stefansson-wrangel-09-24-001-005

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- 5 -

prevented the ship which eventually sailed from reaching
the island.

Crawford, Galle, Knight, and Maurer have therefore
been isolated on Wrangell Island for two years. We have
not had a word from them; they have not had a word from
us; neither has been possible. Their supplies probably
gave out a year ago. Two of the men are veterans of my
former expeditions, who believe as firmly as I do that one
good hunter can provide food for ten dependants so long as
his ammunition holds out - and they have plenty of
ammunition. However, two years is a long time to be
alone on an uninhabited island. They consider themselves
engaged in a public service which farsighted men should
appreciate now and which the whole world will appreciate
eventually. They will therefore be unable to understand
why they should be neglected. From June until September
1922 they probably climbed the highest hills every day
watching through their field-glasses for the ship that did
not come. The ice was there to show them that it could
not come and so I consider that they faced cheerfully the
winter of 1922-23 because the responsibility of their
isolation lay with Providence.

But it is on the average only one year in twenty that
enough ice is driven in between Wrangell and Siberia to bar
a ship that wants to approach. The ocean is therefore

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