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stefansson-wrangel-09-20-092-001
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Dear Mr. Maurer:
As a memorandum for you, I am enclosing a copy of your last letter. I think it would be a wise precaution if you would discuss this matter with Delphine enough to make sure that the whole family has the same attitude about the letter both as to its interpretation and the advisability of not including it in the book.
When you write me next, please say if you would mind my quoting your letter either literally or by summing up your views in so far as concerns your interpretation of Fred's attitude towards the journey from Wrangel Island.
I am telegraphing you for specific information as to the parts of the book manuscript you suggest should be altered - the part about which you say that according to your understanding it will probably be changed and that Delphine will never see it.
Apparently I did not make myself clear in a previous letter where I spoke of Fred's having accused Lorne of shamming sickness. I was thinking of the implication of the sentence in the letter where Fred says that "Knight claims to be afflicted with the scurvy." It is possible to interpret that in more than one way but my understanding was something to this effect - that Fred didn't object much to the plan of some of the party going to Siberia as long as he was not included in it, but he may have felt that Knight, who originally was the chief advocate of the journey, was now trying to get out of making it by pretending he was sick.
Nothing is more astonishing about the whole Wrangel story than the almost complete absence of friction through the whole two years. Although we now know that Knight was really ill when Fred wrote this, no one who really understands would blame Fred in the least for writing it. However, some of the public who do not understand might blame him for this one sign of irritation, forgetting how marvelous it is that four men should have lived together for two years with so little trouble.
I am enclosing a carbon of a letter written to Delphine.