stefansson-wrangel-09-28-018

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To the Editor of the Times.

Sir, -

Most readers of The Times will know of Vilhjalmur Stefansson's
disinterested enterprise in sending Mr. Crawford and three other white men with
some Eskimos to Wrangel Island, to hold possession until the British Government
shall decide whether this island (discovered by an officer of the British Royal
Navy, and not by a Russian, as some have assumed) shall be retained as a part of
the Empire. These adventurous patriots have now been marooned in the/Arctic for
two years, nor have we heard a word from them. Their supplies must have given
out last year, and they have since been dependent on hunting for food - an
eventuality for which they were prepared, for two of them are veterans of
Stefansson's former expeditions, and used to living in the Arctic by forage.
Nevertheless, their condition may by now be desperate.

Mr. Stefansson has spent on the Wrangel Island Expedition all the
earnings from his books, magazine articles, and American lectures, and it is now
beyond his power to find the costs of a relief ship to go to Wrangel Island this
summer. Rather than see these gallant men deserted on the island during the coming
winter, the British Wright Company two weeks ago voted the sum of $2,500 to pay for
an auxiliary schooner to visit Wrangel Island from Nome, Alaska. A cable now
received tells me of the schooner which first offered to go to the relief having
accepted another charter, and that an additional sum of $10,000 must be deposited
in the bank at Nome to safe guard the crew of the only other vessel now available
in the event of the ship being frozen in. This sum, to be of use, must be found
immediately.

Is it possible to find some reader or readers of The Times to add
the sum of -£2,250 to the -£550 already subscribed by my company? My directors
have no financial interest in this adventure, but they are anxious that these lonely
men should not be put to that supreme test which Franklin and his men failed to
meet and live. These men are as isolated as Shackleton's men who were taken off
Elephant Island, when the British, in spite of the stress of war, spared a ship
to go to their rescue.

With reference to the dispatch, which appeared in The Times to-day,
I do not think that the Soviet Government would seriously attempt to interfere
with the relief ship, seeing that it is merely going on an errand of humanity, and
the question of whether or not it succeeds in bringing the men back from Wrangel
Island can have no bearing on the ultimate nationality of the island.

Subscriptions for the Wrangell Island Relief Expedition may be
sent to Griffith Brewer, 33, Chancery-lane, W.C. 2. Should more than is
required for the relief expedition be subscribed, the balance will, on the return
of the ship, be distributed pro rata amongst all the subscribers.

Your obedient servant,

GRIFFITH BREWER, Managing Director
of the British Wright Company, Limited.

33, Chancery-lane, W.C.2, Aug. 1.