New Siberian Islands
More than three hundred years ago, the Dmitry Laptev Strait, separating the mainland from the New Siberian Islands, was already known to Russian sailors. One of the first to sail through this strait from Lena to Indigirka was Fyodor Churka in 1640.
In 1761, the merchant Nikita Shalaurov, a passionate explorer, passed through the strait. He repeatedly made bold attempts to pass east of Kolyma, trying to round the north-eastern corner of Asia (Chukotka). But in 1764, Nikita Shalaurov died on the mainland shore of the East Siberian Sea, where he crossed from a ship crushed by ice.
“…To this glory,” the Northern explorer F.P. Wrangel later wrote about Shalaurov, “he sacrificed both his property and his life.”
From the notes of the polar scientist A. F. Treshnikov, who was engaged in the study of the northern regions of the Earth – the Arctic and Antarctica.
Dmitry Laptev Strait
The day of our departure from the port of Tiksi arrived. By two o'clock in the morning of August 8, everything was ready. We weighed anchor and in calm weather passed the Karaulnye stones lying at the entrance to the bay. And now the ice-free Laptev Sea stretched out before us. In the distance, an unusual panorama opened up before us: capes and mountains distorted by strong refraction hung in the air, bifurcating, and then seemed to evaporate. In the west, instead of the shore of the Bykovsky Peninsula, a huge fantastic forest grew.
We are heading towards the Dmitry Laptev Strait. This strait separates the islands of the New Siberian Archipelago from the mainland, located on the border of two seas – the Laptev Brothers Sea and the East Siberian Sea. The Dmitry Laptev and Sannikov Straits connect these seas, through which ships sail along the Northern Sea Route.
A few days before us, the ship “Smolny” left Tiksi Bay and headed for Cape Shalaurova to take on board the hydrologists who had spent the winter there. The Arctic Institute had sent an expedition to the strait back in 1939, which conducted winter observations from the motionless sea ice.
In the evening, when the sun went behind the clouds in the north, the moon appeared in the east, and Venus shimmered brightly for several minutes in the west. Wind and cold. Before the eyes, a huge, changing its outlines every moment, “hilly plain”, the undulating surface of the sea. The west wind drives individual ice floes of the most bizarre shape, reminiscent of giant mushrooms, swans, camels, obelisks. Hitting the edges of these ice floes, the waves scatter into white columns of spray.
And thoughts are carried away to the distant past…
More than three hundred years ago, the Dmitry Laptev Strait was already known to Russian sailors. One of the first to sail through this strait from Lena to Indigirka was Fyodor Churka in 1640. The frail little boats-kochi of the first sailors usually sailed along the coast, using coastal polynyas. Often, sailors got into trouble, suffered severe hardships. Often the kochs were broken by ice and explorers had to make their way across the ice to the shore to their homes. Many found their graves in this icy land.
In the autumn of 1739, one of the Northern Expedition detachments passed through the strait on the sailing boat “Irkutsk”. The detachment was commanded by Lieutenant Dmitry Laptev. The detachment made the first description of the mainland coast, and the strait was first mapped. These works retained their significance for many decades. Navigational charts were made based on them. The strait was deservedly named after the brave Russian navigator and explorer Dmitry Laptev.
In 1761, the merchant Nikita Shalaurov, a passionate explorer, passed through the strait. He repeatedly made bold attempts to pass east of Kolyma, trying to round the north-eastern corner of Asia (Chukotka). But in 1764, Nikita Shalaurov died on the mainland shore of the East Siberian Sea, where he crossed from a ship crushed by ice.
“…To this glory,” the Northern explorer F.P. Wrangel later wrote about Shalaurov, “he sacrificed both his property and his life.” The southeastern cape of Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island is named after Shalaurov.
New Siberian Islands
According to legends preserved in the memory of the Chukchi and Yakuts, the Ankilon tribe lived on the coast of the Arctic Sea, later moving north to the islands of the Arctic Ocean. Ruins of earthen dwellings and stone tools confirm these legends. Soon attempts were made to explore the lands north of the mouth of the Yana River. In 1650, a service man, Yuri Seliverstov, was sent from Yakutsk with the task of “going by sea to the island and hunting for bones.” The following year, Seliverstov's detachment was robbed by industrialists at the mouth of the Yana and, having lost their food supplies, headed for the mouth of the Kolyma. The Yakut authorities commissioned the Tobolsk Cossack Ivan Robrov to explore the lands north of the Yana. The first information reached the Siberian governor, Prince Gagarin, in 1710, who ordered the Yakut voivode to speed up the exploration of the islands. By order of the governor, the voivode sent two detachments.
The first detachment of 11 Cossacks under the command of Merkury Vagin left Yakutsk in the autumn of 1711. In May 1712, the detachment reached Cape Svyatoy Nos on dogs, from where they headed north across the ice and arrived at the large Lyakhovsky Island. They saw another island from the northern shore, but Vagin did not risk heading to this island, since the detachment was experiencing a shortage of food, and the already begun melting of the ice and the opening of the sea would cut off the return route. Vagin decided to return to the mainland to stock up on fish in the summer and continue the exploration the following winter. The detachment went ashore and headed to the Khroma River, where they planned to start fishing. However, heavily overflowing lakes and swamps blocked all their routes to the fish rivers.
Meanwhile, food supplies ran out, and the people were forced to feed on dogs and lemmings. In the end, the detachment had to return to the seashore and live there all summer.
Despite the hardships, Mercury Vagin decided to go north again the following year. The Cossacks, not wanting to experience all the hardships again, rebelled and killed the detachment leader and his closest assistants.
The Cossacks returned to Ust-Yansk, where their crime was soon uncovered. Two of the ringleaders were hanged, the rest, after being punished with the whip, were exiled to the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk.
Rumors about new lands did not die down. Around this time, another Yakut merchant, Ivan Lyakhov, became interested in the local population's talk of mammoth tusks between the Khatanga and Anabara rivers. Extraction of these could prove very profitable, as this bone was valued both on the European and Asian markets – in China.
One day in March 1770, Lyakhov, who was excavating near Svyatoy Nos, saw a herd of deer moving from the sea to the mainland. The mass migration of a herd of deer confirmed the stories about the existence of land in the north. Lyakhov decided to try his luck. On a sleigh, following the tracks of the deer, he reached the first island. The tracks went further and led him to the next island, but even there the tracks did not end – they led further north. Encouraged by his success, Lyakhov followed the tracks, but, having encountered heavy hummocky ice, was forced to turn back. Understanding the importance of the geographical discovery he had made, Lyakhov immediately went to Yakutsk with a report, where he asked to grant him a monopoly on the collection of mammoth ivory and the collection of fur animals on the newly discovered islands. The report on the discovery and his request were favorably received by the government. As a special favor, the islands discovered in 1770 were named Lyakhovskie. Having spent large bribes to the authorities, Lyakhov was forced to take the merchant Protodyakonov into the company.
In the summer of 1773, both set out in a boat with five rowers to the north of Maly Lyakhovsky Island. This time, another island was discovered here, which was initially called the Third. One of the rowers left a copper boiler on the Third Island, and the industrialists subsequently named this island Boiler Island.
In the last years of the 18th century, the merchant Ivan Lyakhov died. The Yakut voivode's office sold the right to the trade to the merchant Syrovatsky, and later to his son. Mammoth ivory mined on the islands was in great demand.
This period marks the beginning of the activity of Yakov Sannikov, a Yakut tradesman. Energetic, well-versed in local conditions, and possessing an extraordinary mind, Sannikov played a significant role in the exploration of the New Siberian Islands.
In April Sannikov returned to Ust-Yansk, and in May he set off again on a reindeer expedition to Kotelny, and from the northern shore in a northwestern direction he saw high mountains, as he determined “at an approximate distance of 70 versts.” In this direction the industrialist Belkov also “saw” land. Since then, the notorious Sannikov Land has long occupied the imagination of travelers.
Also on this journey, on the shores of Kotelny, Sannikov discovered for the first time the bones of horses, buffalo, sheep and bulls' heads “in great abundance”. When he returned and told them about his findings, they did not believe him. Only later research confirmed the veracity of the report about the presence of animal bones unusual for these islands. The final inventory of the islands was entrusted to the surveyor Pshenitsyn. In March 1811, Pshenitsyn sailed around the island of Novaya Sibir, described its shores and made a map. Returning to Kotelny, Pshenitsyn made a map of this island based on Sannikov's inventory. Here, Pshenitsyn's detachment found itself in a very difficult situation. There was not enough food, the people were starving.
In the spring of 1880, west of Maloy Lyakhovsky Island, Sannikkov discovered Stolbovoy Island and described it. Crosses were found on this island and traces of seafarers' presence were discovered as early as the 17th century. Whether these seafarers were thrown here by a storm or sailed here intentionally will probably remain a mystery, but they left empty-handed.
Thus, by the beginning of the 19th century, all the large islands of the Novosibirsk Archipelago were discovered. Information about the rich fisheries on the islands reached St. Petersburg. Chancellor N.P. Rumyantsev became interested in the islands. In 1808, he sent a special expedition under the command of the official M. Gedenshtrom, who was in administrative exile in the city of Tobolsk. Yakov Sannikov heard about this expedition and offered his services, to which Gedenshtrom readily agreed. The expedition was formed in its final form in Ust-Yansk. Local authorities were ordered to provide full assistance to the expedition, supply it with transport and everything necessary.
In the spring of the following year, Gedenshtrom arrived at Cape Pestsovy on the island of Novaya Sibir and, having determined its dimensions, set off across the ice to the northeast. After traveling 80 miles, he encountered open water with floating ice drifting across it and was forced to turn south, reaching the mainland at the mouth of the Kolyma. Before the ice broke up in the spring, they surveyed the southern shore of Novaya Sibir and returned to Ust-Yansk for the summer. Kozhevin described the shores of Faddeyevsky Island.
That same year, Yakov Sannikov crossed the island of New Siberia from south to north. From the northern shore, he saw a land with high mountains and went to it across the ice, but having encountered the same ice hole as Gedenshtorm, he turned back.
Then Sannikov moved to Kotelny Island and spent the summer on its western shore, hunting for mammoth ivory. Returning to Ust-Yansk in the fall, Sannikov said that he had found a grave with a wooden cross with a Slavic inscription carved on it. Near the grave stood a sled, from which it was clear that people had pulled it on straps. Not far away was a chopped winter hut, in which household items made of deer antler, hewn with an axe, were found. At the mouth of the Balyk-takh River, the remains of a ship made of pine and cedar were found. Apparently, this was the last camp of Siberian seafarers of the 17th century.
In May, Sannikov again went to Kotelny, in 54 days he walked around the island, and in the north-west direction he allegedly saw high mountains at a distance of approximately 70 miles.
The industrialist Belkov also saw land in this direction. He reached this land on the ice and established that it was also an island. This island was named Belkovskiy.
The Admiralty equipped an expedition under the command of Lieutenant P. F. Anzhu, which was ordered to make an accurate inventory of the New Siberian Islands and the mainland coast between the Yana and Indigirka, as well as the lands seen by Sannikov. Anzhu made numerous trips north of the islands in order to find the legendary land, but each time his path was blocked by a polynya or thin ice. He was the first to describe the islands of Stolbovoy, Semenovsky, Vasilievsky and Belkovsky. After Anzhu's expedition, no other explorers visited the islands. Only Russian Ustyansk industrialists and Yakuts went there to fish.
During his journey across the islands and the mainland, M.F. Gedenstorm, along with geodetic work, also became familiar with the structure of the coasts. The scientists were especially interested in the report of fossilized ice located under a layer of soil in the coastal cliffs between the Lena and Indigirka. “The properties of the land near the Arctic Ocean represent an incomprehensible secret of nature,” wrote Gedenstorm. “The steep banks of streams and lakes several fathoms high are made up of layers of earth and solid fossil ice.”
On the western shore of the island of Novaya Sibir, Gedenshtorm found thick layers of petrified trees, which he called “wooden mountains.” The researcher's reports were supplemented by information about numerous finds of not only mammoth tusks, but also other parts of its skeleton and even whole corpses found in the cliffs of the banks of Siberian rivers. The animal bones found by Yakov Sannikov on Kotelny Island also became known. Thus, many mysteries accumulated that needed to be answered, that is, scientifically explained. The Russian Academy of Sciences took on this task. They began to prepare for the expedition. The expedition was led by Dr. A. Bunge and his assistant, geologist E. Toll. The Academy of Sciences became interested in E. Toll's project. The expedition under Toll's leadership was equipped for a long time and carefully. The polar whaling ship “Zarya” was purchased for it in Norway. In June 1900, Zarya left St. Petersburg, passed through the Barents Sea, and from there through the Yugorsky Shar Strait entered the Kara Sea. That year, very difficult ice conditions developed in the eastern part of the Kara Sea, and the expedition was forced to spend the winter.
Meanwhile, Toll was feverishly preparing for a voyage to Bennett Island to study its geological structure. In addition, he intended to make another attempt to discover the unknown land. The Zarya was supposed to take his party off Bennett Island in the summer. But having used up its coal reserves in a fruitless battle with the ice, the ship was unable to make its way north and went to Tiksi Bay, where it dropped anchor. Soon, a storm threw the Zarya aground and it ended its voyage forever.
Toll's party did not return either in the winter or in the spring of the following year.
In 1903, the Academy of Sciences sent two parties to search for the missing travelers. One of them, having traveled around the shores of the northern islands during the spring and summer, found no trace of Toll's return from Bennett Island. In the spring, the second party delivered a heavy whaleboat from the Zarya across the ice to Cape Medvezhyi on Kotelny Island using dogs. On July 31, this party set off across the ice to Bennett Island via the Blagoveshchensky Strait and landed on the narrow sandy shore of Bennett Island. Traces of Toll's camp were found here. During further searches, they discovered a hut built from driftwood, half-filled with frozen snow. Along with the abandoned tools and things, they found a canvas box containing Toll's report to the president of the Academy. In the report, Toll reported a successful landing on the island and provided brief information about its nature.
The last words of the report were:
We are heading south today. We have provisions for 14-20 days. Everyone is healthy. Bennett Island 26.XI.1902.”
The Academy of Sciences offered a reward for finding Toll's party, but the search yielded no results. It remains to assume that Toll and all his companions drowned in the sea while crossing the ice at such a late and dangerous time of year.
Thus perished E. Toll, searching for the land that appeared to him in the misty distance. The geological collections collected by Toll on Bennett Island were taken away from there by the expedition.
Recently, the idea was expressed that Sannikov Land did exist in the past. Academician V.A. Obruchev, who wrote the novel “Sannikov Land” in 1924, also believed in this.
The genre is science fiction. The novel is based on Yakut stories about a mysterious warm land lying far away in the Arctic Ocean. At the beginning of the 20th century, Obruchev took part in an expedition to the north of Yakutia. He sincerely believed that folk tales could have some basis, while he remained a staunch supporter of science.
Obruchev, as a geologist, assumed that a warm island in the ice could have formed and existed as a result of volcanic activity. The existence of the Kuril Ridge with its local climate could serve as evidence. Obruchev had no real evidence in favor of the existence of such a plot of land in the north. By writing the novel, he thus laid out his theory about the possibility of such plots on Earth.
Author: Marina Antonenko
