THE IMPOSTERS—V Claim to have discovered North Pole

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32703, 4 September 1971, Page 13

THE IMPOSTERS—V Claim to have discovered North Pole

(By

RONALD TRENT)

On September 1,1909, the telegram from Lerwick in the Shetlands was short and dramatic: “Reached North Pole April 21, 1908. Discovered land far north. Cook.”

The news electrified the world. One of the world’s most "impossible” feats had been achieved incredibly, by the wrong man.

It was not the American explorer, Commander Robert Peary, who in 1907 had set out on his seventh attempt to reach the Pole—and from whose party nothing had been heard for over a year—who was first at the Pole but the dashing New York adventurer, Dr Frederick Albert Cook.

He had been a ship’s doctor with the Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897-99, explorer of Greenland and a mountaineer who claimed to have climbed the formidable Mount McKinley, in Alaska.

Cook had been in the Arctic for two years, but was without any of the special equipment needed for prolonged Polar exploration. He had no white companions —and his claim was greeted with scepticism. But the scepticism faded when the whaling vessel Hans Egede brought him to Copenhagen for a welcome from the Crown Prince of

Denmark and dinner with the King and Queen at the Royal Palace. Nearly 100 newspapermen swarmed aboard the ship and he was offered huge sums for his full story. He accepted a modest 4000 dollars from an American magazine: it was said that he might have got 20 times as much. For the time being he told journalists a dramatic story of how, during an Arctic hunting trip he suddenly decided to make North to the Pole. He described a desperate fight against famine and frost before reaching the Pole with his two devoted Eskimo companions Etukishook and Ahwelsh. Planted flag Geographers were surprised by his claim that he had discovered formerly unsuspected land near the Pole. He spoke eloquently of “30,000 square miles cut out of the terrestrial unknown. A new highway, with big game haunts located which will delight the sportsman and extend the Eskimo horizon.” Among those disposed to be critical of the claims, Admiral Sir George Nares, a noted British geographer, said: “Dr Cook should be asked to what distance from the Pole did the land extend? Did he communicate with Peary and his party, and with what result?” Others wanted to know what astronomical observations had been made to confirm the positions he claimed

to have reached, but Cook said laconically that he had “taken observations” and planted the American flag. But, he said with a laugh: “I do not claim to have put my finger on the exact spot.” He insisted that he would be prepared to put his observations before any scientific society in the world—and maintained that complete proofs were on the way from the Arctic in another ship. For five days Cook enjoyed the limelight—and not least a' congratulatory telegram from President Taft Then, on September 7, from the radio station at Indian Harbour, Labrador, came a brief cable: “I found the Pole. I reached it on April 6,1909. Peary.” If Cook was startled he did not show it. "I hope it is true,” he said. “Peary’s report will confirm all my claims.” But two days later, when Peary was questioned by reporters, he said: “Cook’s story should not be taken too seriously. The two Eskimos who accompanied him say he went no distance north and not out of sight of land. Other members of the tribe corroborate." He said flatly that Cook had “not been at the Pole on April 21, 1908, or at any other time.” Geographers and others began to take sides between Cook and Peary. The Norwegian explorers Amundsen and Rasmussen believed in Cook, but the Royal Geographical Society took Peary’s side. In the United States the Arctic Club of America supported Cook, but the Peary

Arctic Club were on the other side. In America there was some feeling that Peary, highly ambitious and rather vain and arrogant, was making too much of the controversy—as if Cook had no business trying to reach the Pole. -So when Cook returned to America he was feted in New York and given the freedom of the city. Then Peary adopted a new tactic: he suddenly announced that he would accept no public honours and would not dispute Cook’s statements. So Cook had won his claim to be the first man at the Pole? It looked rather like it, till. time did its work. Months went by without Cook producing any observations or documents. Credibility lost It seemed that Cook had left instruments and the notes that were the only proof of his having reached the Pole with Harry Whitney, the millionaire sportsman, at Etah Camp in Greenland. Whitney confirmed that boxes had been left with him. When Peary reached Etah on the way back to America he refused to take anything belonging to Cook in his ship; he said afterwards that if he had done so he might have been accused of tampering with them. The boxes were last seen hidden among rocks. Soon came revelations which destroyed Cook’s credibility. Breaking his silence, Peary said Cook’s Eskimo companions told him that they had never left land

to venture out- on to the polar ice. Cook countered that he had sworn the Eskimos to secrecy. Then Cook’s sole companion on the ascent of Mount McKinley in 1906 said they had never been near the summit and that Cook had faked the “conquest” diaries. A retired navigator and an insurance agent said that they had made up for Cook a full set of nautical and astronomical observations—presumably those left behind at Etah Camp. A vital point was scored by Peary when he said that there was no land at the Pole (as Cook claimed), but only ice covering water some 1500 fathoms deep. Next year the Cook “bubble” finally burst when a careful check of the Eskimos* narrative showed that Cook was no nearer the Pole than 500 miles. Nevertheless he made a living for some years from writing and lecturing on his adventures. In the 1920 s he served five years of a 14year gaol sentence for fraudulent share-pushing. In 1937 he lost an action for £5OOO damages against the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the court ruling that he had not been libelled by their statement that his claim to have reached the Pole was “universally rejected.” He died at he pge of 74 in 1940, still maintaining his claim that in a nightmare 14month journey to and from Greenland he did reach the North Pole. But they called' him “the man who stole the North Pole.” (Concluded)