate, was almost equally good. May 4th, 1853, was a day to be remembered, the beginning of the greatest sledge journey but one on record. ”

“ The ponies behaved as well as my companions, and jumped the floes in great style. After getting them on a new floe we simply left them, and there they stood chewing at each others' head ropes or harness till we were over with the sledges and ready to take them on again. Their implicit trust in us was touching to behold. A 12-feet sledge makes an excellent bridge if an opening is too wide to jump. After some hours we saw fast ice ahead, and thanked God for it. Meanwhile a further unpleasantness occurred in the arrival of a host of the terrible 'killer' whales. ”

“ With my short legs this was strenuous work, especially as the weight of the sledge would often stop me with a jerk just before my leading foot quite cleared a crevasse, and the next minute one would be struggling out so as to keep the sledge on the move. It is fatal to stop the sledge as nobody waits for stragglers, and you have to pick up your lost ground by strenuous hurry. ”

“ Towards the end of the journey the snow had disappeared, and, in company with a reindeer caravan, he drove on with his dogs over the bare plain, stocks and stones and all, using the sledges none the less. The Samoyedes and natives of Northern Siberia have no vehicles but sledges. The summer sledge is somewhat higher than the winter sledge, in order that it may not hang fast upon stones and stumps. As may be supposed, however, summer sledging is anything but smooth work. ”

“ Long and fatiguing sledge journeys show a very different state of things. When it came to harnessing, the first trouble of the day began. It was impossible to get them to stand still. The full meal of the previous evening, followed by the night's rest, had given them such a superabundance of energy and joy of life that nothing could make them stand still. They had to have a taste of the whip, and yet it was a pity to start that. After having securely anchored the sledge, one was ready at last with one's team of six dogs harnessed. ”

“ On the sledge journeys the dogs were harnessed in a fan-shaped group to the traces, and were never run tandem. In traveling, the men were accustomed to hold on to the back of the sledge, never going in front of the team, and often took off their heavy overcoats and threw them on the load. ”

“ In America, too, the sledge was employed by Englishmen at an early date for the purpose of exploring the shores of the Arctic seas. Sometimes the toboggan or Indian sledge was used, sometimes that of the Eskimo. It was under the able leadership of M’Clintock that sledge journeys attained their highest development. While the Russians had generally travelled with a large number of dogs, and only a few men, the English employed many more men on their expeditions, and their sledges were entirely, or for the most part, drawn by the explorers themselves. ”

“ Alas! one half-hour’s experience of the real thing is enough to take the whole gloss off the subject. The sledge is heavily laden with tent and sleeping-bags, provisions, and fuel—an item not considered by many people, without which even a drink of water is an impossibility. The driver toils along behind the sledge, guiding it by its handles as he would a plough, or flogging the dogs with all his might. Striding along in the deep snow gives him a peculiar waddling gait universal amongst the Eskimo. ”

“ To the unversed, a march by sled would seem simplicity. In reality there is no more discouraging test than to hit the trail, dogless and by strength of back. The human biped cannot drag across the snow for any distance more than its own weight; hence equipment is of the simplest. At that, the sledge rope galls one's neck with a continual, endless, yielding drag, resulting in back pains peculiar to itself. It is this eternal maddening pull, with the pitiful crawling gait that tells; horse's labour and a snail's pace. ”

“ Instead of frisky dogs with tails curled over their backs, with drivers comfortably seated on the sledge cracking a whip at the flying team, snarling dogs and worn-out men tramped slowly and silently through the unbroken snow.
It very rarely occurs that there is either a beaten or a marked trail, so the lead is taken by a man who keeps in advance, picking out the best road, while his comrades are hard at work lifting the sledge over bad places or keeping it from capsizing. ”

“ Meantime sledges were prepared, being small open carts without wheels, which just held two persons each: my mother and I were in the second, Lea and an Italian in the third, and the Hawkers in the fourth: we had no man with our sledge. The sledges started in procession, the horses stumbling over the ledges in the snow, from which we bounded up and down. At last the path began to wind along the edge of a terrific precipice, where nothing but a slight edging of fresh snow separated one from the abyss. ”

“ The general sledging outfit was of course rigorously adhered to, but each man made such small changes in the fit of his clothes as his autumn experience suggested.
During the darkness the snow had hardened considerably; in many places a sledge now travelled readily where it would have sunk out of sight in the autumn, and as early as the 28th February an exercise party travelling with a dog-sledge to the south reached in a few hours the spot from which our autumn sledges had returned baffled after a ten days’ struggle towards the “Discovery.” ”

“ They always travel at a gallop, no matter what the state of the country may be, and to go down-hill is both difficult and dangerous; and at times it is necessary for the driver to guide the sledge with his feet, or with a strong staff planted in the snow as the sledge proceeds; and when heavily laden, and the descent great, the dogs are often taken off, and the sledge glides down alone, the man steering with his toes, and lying flat on his face, thus descending head-foremost like boys on their sleds. ”

“ In the same way it must be lifted across hummocks through which a road is cut with the end of the spear, which, for this purpose, is always lashed in a place where it is handy for use, generally on the right side of the bottom of the sledge. The difficulties of traveling across heavy ice which has been subjected to heavy pressures have frequently been described. When the sledge stops the dogs immediately lie down, and if they cannot start again, though pulling with all their strength, the leader frequently looks around pitifully, as if to say, We cannot do more! ”

“ The wayworn sledge travellers started on their return on May 27th. They had had the advantage of fresh food from musk oxen, hares, and ptarmigan, and additional fuel from bear’s blubber. But with the summer the most harassing kind of sledge travelling began. Large pools of water formed on the ice floes, and the men often got wet through in ice-cold water. A mixture of ice and snow formed a crust over these pools of water, but not strong enough to bear, and through these they had to wade and struggle as best they could. ”

“ This evil would seem the annoyance of an hour to the travellers in a stage-coach, but to a sledge-party on the ice-waste it is the gravest that can be conceived. The Esquimaux dog is driven by a single trace, a long thin thong of seal or walrus hide, which passes from his chest over his haunches to the sledge. The team is always driven abreast, and the traces are of course tangling and twisting themselves up incessantly, as the half-wild or terrified brutes bound right or left from their prescribed positions. ”

“ The British searching squadron, including the Resolute, the Assistance, the Pioneer, and the Intrepid, while wintering in the vicinity of Cornwallis Island and Griffith Island, had held frequent communication and planned for exploration journeys on sledges to be undertaken as early as possible the following spring. Before the winter became too severe, depots of provisions were established to be used by the sledging parties, and the men trained in sledge dragging and walking exercises that they might be in good physical condition when the time for a test of endurance should arrive. ”

“ Alas, more wear for the runners of the sledge, which meant more labour to the eight of us, so keen to succeed in our enterprise—soon we are in the thick of it; first one slips and is thrown violently down, then a sledge runs over the slope of a great ice wave.
The man trying to hold it back is relentlessly thrown, and the bow of the sledge crashes on to the heel of the hindermost of those hauling ahead with a thud that means "pain." ”

“ But no! we have a merciful Providence to watch over us.' At length our children fell asleep, while we covered them with ox-hides in the frightful snow-drift."
[16] In my own expedition we shod our dogs for travel in very cold weather with neatly fitting, thin, oil-tanned seal-skin shoes. Though a shoe was occasionally lost, as they had to be tied on loosely, the feet of the dogs were well protected.
[17] The upstanders are stout poles rising from the extreme rear of the sledge by which the driver is able to steer or direct the course of the sledge itself. ”

“ When about to pitch camp, or whilst resting, drive the spears into the ice to secure the dogs to by short neck ropes. Most sledge dogs are trained to lie down when the whip handle is passed lightly along their backs. Never heedlessly quit your sledge whilst on the march, unless you have fast hold of the upstanders, or without first bringing it to an anchor. This can be done by thrusting a seal spear or lance down into the snow between the first two transverse bars of the sledge bottom. ”

“ Most travellers rode horses or mules where they could, and led, or crawled with them, the rest of the way; but sledges were also in use, in which case, Moryson was told, "it sometimes happens the sledge whereon the passenger sits is cast out of the way and hangs down in a most deep valley with the passenger's head downward. ”

“ A wonderful Providence arrested the fall of the sledge; at a depth of about thirty feet it stuck fast between the sides of the crevasse, just as I was being dragged to the edge of the abyss by its weight. The sledge having jammed itself in, I lay on my stomach close to the awful brink, the rope which attached me to the sledge tightly strained, and cutting deep into the snow. The situation was all the more dreadful as I, the only person present accustomed to the [293] dangers of glaciers, lay there unable to stir. ”

“ How my heart leaped to see the sledge gliding over the snow, the man inside and the one on snowshoes shouting at the plucky, galloping dogs! But they still had one hundred and fifty yards to come, not far behind them, whooping and yelling, firing musket and hurling tomahawks, were at least two score of redskins—the most of them on snowshoes. Crack, crack, crack! They seemed to be aiming poorly, for the sledge swept on, dogs and men uninjured.
“Be ready!” cried the factor: “make room there! The moment the sledge dashes in let the red devils have a volley—muskets and howitzer!” ”

“ The small ones were made so that one person could drag them over the smooth parts of the ice; and on having to pass any rough portions, two or three persons might tackle together, passing one sledge after the other.
To carry the woodwork for our house, we were obliged to form a large sledge, which would require nearly all the party to drag it forward. Taking care to close all the hatches, we loaded our sledges with provisions, blankets, and some additional clothing, and set forward on our return to the bay. ”

“ Thus, while one lot of men were skilfully fitting sledges with convenient straps to secure the loads against the inevitable bumping, jolting, and capsizing, and lashing tank-like contrivances of waterproof canvas on, to contain the component units of food, another set of people would be fastening light wicker or venesta boxes athwart the sledge ends for carrying instruments and such perishable things as the primus stoves and methylated spirit bottles. ”

“ We packed our ski on the sledge, attached spiked crampons to our finnesko, and guided the sledge through the maze of hummocks and crevasses.
The travelling surface was wind-swept and consequently too easy, for the sledge would charge down a slippery slope of blue ice and capsize time after time. In places the way became so steep that our united efforts were needed to avoid the yawning chasms which beset our path. ”

“ My own sledge carried four cases of man pemmican, two cases of biscuit, thirty-six cases of milk, twelve tins of coal oil, 2,400 tea tablets, one tent, matches, one Primus stove, one axe, two pickaxes, candles, snow-knives, one gallon of alcohol, one pair of snowshoes, one pair of ski, one Mannlicher rifle, 250 rounds of ammunition, one Colt revolver, 100 rounds of ammunition, sleeping-robes, rope and spare harness. We had to leave a Peary sledge in camp because there were not dogs enough to make a team to haul it. ”