The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-10-18
---L'-as,
ARCTIC EXPERIENCE.
Remarkable Trip Made By Five De-
serters From Whaling Vessels.

Remarkable Trip Made By Five De-
serters From Whaling Vessels.
The five whalers who deserted their
ships in winter quarters at Herschel
island succeeded in reaching the gold
mines of the Yukon. They staggered
into Circle City after having tramped
for nearly a month over the mountains
and trackless snowy wastes of the
Arctic. Physically they were more
dead than alive; in appearance more
like beasts than men. During their long
tramp toward Circle City they made a
hard fight for existence.
After their companion, Thomas, had
been shot and Fitzgerald wounded, and
the other seven of the fourteen %ho de-
serted had been captured and taken
back to their vessels, the five who
reached the Yukon pushed on for the
gold fields, with only their rifles to de-
pend on to supply them with food. The
five were Anderson, Rae, Schultz, Jor-
gensen and Watson. The story of their
hardships in crossing the unknown
northern part of the Alaskan terri
tory was brought down from the north
by the miners who returned from the
Yukon on the Bertha.
When they escaped from their pur-
suers they were undecided about VEN
turing into the barren country that lay
between them and the gold fields. For
a day or two they remained in camp
celebrating on plan of action. While
thus engaged deer stumbled almost
on top of them. Two or three rifles
cracked and the animal fell 1t meant
a fair supply of, meat to begin the
journey with and it decided the ques-
ton. AS soon as the carcass had been
cut up and each man had shouldered
as much of the meat as he could carry,
the deserters started for the Yukon.
1t was almost in the middle of an
Arctic winter and the men had nearly
500 miles to travel to reach their goal
if they went in a direct. line. Over
mountain ridges and glaciers they
tramped and made fairly good progress
for a week. Then they We're caught in
a blizzard that prevented any travelling
for a week. The cold was intense and
the men burrowed in the snow to keep
warm. They were unable to cook any
of their frozen deer meat and hunger
compelled them to eat it raw. By the
time the blizzard had subsidized their
stock of provisions was almost ex-
hausted and two-thirds of the journey
was vet before them.
On they plunged through the snow,
their fingers and toes frostbitten, and
starvation before them. Two days
passed without any of them tasting
food. Worn and helpless they laid down
in the shelter of an ice-crag praying
for the end.
Anderson was half dreaming be-
numbed with the cold when he saw a
pair of eyes glisten through the gloom
not over twenty feet from his eau
tiously he raised his rifle and when it
cracked q large wolf fell in death.
Eagerly the men skinned the animal
and soon its steaks were broiling over
a moss fire. That wolf lasted four
days, when another was killed. The
meat of the second had been eaten for
two days when from the crest of a
steer, ridge the men saw blue curl of
smoke rising from the bottom of a
valley beyond. The smoke was from
Peter Hannett's cabin on a branch OF
the Yukon near Circle City. There the
sailors were given a welcome AS soon
as the summer opened three of them
started down the river for ST. Michaels
The other two remained to dig 70,
gold.-San Francisco Examiner.