Fatal North

by Bruce Henderson

  The hours ticked by on the brass chronometer hanging on the bulkhead of the ship’s bridge. At half past two in the morning on November 8, 1871, Hall took his final breath.

  The sudden silence startled Morton. He placed one ear close to Hall’s lips. He could detect no respiration. He placed his hand above Hall’s heart; his chest was still.

  Morton was struck by how peaceful Charles Francis Hall looked in those final moments. His face was placid and lifelike. There were no contortions or signs of pain, nor was his face red or flushed as it had been periodically during his illness. Morton understood now why they called it the sleep of the dead.

  The second mate pulled himself away and went to the opposite side of the cabin, where he shook Bessels from a sound sleep.

  “The captain is dead,” Morton said.

  Bessels blinked, seemingly awaiting further confirmation.

  “He is dead, sir. Captain Hall is dead.”

  The doctor jumped from his bunk to go see for himself.

  Morton next went to the lower cabin and awakened Buddington with the same news.

  The upper cabin was soon filled with groggy but stunned men who, between the whispers and quiet prayers that mourners speak around the recently departed, looked sorrowfully and disbelievingly at their dead leader.

  The Arctic explorer who had so trusted in his fate had been cheated of his destiny.

  7

  A Change of Command

  On deck outside the pilot house, Sidney Buddington leaned against the icy railing. A group of sailors huddled nearby, speaking in hushed tones. Their commander had been dead less than two hours, and the mood aboard ship was somber and depressed.

  Seaman Henry Hobby, a German in his mid-thirties who had been going to sea for seventeen years and in that time had sailed much of the world on merchant ships, came topside for some fresh air.

  “We are all right now,” Buddington said without looking at the seaman.

  “How do you mean that, Captain?” Hobby asked.

  “You shan’t be starved to death now, I can tell you that.”

  “I never believed I would,” said Hobby, taken aback by Buddington’s comment.

  It had been the sailing master, after all, who had shorted the men on their rations and Captain Hall who had fixed the problem. Hobby knew that Hall had also vigorously tried to improve the quality of the food, although to no avail. As far as the men were concerned, the cook, William Jackson, generally spoiled the grub. He couldn’t even bake bread that was edible and would usually end up tossing the half-baked dough over the side. Much of what he prepared was similarly wasted or ruined. Hobby had once overheard Hall angrily dressing down Jackson in the galley, telling the mulatto cook that if he didn’t attend to his business and improve the chow, “you shall not have a cent of pay when you get home.”

  Buddington was clearly relieved that they would no longer be forced north by the zeal of a commander obsessed with discovering the Pole—a dangerous course that could mean uncertainty, even shipwreck and starvation like other Arctic expeditions. The cantankerous whaler who liked his drink had the helm now, and he intended to steer his own course. They would take it easy and get home safely, but not early, so as to draw their full pay.

  “I’ll tell you, Henry,” Buddington went on, “there’s a stone off my heart.”

  Meteorologist Frederick Meyer joined them. No one spoke for a while.

  “Well,” Meyer said, breaking the silence, “maybe now the officers will have something to say about this expedition.”

  Buddington went below, found the carpenter, and asked him to make a coffin. The work began immediately, and the carpenter’s hammer echoed in the frozen stillness.

  In the lower berthing compartment, Buddington came across a roomful of men. “Will anyone lay out the old man?” the sailing master asked.

  George Tyson stepped forward. A few hours before Hall’s death, Tyson had gone to his commander’s bedside. Finding him unconscious and breathing laboriously, Tyson left knowing that Hall was not long for this world.

  “I’ll help,” said William Morton, as genuinely bereaved as any crew member.

  The two men went to the upper cabin, which had emptied out.

  Charles Francis Hall still lay where he had expired, a light cover thrown over him.

  Tyson pulled back the cover. As Morton had been earlier, Tyson was moved by the dead man’s peaceful expression. Devoid of any suffering and angst, Hall’s countenance looked more natural and fresh than any face of death Tyson had ever seen.

  The two men found a plank and rolled the body onto it. Setting either end of the board on overturned crates, they stripped the corpse and washed it. Finding Hall’s favorite blue uniform with shiny brass buttons, they dressed and groomed their late commander as if he were scheduled to stand a fleet admiral’s inspection. They then lifted the plank onto the bunk, where they covered the body with a clean wool blanket.

  Buddington entered the cabin and asked to speak to Tyson. They went into an alleyway between the cabin and the ship’s rail. After checking to make sure they were alone, Buddington said, “Don’t you say anything about it to anybody, but that bastard little German doctor poisoned the old man.”

  Tyson had visited Hall during his worst days and heard firsthand his wild talk about being poisoned. When the commander was most delirious, Tyson had himself been accused of breathing deadly “blue vapor” in the cabin. At one of his bedside visits, Hall had looked urgently in his eyes and said there was a traitor aboard—“a snake in the grass” that would have to be found and dealt with. Tyson knew from Joe and Hannah that a suspicious Hall had sometimes refused food and medicine. There had been a lot of talk aboard the ship about the commander’s strange and sudden illness. If it had been brought on by the “heat of the cabin” coming in from a long sledge journey—as suggested by Bessels—why hadn’t Hall stepped outside when he began to feel overheated? Besides, would heat exhaustion, not exactly a common ailment in the Arctic, present itself as an upset stomach? Tyson had not heard of Hall eating anything that could have sickened him; there was only that cup of coffee.

  As for Buddington’s accusation, Tyson well knew that Hall and Bessels had not gotten along, but had their animosity been terrible enough for the ship’s doctor to poison the expedition’s commander? What would Bessels be gaining from Hall’s death? More leeway and authority to conduct his scientific agenda, without doubt. And added credit for anything that the expedition accomplished, perhaps even claiming himself as the discoverer of the North Pole. Tyson knew the seeds of jealousy had already been planted between the two men. Still, a murder plot struck him as unlikely. Although he didn’t believe that the German doctor had done all he could for the grievously ill Hall, Tyson did not suspect foul play. He also did not want to consider the possibility of murder.

  “I don’t believe it,” Tyson said softly.

  “Yes, he did it,” Buddington said emphatically. “I know, I tell you. But don’t you say anything about it or it’ll go badly for all of us when we get back home. Look out for Bessels. He poisoned the old man, and if you ain’t careful he’ll serve you the same way.”

  Of course, if Hall had been murdered, Buddington himself had to be considered. Tyson well remembered his words about Hall—“that old son of a bitch won’t live long”—although at the time he had thought the sailing master was merely hoping for an accident to befall Hall on one of his sledge journeys. Still, Buddington had been looking for Hall’s death, and his disturbing prophecy had come true.

  And what of the possibility that Buddington and Bessels, each of whom had had serious disagreements with Hall, had entered into a conspiratorial pact to do away with their leader? That didn’t seem plausible. Tyson could not see these two men working together on anything. The two had already had a nasty row over the liquor supply. Plus, long before that altercation, they had shown they despised each other. To Bessels, the sailing master was an uneducated, lazy slob, and to Buddington, Bessels wa
s an arrogant elitist and a “damn Kraut” besides.

  Tyson had more immediate matters to think about this day. Now that the body was prepared for burial, they had to dig a grave. He took Chester and some men ashore, and found a suitable spot about a half mile from the ship. The ground was frozen as hard as marble. By the light of lanterns, they hacked at it with picks, ice chisels, and axes for two days until they reached a depth of twenty-six inches—the depth of the permanent frost—considered sufficient to protect the coffin from hungry, marauding bears, the only Arctic creature capable of breaking into the wooden box. By the time the grave was dug, the simple pine coffin was ready.

  The body, wrapped in an American flag with thirty-seven stars, was placed inside. Before the lid was nailed shut, all hands were called in to look, for the last time, upon the face of the man who had brought them to the Arctic. Most had appreciated his singleness of purpose and the force of his character. His zeal and forethought had animated and directed the smallest duties, and he had inspired enthusiasm and stimulated the efforts of the most indifferent. A sense of loneliness and loss filled the hearts of officers and crewmen alike.

  Little was said as the sorrowful procession passed the open coffin. When the viewing was over, the coffin was closed and carried to the afterdeck.

  Shortly before noon on November 11, 1871, the ship’s company gathered on the ice. The ship’s bell sounded as they departed, and the dogs howled a sad refrain. Under an overcast sky, the small cortege walked the short distance to the grave, the coffin sled-borne and covered by Old Glory. The men wore sealskins to ward off the cold, and a few carried kerosene lanterns against the perpetual gloom of Arctic winter.

  Tyson noticed that a storm was blowing up in the northeast, and he realized they might have to hurry the service. It was a day befitting of the event—the weather appropriately dismal, and the place rugged and desolate in the extreme.

  As far as the dim light enabled the men to see, they were bound in by huge masses of slate rock, which stood like a barricade, guarding the barren land of the interior. Between these rugged hills lay the snow-covered plain; behind them were the ice-bound waters of Polaris Bay, shimmering in the clear light of the stars. The shore of the bay was strewn with great ice blocks. Not far off, the little hut they called the Observatory bore aloft, upon a tall flagstaff, the only cheering object in sight, and even that was sad enough today, for the colorful Stars and Stripes was dipped at half-mast.

  Tyson led the way with his lantern, Buddington abreast of him. Two by two they proceeded: Bessels and Meyer, Chester and Morton, the other officers, then the crew. Several of them hauled the coffin by a rope attached to the sled across ground generally covered with snow, although blown bare in places by the wind. The Eskimos followed: including the heartbroken Joe and the weeping Hannah, inconsolable in her grief.

  With Hall, Joe and Hannah had shared many trials and dangers. They had saved his life in the Arctic a number of times, and they were pained that they had been unable to do so this time. The couple felt very alone, on a ship now filled with strangers.

  Even at noon it was almost dark, and Tyson had to hold up his lantern at the grave for Chaplain R. W. D. Bryan to read a short burial service.

  As Hannah sobbed, the coffin was lowered into the ground.

  Each mourner threw a handful of frozen dirt over it.

  In twos and threes, they walked back to the ship, arriving just as the snow did.

  Later that day, Tyson, by candlelight, wrote in his journal:

  Thus end poor Hall’s ambitious projects; thus is stilled the effervescing enthusiasm of as ardent a nature as I ever knew. Wise he might not always have been, but his soul was in this work, and had he lived till spring, I think he would have gone as far as mortal man could go to accomplish his mission. But with his death I fear that all hopes of further progress will have to be abandoned.

  Two weeks later, seaman Noah Hayes, the sole American among the deck force, was helping Dr. Emil Bessels in the observatory. Hayes, a particularly observant young man who would write one of the most literate and detailed journals of any in the Polaris crew, noticed that the doctor appeared uncharacteristically lighthearted.

  The sailor casually asked him why.

  “You know, Hayes,” Bessels said, stopping to laugh before continuing, “Captain Hall’s death was the best thing that could have happened for this expedition.”

  8

  Stirring an Ice-Co Id Grave

  For more than a week after Charles Francis Hall went to his grave, a terrible storm raged: seven days of blinding snow blizzards and roaring winds, the likes of which members of the North Polar Expedition had not before experienced. Even the Eskimos, born and raised in the clime, were awestruck by the intensity of the celestial violence. During Hall’s illness the weather had been unusually calm and clear for winter. Now, they agreed, it was as if the spirits were angry.

  The night after Hall’s burial, the ship’s company were startled at midnight by a loud cry of distress. The carpenter, Nathaniel Coffin, was found crouching in horror in a corner of his bunk, believing that he had heard a voice calling to him from the adjacent storeroom. To pacify him, the storeroom was unlocked and searched. Despite proof that no one was lurking inside, the carpenter continued to believe that he had heard something. Because his bunk was so near the storeroom, he was offered an empty bunk in the upper berthing compartment. The carpenter was happy crawling into the bunk so recently occupied by Captain Hall, and he soonfell asleep.

  Several men had close calls in the big storm.

  Dr. Emil Bessels was trapped overnight in the Observatory by the howling snowstorm, a virtual prisoner. He went eight hours after running out of coal and having no heat in temperatures that dropped to 24 degrees below zero. Finally he was reached and brought back to the ship by the two Eskimo hunters and meteorologist Frederick Meyer, whose eyelids froze from battling the driving snow and icy winds up to sixty miles per hour. The storm was so violent it was impossible for Meyer and Bessels to stand against the wind on the way back to the ship, and even when creeping on their hands and knees they had difficulty making headway. The Eskimos had less difficulty with the trek, as they knew better how to battle the strong wind. All except Hans ended up frostbitten.

  Herman Sieman, a thirty-one-year-old German seaman who had never before sailed in Arctic waters, went out to examine the tide gauge to make sure the vessel was not in danger of drifting from her anchorage. Solid and strong of build, Sieman was nonetheless lifted up by the storm and carried a hundred feet, whereupon he was thrown violendy upon the ice, and covered by freezing water rushing up through huge cracks that opened. When he recovered from the shock, he found that he was lying on his back with hands and feet in the air. Fortunately, he still retained his lantern, which had not gone out. Getting up on his feet, he forced his way against the wind and reached the fire hole in the ice, which was where the tidal activity was read. The gale-force snowstorm was so furious that he could hardly keep his eyes open long enough to read the tide gauge.

  The poor dogs suffered greatly on the ice. Their yelps of distress so affected the men that they were brought in off the ice and provided with shelter on deck under the awning.

  The creaking of the masts and the howling of the wind through the rigging proved that the storm continued to rage without a lull. In the lower cabin, all felt the rocking of the vessel as well as the grinding of the ship’s hull in her icy cradle upon the berg, causing everyone much anxiety. In the upper cabin, crewmen heard the heavy canvas awnings on the main deck repeatedly snapping like thunder in the wind.

  The wind blew with such force against the broadside of the vessel that she was thrown over on one side, and the snow wall built around her gave way and sank several feet. The more than two-foot-thick ice encircling Polaris began cracking loudly, and the vessel was repeatedly driven against the ice with severe shocks.

  The ice had broken all around the bay, and they were now surrounded by open waters with
in half a mile. Although still stuck in the ice floe, the vessel had begun to drift from the protection of Providence Berg. They quickly put out another anchor forward in eight fathoms of water, but Polaris still headed ominously toward the wind-whipped bay, filled with swirling icebergs.

  Someone had to get a line attached to the berg, but Buddington hesitated to give the order, apparently unsure if it would be obeyed. The duty was made perilous by the extreme violence of the wind and the steep, slippery surface of the berg.

  Seaman William Nindemann, a strong, quiet twenty-three-year-old German, stepped forward. “I’ll try.”

  “Joe and Hans will give you a hand,” said Buddington, volunteering the Eskimos.

  To illuminate the work, a large pan containing tarred rope saturated with kerosene oil was set out onto the ice and lit.

  Nindemann succeeded in getting across the cracking ice floe to the berg fifty feet away. Using a hatchet, he cut steps up the side of the berg and scaled its slippery banks. He carried with him an ice anchor and a line tied to a stanchion on deck. From the ship’s supply he had taken the heaviest of the ice anchors, a seventy-five-pound iron hook that he strapped to his back. As line was fed to him by the natives from the ice floe, the seamen secured the hook into the berg and the line was pulled taut from the ship.

  Once the ship was holding steadily to the berg, a cheer went up from the assembled officers and crew who had watched Nindemann perform his daredevil feat. For added security, two other anchors were made ready, and the Eskimos took these across the floe and up the side of the berg to the waiting Nindemann. With the three lines secured to the berg, the threat of the ship being carried away and colliding with fast-drifting bergs was eased. Nindemann and a native were frostbitten during their exposure but not seriously.