ARCTIC TRAGEDY.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 15 November 1926, Page 8

ARCTIC TRAGEDY.

PROFESSOR MURDERED, REVEALED AFTER 17 YEARS. NEW YORK, Nov. 4. The New York Times prints a dispatch from Mr George Palmer Putnam, the publisher, who is returning from the Arctic, where he has been carrying out investigations, revealing that Professor Ross Marvin, of Cornell University, who was believed to have been drowned on fhe Peary Expedition in 1909, was murdered ,by one °f his Eskimo companions. Mr Marvin, who was about 30 years old, headed the third supporting party accompanying Admiral Peary (who was then Lieut. Peary) to- the North Pole from the ship Roosevelt. When the explorer returned from the Pole, he learned that the Eskimos baxl returned alone, reporting that Mr Marvin had been drowned by falling through thin ice. Admiral Peary incorporated their version in his book. Last year a Danish, missionary converted most of the membets of Admiral Peary’s tribe of Eskimos, among whom were Mr Marvin’s companions. One of them, a man named Kukiooktoo, when baptised, informed the missionary that lci-s conscience had been awakened by the white man’s Christianity. He then admitted that he shot the professor behind the ear, and that ho and his partner, named Inukitsoq, invented the drowning story to conceal their crime. The Eskimo said that he shot Mr Marvin to save his companion. Mr Marvin, weakened by hardships/became suddenly infuriated and ordered Inukitsoq to "be turned adrift without food or shelter. To save his friend, Kukiooktoo, pretending to see a seal, got a rifle and shot Mr Marvin. The Danish Government sent Mr Knud Rasmussen to investigate ’the story, and he obtained full corroboration of Kukiooktoo’s confession. The scene of the murder was in "No Man’s Land,” which has since been taken over by Denmark, and Mr Putnam is of the opinion that no action will ever be taken legally against the Eskimos.