stefansson-wrangel-09-30-006-002

the season was an exceptionally open one, the place was also visited by several
American whalers,including Captains Thomas and Williams, who established the
fact that "Plover Island" was merely a headland on the coast of Wrangel Land.
Thirteen years afterwards, a German, Captain Dallman of Hamburg, claimed to
have anticipated Long's discovery of Wrangel Land by a year, but after that lapse
of time he was unable to produce his log or any member of his crew to support
his claim. Erroneous reports on the extent of the eastern coast gave fresh sup-
port to the false conception of its size and the importance of the discovery.

One of the visitors in 1869, Captain Bliven, for example, expressed his
opinion that it not improbably extended several hundred miles to the north.
This was to have an unfortunate result. In 1879 Commander De Long, U.S.N., of
the Jeannette, being on a voyage of exploration, entered the pack near Herald
Island, hoping that he would be carried to Wrangel Island, where he might win-
ter. Actually he drifted westwards, but to the north of Wrangel Land, which
was thus shown to be a comparatively small island. The Jeannette was finally
crushed in the pack near Henrietta Island, few of her crew surviving their sub-
sequent hardships. Two years later Captain Hooper, of the Corwin, searching
for De Long, landed on Wrangel Island, as it is now more generally called, and
took possession of it for the United States (12 August 1881). The same year
Captain R. M. Berry, U.S.N., of the Rodgers, made a stay of nineteen days at
the island, during which it was explored and mapped, and the idea of an exten-
sive land in this region was finally dispelled.

There seems to be no record of any Russian ship having reached this island
until 1911. In the previous year the ice-breakers Taimuir and Vaigach had been
fitted out at Vladivostok for the hydrographic survey of the Arctic Ocean and
islands lying off the Siberian coast. No narrative of the first years of this
work is accessible, but a summary of the geographical and hydrographical re-
sults was compiled in 1912 by Lieut. B. V. Davidov and printed for the Russian
Admiralty. This expedition must have erected the tall beacon 35 feet high which
stands north of the entrance to the lagoon in the sand spit between Blossom
Point and Cape Thomas ('Arctic Pilot,' 1920, p. 477). In the summer of 1914
these same ice-breakers tried to reach Wrangel Island again, to rescue the crew
of the Karluk(see below), but were unable to get within 30 miles of the island,
and so far as can be ascertained, no Russians were ever on Wrangel Island be-
fore or after the single visit of 1911.

Nevertheless the island seems to be claimed by Russia. At the end of 1916
we were informed by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs that he had re-
ceived from the Russian Ambassador in London an official notification to the
effect that "the territories and islands situated in the Arctic Ocean and dis-
covered by Captain Vilkitski in 1913-1914 have been incorporated in the Russian
Empire." Attached to Count Benckendorf's note was a memorandum giving a sum-
mary of Vilkitski's new discoveries off Cape Chelyuskin, claiming them for the
Russian Empire; and the note continued thus:

"Le Gouvernement IMPERIAL profite de cette occasion pour faire ressortir
qu’il considére aussi comme faisant partie intégrants de l'Empire des îles
Henriette, Jeannette, Bennett, Herald et Oujedinenia, qui forment avec les îles
Nouvelle Sibéria, Wrangel et autres situées pres la cote asiatique de l’Empire,
une extension vers le nord de la plate forme continentale de la Sibéria.

"Le Governement IMPERIAL n'a pas jugé néecessaire de joindre a la présents
notification les îles Novaia Zemlia, Kolgouev, Waigatch et autres de moindres
dimensions situées prés la cote européenne de l'Empire, étant donné que leur
appartenance aux territories de l’Empire se trouve depuis des siécles univer-
sellement reconnue."