12 



CONQUERING THE ARCTIC ICE 



Mr. Edwards's place as mate was taken by Storker Storkersen, 

 who joined the expedition a few hours before we left Victoria. 

 He came on board as a sailor, but his good qualities soon made 

 him liked by every one, and when the mate's place fell vacant 

 he was promoted to it. He performed his work to our great 

 satisfaction and was with us on the ice trip in the spring of 



1907. We were very 

 glad to have him, and 

 I never had any reason 

 to complain of him, 

 until he left us in the 

 summer without per- 

 mission and in spite 

 of the contract which 

 he had signed shortly 

 after the first ice trip. 

 Although I was both 

 angry and sorry at the 

 time to see my plans 

 frustrated, I cannot but 

 admit that his action 

 was perhaps justifiable from his point of view. It is much to 

 ask of a man to risk his life for the attainment of a goal in 

 which he has no interest whatsoever. He went back to 

 Flaxman Island in the spring of 1908 at the request of 

 Dr. Leffingwell, to help his son in the geological and geo- 

 graphical work which he intends to carry on during the 

 summer and winter of 1908-9. Storkersen was, when he 

 joined the expedition, only twenty-three years of age, was born 

 in Tromso, Norway, and had been to sea since his childhood. 



Christopher Thuesen, twenty-seven years of age, was likewise a 

 Norwegian by birth, and, being an expert with the blacksmith's 

 hammer, the carpenter's axe, and the sewing machine, he was 

 a highly useful man to take on an expedition. He had been 

 with Mr. Leffingwell and myself on the Baldwin-Ziegler Expe- 

 dition and had consequently some experience of Arctic work. 



William Hicky, a Scotchman, twenty-two years of age, and 

 Max Fiedler, a German of twenty-one, joined us at Point Hope 

 as volunteers from the Revenue cutter Thetis. They were fine 

 fellows, good sailors, and pleasant men ; the only difficulty 



THUESEN AND DR. HOWE. 



