mss142-vasilevShishmarev-i3-046

– 96 –

and after that, we weighed anchor, with a weak NW, taking a
direction S along the American shore.

Turning southward

In Kronstadt, our sloop was loaded with pre–cut parts of
a seagoing shallow draft single-masted vessel or boat, indis-
pensable for exploration and survey of the shores of America
from Cape Prince of Wales to the Aliaksa [Alaska] Peninsula.
The intention was to assemble and build it in Kamchatka or in
Sitka so that it would be ready for navigation in 1821. Having
only eight ship's carpenters, it was necessary to begin
building in good time so that it would be ready on the scheduled
time. Due to the condition of the ice, extending, as we mentioned
before, to an infinite space northward, we could not
hope, without a big waste of time, to penetrate farther to the
pole. We took our present direction to the south.

Henceforth, although we did not have such frequent and
thick fog as before, it was supplanted by snowstorms from the
N and the NW from which we suffered cruelly, especially when
they were accompanied by freezing. Moreover, scurvy began to
appear among the sailors from wetness, cold, infrequent calms, and
sailing near shores and ice where we were often forced to fight
storms. This sickness, once it gets the upper hand on some
vessel, is most terrifying. Its symptoms are so varied that
sometimes one does not imagine that it is scurvy. It is even
more dangerous when immediate aid is not given, and is always
fatal. No matter how well our crew was equipped with coats