The crew of the USS Jeanette
Time stranded: 22 months
Distance traveled: >1000 miles
Terrain types: Sea, Ice sheet, Arctic wilderness
Deaths: 20
Situation ended: Part of the crew reached a settlement
Location: Arctic Ocean
The USS Jeanette was a naval science vessel commanded by George W. De Long which in 1879 set off on an expedition to the Arctic. The plan was to sail their ship through the Bering Strait on the assumption that the warm water flowing north would ease their passage through the ice.
The ship itself was funded by James Gordon Bennett who was the proprietor of the “New York Herald”, but he was bound under an agreement with the US Navy to comply with naval laws of the United States on the expedition, which meant the ship had to be commanded by a US naval officer, which is were De Long comes in.
The USS Jeanette departed San Francisco on July 8th, 1879 and for the first month was smooth sailing. Towards the end of August, the ship started to run into large sheets of floating ice which quickly thickened the further they went.
On 7th September the ship was caught fast in the ice and drifted with the flowing sheets in a mostly north-western direction. For the next 21 months the ship drifted wherever the ice took it, but in doing so 2 new islands were discovered, with the first being named after the mother of the ship’s owner, Henrietta Island, and the second being named after the ship, Jeanette Island.
After flowing uncontrollably for so long trapped in the ice, the ship finally gave way and during the night of June 12th, the pressure got too great and cracked the hull of the ship wide open.
De Long and the crew all managed to escape the initial sinking as it took several hours for the ship to go under. They managed to remove a good amount of supplies and equipment before it finally sank early the next morning.
The stranded crew thought their best bet would be to just head south to the Siberian coast and hope for some kind of help, so the group headed off with their supplies dragging behind them in small boats they used as sleds. They discovered a further island on their travels which was named after the expedition sponsor, Bennett Island.
The group managed to reach the north Siberian islands and even found some game to hunt, resupplied on fresh fish, and caught up on some much-needed rest. The next stage of their plan involved sailing their boats across the sea to the Lena Delta, a river system that flows deep into Russia and past various towns and villages, guaranteeing their safety, if they can make it of course.
The 3 boats had set off at the same time, but shortly after they were far enough away from land to be at risk, a violent storm started and one of the boats capsized and sank, killing all 8 men on board. The other 2 craft, one with 14 men and the other with 11, both landed safely but were separated during the storm.
The group of 14, which was led by De Long started to march across the marshy half-frozen wastes ahead of them, but the trip was too hard on the group so De Long sent the 2 strongest members ahead to look for help. The 2 men sent to scout for help eventually found a small settlement and survived, but De Long and his 11 companions all died from the cold and starvation.
As for the other group, led by chief engineer George W. Melville, they all safely reached a native settlement reasonably quickly and persuaded the locals to help find his captain. Melville was able to find De Longs’ landing site on the delta but was unable to find the group themselves.
In the following spring Melville set out again to try and find his lost captain, hoping they may still be alive, but on March 23rd of 1882, he found the bodies of his lost captain and crew.