The Chronological History of all the Voyages to the Arctic

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Typescript of Chapter Two for a book Dorothy Jean Ray planned to write about the Vasilev-Shishmarev Expedition of 1819-1822. Contains the translation from the Russian by Rhea Josephson of part of The chronological history of all the voyages to the Arctic (Khronologicheska︠i︡a istor︠i︡a vs︠i︡ekh "puteshestviĭ v" s︠i︡everny︠i︡a pol︠i︡arny︠i︡a strany) by Vasiliĭ N. Berkh.

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a general direction SE and of a chain of low mountains. Toward the sea, several cliff-like capes, about 500 feet in height, stand out. Between these capes, the shore is low and forms small inlets, but timber is nowhere to be seen, not even a little green grass is to be seen. What a contrast to the shores of America. In many places we saw large settlements, but could not approach them because of the ice.

Ice, head winds, and stormy weather prompted Mr. Shishmarev to abandon further attempts, and to sail to Mechegmenskaia Bay [Mechegmenan Bay] where he hoped to fortify his crew with fresh provisions. The Chukchi here received the Russians very amicably, and the chief delivered ten live deer to the sloop. Cap. Shishmarev collected, here, too, rather interesting information, discovering, at the same time, that among the Mechegmenskaia Chukchi lived four more nations, talking various languages different from the Chukchi dialect.

On Aug 15, Mr. Shishmarev left Mechegmenskaia Bay and went to St. Lawrence Island. Having surveyed its northern shore, and having established communications with the inhabitants, who, in his opinion, are much poorer than the Chukchi, Mr. Shishmarev went his way to St. Matthew Island, which was discovered in 1766 by Lieut. Sind. Determining the geographical location of this island and both [?] located near it, Mr. Shishmarev decided to end his voyage in arctic regions, and went toward the harbor of St. Peter and Paul ----------|

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[Petropavlovsk] where he arrived safely on September 21.

Both sloops departed in the middle of October on the return trip, and arrived safely in Kronstadt after nine months.

Last edit 7 months ago by Fernando Rowland
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