stefansson-wrangel-09-31-105v

168 THE ADVENTURE OF WRANGEL ISLAND

carrying out the plan we had agreed on before they sailed,
to the effect that after the middle of the second winter
they might, if they desired, come out to Siberia for the
purpose of sending me news. Everyone knows that trav-
eling over sea ice has certain elements of danger at all
times and notably during the midwinter, when there are
only a half dozen hours of twilight each day, making it
difficult to detect the treachery of the young ice. In the
comments which ! gave to the press a day or two later I
said, “It seems likely that one afternoon the party trav-
eled too far into the gathering twilight, walked on unsafe
ice and broke through.” That this and not starv&tipn
was really the end we can now clearly infer from the
WrangeLIsland documents themselves.

A few days after the news story to the press I received
a cable from Mr. Noice, which showed that my original
interpretation had been at least partly right.

“Nome, Alaska, Aug. 31-Sept. 4, 1923.
“Arrival last night Wednesday Blackjack only survivor
stop buried Knight August twentieth stop Crawford Galle
Maurer left Wrangel January twenty eighth nineteen
twenty three stop believe entire party perished you notify
relatives of boys as you think best stop have left colony
of two Eskimo families two unmarried Eskimo men in
charge of Wells stop equipped party for two years sojourn
stop game conditions Wrangel apparently excellent stop
failure of last expedition due to combination poor equip-
ment and inexperience.”

The reader already knows, as I did when I received it,
that this message gives in part a wrong impression; as,
for instance, where it implies that Knight and Maurer
were inexperienced, although they were in fact among the