The Ice Master

by Jennifer Niven

  McKinlay took night watchman’s duties that night so that he could make two copies of the Admiralty Chart of Wrangel Island, one for Mamen and one for Sandy. He worked until 3:00 A.M., a thankless job because he had no way of spreading out the chart but had to work cramped in one position.

  There was just one more thing to be dealt with. Malloch was worrying about going. Ever since he received the news that he would be joining the scouting party, he had been anxious and preoccupied. It was too great a risk. His clothes weren’t ready yet, but even more than that, he was petrified about going on the trip. His attitude surprised Bartlett and the rest of the staff. Malloch was physically one of the strongest men in the company, and by far the most reckless. He had always been wild and careless when it came to his own health and well-being, and he had a way of laughing everything off when it became too serious. But ever since the ship went down his colleagues had seen a change in him.

  Malloch went to the captain not once, but twice, expressing his concern, and even though Bartlett had tried to reassure him, his mind was still uneasy. He asked and then demanded to be replaced. So it was that at 10:00 P.M., on January 19, Seaman John Brady was informed he would be going instead.

  IT WAS, AS MCKINLAY described it, a dirty-looking night. The wind had not let up and the snow swept through camp with the venom of a great, white beast. Everyone was to be called at 4:00 that morning, but Bartlett took one look outside and changed his mind. The wind howled and shrieked, and it was savagely raw and cold. The trip was postponed once more.

  “It gets on47 the nerves to wait and wait under these circumstances,” Mamen wrote in his diary. “All depends on these trips to the island.. . . I hope they will be successful, it is my highest desire these days.”

  Miraculously, by January 21 the breeze had lightened, the snowdrift had mellowed, and the sky had cleared. Bartlett took a good, long look, studying the distant island, the ice pack, the elements, with a weathered, seasoned gaze. And then finally, he gave the word—they were cleared to go.

  As Mamen set out to lead his first small expedition of sorts, he reminded himself of all those who were counting on him. It was an enormous responsibility for a twenty-two-year-old, and the first serious challenge of his young life. He thought of his family back home and about Ellen and, most of all, he thought about the journey ahead. If Mamen was good at anything it was bolstering himself up and finding courage in daunting situations. Time and again, he had discovered deep within himself the ability to rise up and fight when all looked bleak. But still, he was riddled with doubt, and overwhelmed by the trust Bartlett was placing in him. “One must take48 chances and risk something to win,” he wrote, ”and win we must.. . . With God’s help we will get successfully through with it.”

  MAMEN WAS LESS THAN HAPPY with their first day’s work on the trail. He went to bed that night in their crudely and hastily constructed snow house feeling restless and unsatisfied. He was being hard on himself, unnecessarily. The changeable weather hadn’t helped, and neither had the ice conditions. Now he listened to the wind screaming outside and prayed for better luck and an improvement in the weather.

  Mamen wanted desperately to prove himself, not only to the captain, but to everyone else as well. He would go out there and lead that party, and it would all be wonderful experience for the expedition he planned to lead someday. He was certain tomorrow would be better. But still . . . a weight remained. All were waiting for him to lead them and then return for the others. And now the wind was howling as he had never heard it howl before, and he couldn’t see anything in the thick, falling snow.

  After breakfast that morning at Shipwreck Camp, they had dug out the snow-covered sleds, and after Bartlett had presented official written instructions to both Mamen and Sandy, the scouting party had departed, Mamen leading the way on skis. Everyone but the captain, Hadley, Murray, Beuchat, Auntie, and the little girls accompanied them for the first four or five miles, making a good, fast start. The dogs were fresh and energetic, but the ice proved rough. The sleds were repeatedly drawn to a standstill by pressure ridges and snowdrifts, and fresh cracks in the ice were troublesome but crossable.

  By noon, the extra men turned back to Shipwreck Camp, bidding Mamen’s party “au revoir49” and “good luck.” There was great excitement, everyone full of hope for the future. At last, the moment they had been preparing for had arrived—the men were finally on their way.

  Now on their own, Mamen led his party onward, and not long afterward the snow began to blow so that they could not see more than fifty or sixty yards in front of them. It was disastrous because just as suddenly the smooth ice grew rough and uneven, shattering their hopes of a good day’s travel.

  They headed southwest, relying on the compass at times because the snow was so blinding. Just seven miles from Shipwreck Camp, they came to the first opening in the ice. The ice was thin and the lead wide enough so that they were forced to unload the sleds and drag them across empty so they would be light enough to make it. Then they transferred all of the provisions by hand.

  Discouraged, they made camp not too long afterward on a large floe of old ice, building a snow house with a tent for a roof because they were too tired to construct a proper one. Sandy had forgotten to pack the tent poles that Bartlett and McKinlay had set out, they had lost a bottle of alcohol along the way, and the end of one of the rifle butts had somehow broken. Other than that, they were still in good shape. Even though Bartlett had instructed Mamen that the dogs should be fed only once every second day, Mamen went ahead and gave them some pemmican anyway because they were worn out and he wanted them to be fresh for tomorrow.

  The wind was so vicious that night that it blew the roof off their snow house three times. Each time, they would chase it down and replace it, finally piling it with Mamen’s skis and ski poles, ropes, an Eskimo walking stick, some rifles, a piece of canvas, and a sleigh cover, to give it extra support.

  When morning came, Mamen nearly decided to stay in camp and wait for the storm to abate; but gradually the wind began to die down and they set out once more. Huge ridges of ice awaited them on the trail, however—some as high as twenty feet—and these they climbed, pulling the dogs and sleds up and over them. It was an unbearable job and they wore themselves out in the process.

  Because of the fog, they hadn’t laid eyes on Wrangel Island since leaving Shipwreck Camp, which worried Mamen. Still, he remained hopeful. Surely they would see the mountain peaks again as soon as the weather cleared.

  They pressed on until noon on the twenty-second, when they came to an open crack in the ice that stretched far and wide. There was no way of getting across it. The ice surrounding the open water was shaky and thin. They retreated a quarter of a mile and made camp on a large patch of old ice. The total day’s progress was seven miles, and they were in worse condition than the day before. Their tent had ripped in two places and most of the party had frozen noses and hands. Earlier in the day, Mamen took a spill into the water up to the middle of his thighs. The water was deadly cold, and he was shivering and blue, dripping wet, his clothes beginning to freeze on his body. But he would not allow the party to stop for him to change clothes; they had to keep going. He paid for his decision with a frozen nose and middle finger, and two frozen feet, the left one particularly bad.

  When at last they took shelter in their new snow house, Mamen was sleepless. He lay in his makeshift bed, uneasy and in pain. He was worried about the fact that they were still unable to see Wrangel Island. And he was worried about Kuraluk. The Eskimo was making him a nervous wreck because of his anxiety about leaving his family behind. Kuraluk was very protective of Auntie and his daughters. This was the first time he had been separated from them on this journey, and the first time he had left them alone with those strangers from the ship. Bartlett, he trusted, but the others worried him. He wanted to get back as soon as possible. He would have no rest until he saw his family again.

  Mamen also worried about his own frostbitten feet, wh
ich gave him so much pain that he could not rest. He got up twice to rub them with snow in an attempt to get the circulation back, not realizing that this was the worst thing he could have done. He should have warmed them against the body heat of one of his comrades instead.

  “Oh, what a50 road we have,” Mamen wrote in his diary on that sleepless night. “It is more than difficult and will take longer time than expected.”

  The following day brought better results, though the high pressure ridges still troubled them and Wrangel Island remained shrouded in fog. The men were in better spirits all around, their outlook improved by eleven miles progress and more accommodating weather. With a little luck, thought Mamen, they would reach Wrangel Island tomorrow.

  THEY SET OUT THE NEXT MORNING in snow flurries and a steady, driving wind, which kept up throughout the day. The sky was dark and clouded, and Wrangel Island was still nowhere to be seen. Mamen drove them onward, and they crossed several small openings in the ice, which gave them considerable trouble. The worst came just past noon when they reached a wide, sprawling lead, too wide to cross with the dogs and the loaded sleds.

  Mamen and Sandy and the others unharnessed the dogs and threw them across the chasm, dragging the sleds over behind. It was Mamen’s bad luck to be caught in the middle of a dog fight, which erupted as he was helping the dogs across to his side of the water. Throwing himself into the middle of the pack in an effort to separate the fighters, he felt a sharp, stabbing pain in his right knee. He buckled, but still managed to push the dogs apart, and then was able to assess the damage. The pain was intense, and he had no idea what he had done. As far as he could tell in his hasty examination, it was either the kneecap or the ligament, but he could not assess the extent of the damage. It was a familiar feeling—the same knee he had injured just weeks ago.

  With Mamen virtually crippled, the men were forced to set up camp. Mamen sent Kataktovik out to find a good place, and then the young leader was lashed to Sandy’s sled for the drive there. As Mamen was bumped and jostled over the rough ice, his knee shot lightning bolts of pain through his entire body.

  They built their snow house, lit the Primus stoves, and ate a quick dinner. Afterward, Sandy and Brady tried to help Mamen with his leg. They pulled it and massaged it, but nothing seemed to help. After just nine miles progress for the day, Mamen was forced into bed, his last thoughts being ones of hope and prayer that his leg might improve during the night and be good enough to walk on in the morning. Otherwise, he would be of no use to his men, only a hindrance, and he would slow them down.

  What had he gotten himself into? “I have not51 yet seen worse luck,” he wrote, “I cannot but say that I am much worried both about ourselves and our comrades in the camp. I don’t know how to manage everything now. It is worse for the people left behind out on the ice. If the leg is not all right tomorrow, we must do all we can to reach land and then send Anderson and the two Eskimos back, to return now would be folly.”

  As the temperature dipped to minus forty degrees Fahrenheit, the men endured another sleepless night. They couldn’t risk tents or sleeping bags because the ice might shift or break and they had to be unencumbered. Instead, they bedded down on the ice and huddled closely for warmth. Their clothes were wet through from the snow and their own sweat and their exertions over the open leads—the slips, the accidental falls, the dips into the freezing water. It was impossible to dry their clothes, which meant the men were forced to walk up and down periodically throughout the night to keep their blood circulating and maintain feeling in their bodies. They walked even when they couldn’t feel their limbs. Sandy seemed to have it the worst. His legs were frozen, and he sat up all night rubbing them vigorously.

  They were up at 5:00 A.M. and on their way by 8:30, part of the provisions from Sandy’s sled loaded onto Mamen’s and Kuraluk’s sleds so that Mamen could ride. For the first time since leaving Shipwreck Camp, they spotted Wrangel Island, and they let this spur them on and give them the strength they needed to continue.

  There was one other factor that helped them onward: the sun. The great orb had disappeared on November 14 of the previous year, and they could now see it lifting its burning head over the earth. It barely cleared the horizon, but their spirits soared.

  They traveled twelve miles that day and were in sight of land. Surely they couldn’t have much farther to go. That night’s entry in Mamen’s diary was proof of his renewed optimism: “We came closer52 and closer to the island, it is now quite distinct. The mountains rise sombrely [sic], and we can also see the lowland to the west dimly. I hope that we may reach the island tomorrow; it will be a joy both to us and to the others, the sooner we will be back.”

  Over the next two days, they only traveled an average of nine miles total, however. The uneven ice and loose snow made the going next to impossible. There were increasing numbers of open leads, and Mamen and his team were forced to approach Wrangel Island in zigzag fashion instead of a straight line.

  Mamen was still lashed to the sled, unable to straighten his knee or put any weight on it. He felt like the most dreadful burden. If there was anything Mamen hated, it was to be a hindrance. It made him feel weak and angry and frustrated, and yet there was nothing he could do.

  There was no rest for the travelers as the nighttime temperature hovered at minus forty degrees Fahrenheit, and they continued to pace the ice, trying to keep warm. All of their clothes were soaking wet, and even the woolen blankets were more like wet dish rags than protective covering. They could not escape the wind and the cold, and “we shiver and53 freeze more than we have done before,” observed Mamen.

  They were, at least, coming steadily closer to the island, although Mamen now suspected that the distance from Shipwreck Camp to Wrangel was much greater than he and Bartlett and McKinlay had originally guessed.

  January 28 was no better. They were running into more and more open water, and were forced to zigzag more dramatically toward the island. It was maddening to see the land so near, yet not be able to reach it. By noon, they were forced to sit out the rest of the day beside an enormous lead, which they could only hope would freeze over so they could continue. Otherwise, they had no idea how they would get around it.

  Making camp was almost impossible because there was no snow to build their igloo. Somehow, after expending a lot of time and energy, they managed a rather crude structure, only to discover that one of their two Primus stoves was no longer working.

  They had covered just four miles and their clothes were “wetter and wetter54 day by day,” wrote Mamen. “I don’t know how it will go if we don’t reach land soon, I don’t think the boys can manage it this way much longer and then they have also considerable trouble with me.” His leg had not improved at all, but they were so close to the island now—could practically feel the earth beneath their feet—that Mamen insisted they go on.

  At the end of the day, they were a discouraged lot and even Mamen was having trouble rallying. He knew Bartlett and the others were already expecting them back at Shipwreck Camp, but he refused to return until they had reached the island. “I have suffered55 these days more than people might believe,” he said, “both from pain in the leg and from the cold, more than I have done in all my life, but my spirits are still high and I look upon the future with bright eyes, however dark it may appear to be.”

  BACK AT SHIPWRECK CAMP, McKinlay lay in layers of damp clothing on one of the mattresses they’d saved from the ship. He had learned much in the past week from living on the ice. He now knew it was important to remove one’s boots before sleeping and to leave them standing because they would freeze during the night. If you left them standing, at least you could fit your feet into them the next day. They tended to get out of shape if you lay them down. Likewise, it was important to remove any clothing that was wet and next to the skin. Most of their clothing was wet by the end of the day, due to snow or ice or water or sweat.

  McKinlay’s standard outfit now consisted of a singlet, a shirt, ove
ralls, two pairs of underpants, a pair of trousers, mukluks, and reindeer socks. He had also taken to sewing sealskin soles into his socks, with detachable deerskin soles on top of these, at Bartlett’s suggestion. The idea was that at the end of the day, he could slip the detachable soles out and let them dry on his chest while he was sleeping. So far, it seemed a brilliant idea.

  Each of the two snow houses had a stove in the center of it, and they placed the mattresses surrounding this; but the temperature had dipped to forty degrees below zero, and they soon forgot what it ever was to be warm.

  ON JANUARY 25, the sun had appeared over the horizon for the first time in seventy-one days. It was the fourth time Bartlett had seen the sun return in the Arctic, but it was the one which gave him the greatest satisfaction, since so much depended on their having a good amount of daylight. They could also see Wrangel Island for the first time since Mamen had left, situated much farther away than it had been previously. They knew then that they must still be drifting at a greater rate than they had reckoned.

  To celebrate the return of the sun, the men had feasted on oysters. Bartlett had found two tins of them in the galley while he was waiting for the ship to go down and had tossed them overboard onto the ice where they broke and scattered. That night, they all went out into the drifting snow and dug for oysters, which Templeman cooked up into a soup.

  Afterward, they gathered around the big stove in the box house and enjoyed an impromptu concert, each man reciting something from memory—“Casey at the Bat,” or “Lasca”—while Munro offered some of his favorite Robbie Burns’s poems. Then they all sang together such popular favorites as “Sweet Afton,” “Alexander’s Ragtime Band,” “Loch Lomond,” and “Red Wing.”

  Auntie sang hymns in her rich, strong voice, and then Helen and Mugpi sang nursery songs. The children helped the men take their minds off their own troubles. It was always easier when there was someone smaller and more vulnerable to worry about, and the children were becoming increasingly important to them. When the little girls sang “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” their mother joined in. It was a memorable moment and, as McKinlay noted, one of the most cheerful times they had had for a long while.