Johan Alfred Björling

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Johan Alfred Björling

Johan Alfred Björling (born October 19, 1871 in Stockholm , † probably 1892 in Baffin Bay ) was a Swedish polar explorer . His expedition to the Canadian Arctic ended tragically in 1892.

Life

Origin and education

Johan Alfred Björling was the son of shop owner Johan Alfred Björling (1822–1871) and his second wife Lydia Kastengren (1836–1916). He had four half-siblings from his father's first marriage. The father died a week after Alfred Björling was born.

Björling attended Stockholm's oldest grammar school, the Norra Real , and passed the matriculation examination (Swedish student exam ) on December 11, 1891 .

First ventures

Alfred Björling became known in Sweden as a 17-year-old student. On July 9, 1889, he and his classmate Axel Otto Hultman (1872–1921) were the first Swede to climb the highest mountain in the country, the 2104 m high Kebnekaise . A year later he traveled with the geologist Gustaf Nordenskiöld (1868–1895) and the zoologist Axel Klinckowström (1867–1936) to the Bellsund in Spitzbergen . Her collection of fossil plants is now in the Natural History Museum in Stockholm. In 1891 Björling traveled on board a Danish merchant ship to Upernavik in western Greenland and in July undertook a well-known voyage north in the open Umiak along the coast of Melville Bay with local companions . He came to the then uninhabited island of Kullorsuaq , which is known for its striking mountain, the devil's thumb . A further advance was prevented by the fixed ice here .

The Björling-Kallstenius expedition of 1892

Björling's next destination was an expedition to Ellesmere Island, of which only the east and north coasts were well known. In addition to geographical discoveries, the inventory of the flora and fauna of the area should be the focus of scientific work. With the zoologist Evald Kallstenius (1868-1892) from Uppsala , he traveled via Liverpool to St. John's on Newfoundland in the spring of 1892 , only to discover with disappointment that it was too late to board a whaler in Baffin Bay this season reach. Although the men's financial means were very limited, it was possible to buy a small schooner of 37  GRT , which the locals considered unsuitable for arctic waters. Björling found it difficult to find a crew that was ready to go to Ellesmere Island on this ship. He hired Karl Kann (1871-1892), a Dane from Roskilde, as captain . The crew was completed by the English helmsman Gilbert Dunn and the cook Herbert McDonald. After a three-week stay in St. John's, the Ripple set sail on June 22nd and reached Godhavn on Disko Island off the west coast of Greenland on July 28th. Björling supplied himself with a shotgun , a rifle and ammunition and bought an open boat. On August 3, the expedition left Godhavn. She has been missing since then.

A year later, in June 1893, the Scottish captain of the whaler Aurora , Henry Duncan McKay (1857–1925), discovered the wreck of the Ripple off the easternmost of the Carey Islands , which is now Björlingø. On land he found a grave and, in a pile of stones, Björling found four written messages that provided information about the further course of the expedition. The Ripple had therefore successfully crossed the dangerous Melville Bay and was caught in a storm off Cape York . On August 16, the expedition had reached the Carey Islands and taken provisions from a British depot that George Nares had set up in 1875 as part of his North Pole expedition. A day later, however , the Ripple ran aground and had to be abandoned. Björling had decided to take the dinghy north to seek shelter in the Inuit settlements on the Foulke Fjord. It would have been easier to get to the closer settlements at Cape York or to Robert Peary's camp on Inglefield Fjord . The men had come by boat to Northumberland Ø and then back. In mid-October 1892 they were back on Björlingø, where one of the five men died. According to Björling's last message, the others had now attempted to reach Clarence Head, the southeastern tip of Ellesmere Island, where they hoped to encounter Inuit, as they did not have enough provisions to winter. McKay then steered his ship to Clarence Head, but could only approach the coast within 30 kilometers due to the perennial ice lying here.

On the initiative of Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld and financed by Swedish patrons such as Oscar Dickson , there were two search expeditions in 1894. Elis Nilsson rode the whaler Eclipse and the zoologist Axel Ohlin used Peary's supply ship Falcon . Ohlin found the expedition's camp on Björlingø and took some items left there. He also found the grave of an expedition member, which had since been destroyed by animals, and renewed it. The Falcon then visited Cape Faraday and Clarence Head, which Björling had named as a target, but without finding traces of the missing there. Apparently these had not reached Ellesmere Island.

Honors

A glacier on the Kebnekaise is now called the Björling Glacier. At his former school Björling is honored with a plaque together with two classmates who also perished in the Arctic, Nils Strindberg and Finn Malmgren (1895–1928).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Björling, Johan Alfred 1871 - (...) on the genealogical website of the Björling family
  2. ^ Björling, Johan Alfred 1822–1871 on the genealogical website of the Björling family
  3. ↑ a b Patrick Lönnberg: Norra Real. Stockholms äldsta gymnasium , accessed February 4, 2015
  4. ^ Rolf Kjellström: Kebnekaise . In: Popular Historia No. 10, September 27, 2004 (Swedish)
  5. ^ Database of the collections of tertiary plants at the Natural History Museum Stockholm, accessed on February 7, 2015
  6. ^ A b Henry G. Bryant: The Peary Auxiliary Expedition 1894 . In: Bulletin of the Geographical Club of Philadelphia Volume 1, No. 5, June 1895, pp. 141-167, p. 152
  7. ↑ Negotiations of the Society for Geography in Berlin 20, 1893, p. 175 .
  8. ^ A b Gustaf Nordenskiöld: Om Björlings och Kallstenii expedition till trakten af ​​Smith Sound . In: Ymer 14, 1894, pp. 1-16 (Swedish).
  9. ↑ Björling-Kallstenius expeditions till nordvästra Greenland 1892 , website of Gothenburg University Library (Swedish)
personal data
SURNAME Björling, Johan Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swedish polar explorer
DATE OF BIRTH October 19, 1871
PLACE OF BIRTH Stockholm
DATE OF DEATH uncertain: 1892
Place of death Baffin Bay