THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 659 



Captain Gonzales changed his mind, told Castel to come aboard the 

 Polar Bear with all his men, and announced that he was going to 

 leave the Sachs behind. Gonzales seems to have consulted several 

 of his men, some of whom agreed that the ship should be left behind, 

 their thought being that she would be put in Baur Harbor and sev- 

 eral men left with her to keep her in condition. Upon my arrival 

 these men together with my party would make a sufficient crew 

 for sailing her out. This would have been a satisfactory arrange- 

 ment. It appears that several of the men, on being asked by Gon- 

 zales, favored his plan of sailing away on the Bear and leaving 

 the Sachs for me, but that every one of them supposed she would 

 be left in a seaworth}^ condition so I could use her to carry my 

 party home should I arrive at Kellett. None of them conceived 

 the possibility of the destruction of the ship nor understood the 

 motive of it when that startling event had happened. 



Storkerson's report to me says that when the Sachs was put 

 broadside on the beach he was standing on the Bear beside the 

 first officer, Seymour, who expressed the opinion that it was "a 

 damn shame" to leave a ship in a dangerous position on an open 

 beach when in an hour she could have been taken under her own 

 power or in tow into a safe harbor three miles away. Later they 

 were still more astonished when, without warning to them, they 

 saw the foremast of the Sachs come crashing down. The mast was 

 sawed up and taken aboard the Bear as wood for the galley stove. 

 As to this, the steward, Levi, said that it was the finest firewood 

 he ever used but that he could have done without it. The yards 

 of the Sachs were also sawed up and carried off; the sails were 

 taken away, as well as the engine-room tools and most of the fuel 

 oil intended for the engines. 



There have been several conjectures as to the motives that led 

 to the destruction of the Sachs. It appears to me most likely that 

 when Captain Gonzales had leisure to think about his procedure 

 of the previous year, he became less certain that his position would 

 be sustained by the Government at Ottawa. Naturally enough, 

 he might worry about this. When he came to Kellett and found 

 himself the senior officer with me away, it occurred to him that 

 if he could sail from Kellett before I arrived and if he left no 

 means behind for me to get out, it would not be possible for me 

 to get over to the mainland by sled until the middle of the winter 

 nor could I get to a telegraph office, such as Dawson, before perhaps 

 March. He might then reasonably hope that if he sailed out, get- 

 ting to Victoria in September, he could make a satisfactory explana- 



