Hans Hendrik

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Hans Hendrik 1883

Hans Hendrik (Greenlandic name: Suersaq , baptized Hans Heinrich ; born June 2, 1832 in Qeqertarsuatsiaat , † August 11, 1889 in Qeqertarsuaq ) was a Greenlandic translator , hunter and Arctic explorer . He participated in five polar expeditions. His memoirs , published in 1878, are the first of any Greenlander.

Life

Hans Hendrik with his family around 1873
The survivors of the drift on the ice floe in 1873. Hans Hendrik in the boat on the right, next to him his wife and two of his children

Hans Hendrik was the eldest of four sons of the Greenlander Benjamin (1783-1850) and his second wife Ernestine, nee Pinnersoĸ (around 1800-1865). He had eight half-siblings from his father's first marriage. Benjamin and his wife worked in the Lichtenfels mission station of the Moravian Brethren . Hans was already a young hunter when his father died.

In July 1853, he was hired as a hunter on the Advance , the ship of the Second Grinnell Expedition led by the American Elisha Kent Kane . In search of the missing John Franklin , the expedition passed Smithsund between Greenland and Ellesmere Island . As the only Inuk on the expedition, Hans Hendrik was of enormous value to Kane. He found the traces of two members of the expedition in distress and led the search team to their tent. With William Morton, Hans Hendrik undertook the longest northward sleigh ride of the expedition to Cape Constitution and discovered the Kennedy Canal . The fact that they found open water reinforced Kane's belief that there was an ice-free sea in the geographic North Pole area . When the expedition members threatened to starve to death during the second winter, Hans Hendrik managed to barter meat with the polar skimos in Etah . He then stayed in Etah and married Merkut in 1855, with whom he had children Augustina (* 1859 or 1860), Tobias (* 1866), Sofie (* 1869), Charles Polaris (* 1872), Vide (* 1874), Johanne ( * 1878) and Benjamin Charles Polaris (* 1879). His wife died on July 24, 1881 and Hans Hendrik married Juliane Judithe Nicoline Ravn (* 1837) on February 16, 1882.

When Isaac Israel Hayes , who had been ship's doctor on the Advance on Kane's expedition , led his own expedition to find the ice-free polar sea in 1860, he looked for Hans Hendrik, who he knew was still living with the polar skimos. He found him at Cape York and took him on board with his wife and two children. The expedition soon ran into trouble when the ship was damaged in the journey through the ice and eventually froze in Port Foulkes in Smithsund. After the majority of the sled dogs had died of an epidemic, Hans Hendrik set off with the astronomer August Sonntag in December to the nearest Inuit settlement to make up for the loss. On the way, Sunday broke through a thin spot in the sea ice and froze to death in the abandoned Inuit settlement Sarfalik on Cape Alexander the following night . Hans Hendrik managed to get the Inughuit to bring them dogs, which Hayes used for long sleigh trips. On the way home, Hans Hendrik was dropped off with his family in Upernavik , where he worked for the Greenland Trading Company ( Den Kongelige Grønlandske Handel ) for the following years .

From 1871 to 1873, Hans Hendrik took part with his family for an annual salary of 300 US dollars in Charles Francis Hall's tragic Polaris expedition , who, like Kane and Hayes, tried to reach the North Pole through Smithsund. After wintering on the coast of Hall-Land at 81 ° 38 ′ north latitude, Hans Hendrik's fourth child was born. It was named after the expedition leader and the ship Charles Polaris. He was the furthest north born man of his time. Later part of the crew was separated from the ship and drifted south on a shrinking ice floe for months. It was only thanks to the experience and ingenuity of the Inuit Hans Hendrik and Joe Ebierbing (Ipiirviq; approx. 1836 – approx. 1881) that none of the 19 people died. Finally they were rescued by the sealer Tigress and deposited in St. John's on Newfoundland , where Hans Hendrik was received as a hero. Like the other members of the expedition, he was brought to Washington and asked about the mysterious circumstances under which the expedition leader Hall had died. Hans Hendrik also visited Boston and New York before he returned to Upernavik in the summer of 1873 and resumed his work at the trading company.

In 1875 the British Admiralty sent the ships HMS Discovery and HMS Alert to finally advance into the supposedly ice-free polar sea. The captain George Nares was ordered back from the Challenger Expedition (1872–1876) because he already had experience in the Arctic. The British did not want to do without the tried and tested Hans Hendrik and ran to Kangersuatsiaq to hire him. He drove - this time without his family - on the Discovery , which was led by Captain Henry Frederick Stephenson (1842-1919). The expedition was able to cross the entire Nares Strait between Greenland and Ellesmere Island, but encountered impassable pack ice at its northern exit. Hans Hendrik excelled in rescuing several expedition teams plagued by hunger and scurvy . In his expedition report published in 1878, Nares paid tribute to Hans Hendrik's great abilities as a hunter and dog sled driver several times .

On his last expedition in 1883, Hans Hendrik accompanied the Swedish polar explorer Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld on board the Sofia to northwest Greenland. Nordenskiöld knew that of all living people, Hans Hendrik had the best local knowledge in this area. The ship, which is not very suitable for ice cruises, only reached Ivsugigsok near Cape Atholl and returned with good luck at the end of the summer.

In 1889 Hans Hendrik died at the age of 55 in Qeqertarsuaq on Disko Island , where he was buried. Hans Hendrik was so respected among the Danes that an obituary appeared in the magazine Geografisk Tidsskrift .

power

Hans Hendrik was one of many Greenlandic Inuit who were recruited by US and European researchers and adventurers for their ventures in the polar regions. But he differed from the others in terms of the number of his expeditions and above all in that he put his experiences in writing. His memoirs are an important historical testimony and show an Inuk's view of the often incomprehensible behavior of the whites, who were at odds with one another and who often treated the Inuit with arrogance. Thanks to his skills in hunting and dog sledding, Hans Hendrik was undoubtedly of great use to the expeditions he was accompanying, even if the opinion of the expedition leaders differed. Above all, Hayes mistrusted him and held him at least partly responsible for the death on Sunday. Nares, on the other hand, was full of praise.

Hans Hendrik was the first South Greenlander to establish a connection with the polar skimos. He lived with them for several years and reported in his memoirs about their customs and traditions. Through him they came into contact with the Christian faith for the first time without him attempting to proselytize. He did not lead the Polar Eskimos unknown kayak one.

Honors

An island on Kennedy Strait that was discovered by the Polaris expedition is named Hans Island in his honor . In 2012, the Greenland Post issued a stamp with Hans Hendrik's portrait designed by the Norwegian engraver Martin Mörck (* 1955) .

Fonts

literature

Web links

Commons : Hans Hendrik  - collection of pictures

Notes and individual references

  1. ↑ church records Lichtenfels 1758-1900
  2. ^ Hans Hendrik: Memoirs of Hans Hendrik, the Arctic Traveler, Serving under Kane, Hayes, Hall and Nares 1853–1876. Trübner & Co., Ludgate Hill 1878, p. 21. (English)
  3. ↑ Malaurie gives Meqru ("the needle"), Dawes Meqo as the name of Hans Hendrik's wife. She was later baptized in the name of Birgithe Judithe. See the myth of the North Pole. S. 144 and Peter R. Dawes: Hans Hendrik and family på fotografier and graveringer (PDF; 1.32 MB). In: Grønland. Volume 5, 1986, pp. 141-151.
  4. ↑ Peter R. Dawes: Hans Hendrik and family på fotografier and graveringer (PDF; 1.32 MB). In: Grønland. Volume 5, 1986, pp. 141-151.
  5. ↑ Church registers Qeqertarsuaq 1853–1888 (deceased p. 117, married p. 70)
  6. ^ Hans Hendrik: Memoirs of Hans Hendrik, the Arctic Traveler, Serving under Kane, Hayes, Hall and Nares 1853–1876. Trübner & Co., Ludgate Hill 1878, p. 38f. (English)
  7. ^ Emil Bessels : The American North Pole Expedition , Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig 1879, p. 86.
  8. ↑ Jean Malaurie: Myth of the North Pole. 2003, p. 150.
  9. ^ Hans Hendrik: Memoirs of Hans Hendrik, the Arctic Traveler, Serving under Kane, Hayes, Hall and Nares 1853–1876. Trübner & Co., Ludgate Hill 1878, pp. 74-81. (English)
  10. ↑ George Nares: Narrative of a voyage to the Polar Sea during 1875-6 in HM ships 'Alert' and 'Discovery'. Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, London 1878, Volume 1, p. 29. (English)
  11. ↑ George Nares: Narrative of a voyage to the Polar Sea during 1875-6 in HM ships 'Alert' and 'Discovery'. Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, London 1878, Volume 2, p. 82. p. 111. (English)
  12. ^ Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld: Greenland. Its ice deserts inland and its east coast. FA Brockhaus, Leipzig 1886, p. 232.
  13. ↑ Jean Malaurie: Myth of the North Pole. 2003, p. 141 ff.
  14. ↑ Stamp: Hans Hendrik Suersaq (1834–1889) , information on the postage stamp on colnect.com, accessed on September 11, 2014.
  15. ^ The Greenland polar explorer Hans Hendrik - Suersaq (1834–1889). In: Greenland Collector. Volume 17, No. 3, 2012, p. 6 f. ( PDF ; 3.35 MB)
personal data
SURNAME Hans Hendrik
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Suersaq (Greenlandic name); Hans Heinrich (baptismal name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greenlandic hunter, translator and polar explorer
DATE OF BIRTH June 2, 1832
PLACE OF BIRTH Qeqertarsuatsiaat
DATE OF DEATH August 11, 1889
Place of death Qeqertarsuaq