In the Lena Delta
A Narrative of the Search for Lieut-Commander De Long and his Companions, Followed by an Account of the Greely Relief Expedition and a Proposed Method of Reaching the North Pole

A personal account of two late nineteenth-century Arctic rescue missions, detailing a heroic search for survivors, published in 1885.

George W. Melville (Author), Melville Philips (Edited by)

9781108041737, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 15 December 2011

546 pages, 15 b/w illus. 4 maps
21.6 x 14 x 3.1 cm, 0.69 kg

George W. Melville (1841–1912) was a member of an 1879 American Arctic expedition seeking a northern passage from the Bering Strait to the Atlantic. Its ship was trapped in ice for nearly two years, and was eventually crushed and sank. The crew, stranded in three small boats, were left with few provisions and little hope of rescue. Melville was the only boat commander to bring his men to safety, assuming leadership of the survivors after landing in Siberia in 1881. He returned to search for other survivors, trekking over a thousand miles, but found only the bodies of his former companions in a frozen campsite, from which, however, he recovered the expedition's records. This account also includes details of Melville's role in the Greely Relief Expedition of 1884, from which he returned shortly before the book's British publication in 1885, and a detailed proposal for reaching the North Pole.

1. Off for the Pole
2. Drifting
3. Cast upon the ice
4. Retreating over the pack
5. Voyage of the whale-boat
6. On the Lena Delta
7. Up the Lena
8. At Jamaveloch
9. Siberian life
10. Kusma to our rescue
11. A step forward
12. At Belun
13. Searching for De Long
14. Losing the trail
15. A trip to the Arctic shore
16. Struggling with Boreas
17. End of my first search
18. From Belun to Verkeransk
19. From Verkeransk to Yakutsk
20. At Yakutsk
21. North again
22. Storm-bound
23. Finding the bodies
24. The burial
25. Searching for Chipp
26. My final search to the Jana River
27. Through Siberia
28. Homeward bound
The Greely Relief Expedition: 1. Northward once more
2. Racing in the Arctic waters
3. The rescue
4. The return voyage
A proposed method for reaching the North Pole
Appendix.

Subject Areas: Historical geography [HBTP]