Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-04-17
THE JEANETTE.
Particulars of Her Loss Never Before
PubIished-How She Went Bown in
the Cruel Arctic Waters-The "Reireat +"
10 siberia Discovery of = New Island.
San Francisco Call. Anil 10th.

Dr. ID, 4. Ledyard, an American gentle
man now in Siberia, travelling overland
from Vladivcstoek, Eastern Siberia, to St.
Petersburg, at Irkoatsk met Lieutenant
Danenhower, of the Inflated Jsannette.
From a private letter of DR.. Ledyard,
kindly furnished the Call by its recipient,
we are enabled to give particulars OF the
loss OF the Jeanette never yet published.
Under date of Irkoutsk, January 25th,
DIR. Ledyard writes as follows
And here we received a call from Lien.
tenant Danenhower, of the Jeanette. He
is the first in command now, as only two
officers were saved, as is believed. The
Chief Engineer, Melville, is actually in
charge, having received written orders
from the lost Captain De Long, because
Lieutenant Danenhower had lost the sight
of his left eye, through exposure, and was
in peril of losing the other He protested,
! however, at losing his right, and, as it
seems, did most of the work of navigation
at last, as he was placed in the same boat
with Melville. The naturalist, Raymond,
and L. Newcomb were also in Melville's
boat, and weathered "the retreat" OF
this must tell you something the other
part you know already from the papers,
but this story has not yet gone to America,
they tell me. And now can hardly say
when 1.-THE retreat" began, for since the
first fall, when they were caught by the
ice in trying to reach Herald Island, they
have never taken a course, but were held as
IN THE JAWS OF DEATH,
Squeezed till every timber quivered, turned
this way and that, thrown floating and
then caught again, and every hour in sus-
pense, never knowing when the ice would
close upon them little more, and even the
frail foundation of the deck sink beneath
them, and leave the floating, broker ice as
the only refuge-and such refuge But
throughout this strain they were well, and
trying to be cheerful, playing and working
working overtime, too, very hard, for
the engine and men were barely able to
keep the water out after one of those fear
full nippings. Always thereafter they had
to pump-pump for year and half !!
Does it not seem too much for man to bear
And to feel sure that at last she must be
left, or would leave them. Ii was June
IL, 1881, when the crisis came.
THE SHIP GOES DOWN.
The ship showed greater straining than
before. The deck quivered, and inexplica.
BILE movements, with groanings and new
noises, warned them, but frightened no
one. Coolly they prepared their boats and
made their camp beside the vessel, there to
await the last and solemn moment when
Nature should bury nearly all they had or
knew of this world, and leave them like
doomed men, with little more than time
to come" before them. She rose and
turned more and more in her cradle, till her
yards touched the ice then the rigging
gave way, and her masts lay PROSTATE.
The water had flooded below where it
would. The sun, it seemed, was staying
up to see the last. 1t was o'clock in the
morning when the foe parted, and all went
down, only chair floating, as if in mock
cry inviting them to rest Then they
would sleep a little but it was not per-
mitted. A cry of alarm called all to escape
from crevice in the ice. 1t opened just
through the Captains tent, and the driven
party must move again before they could
prepare to leave the scene.
THE RETREAT.
Then began what they term "the re.
treat. Twenty. days they struggled
southwark. Three hundred miles of broken
ice were thus passed over. Four miles a
day was thought good fortune, and they
had to know that after one series of four
teen days they were twenty.seven miles
| further north than at the first. Just here
belongs a curious fact. While working
over the ice, dragging three boats, they
discovered a new island, which they named
Bennett Island, and to explore which they
spent three weeks of their precious sum.
mer days, and expended much of their
limited supply of food. To this detour
those who survived attribute much of their
suffering and the death of the Commander,
with nineteen men.
After three months of this perilous and
exhausting work they came to blue water,
and then, with fair winds, took course for
the mouth of the Lena river, but danger
was ever present. Melville's boat was stove
| against block of ice, through the mis-
management of seaman Coal-the first
signs of his failing mind. The Captains
boat lost her mast and sail, Lieutenant
Chips boat is wholly missing, with all
on board. The Captain landed with all
well, but abandoned the boat, as the water
was shallow and they would not make the
channel of the river. Melville's boat got
in, aud they soon found natives, which
proved their salvation. Those of this boat
are all alive, but Lieutenant Eisenhower
has lost an eye, and is suffering still, al
ways fearing the loss of the other; and
seaman Coal has lost his mind. OF the
Captains party, all are given up as lost,
save the two strongest, who were sent
ashore for succor. They were found almost
helpless by the natives and taken in four
teen days after leaving their starving COM
panions.