stefansson-wrangel-09-09-025-001

Nome, Alaska,
Sept. 22, 1922.

Mr. Ralph Lomen,
Nome, Alaska.

Dear Sir:

I wish to give you a detailed report of the
attempted voyage to Wrangel Island.

We left Nome on August 20, 1922 at four o’clock
P. M. There was a Southeasterly wind, which was in our
favor, which continued all that night.

The next morning we ran into a heavy North-
western wind and we had to pull into shelter at Cape
York, where we stayed all day.

On the 22nd we left Cape York at eleven o’clock
A. M. and got as far as Cape Prince of Wales. It was
my plan to go to Point Hope and take what is known as
the "Outside Passage" to Wrangel Island, but the Northerly
wind delayed us — we could not "buck” it.

While we were at Cape Prince of Wales the
schooner "Sea Wolf" came down from Kotzebue and reported
that all of the ships that had gone North on the Cape side
were in the ice most of the summer at Point Hope and
around there and that the ice conditions were unusually
bad.

On the evening of the 23rd, at eight-thirty
P. M., the Northwestern wind was still blowing and I
decided to cross the Straits and take my chance on the
South of the ice along the Northern Coast of Siberia,
or in other words, what is known as the "Inside Passage”.
When we got to East Cape the gale was still blowing and
I decided to go into the East Cape Station and wait for
a change of weather. Three or four miles of ice laid off
the East Cape.

On the morning of the 24th at eleven o’clock
A. M, the wind moderated and in company with the "Olga"
we rounded East Cape and entered the ice. Just at this