Archives – Summer 1999

Photo: National Archives

Greely Arctic Expedition

Pictured here are the survivors of the Greely Arctic Expedition, an undertaking of the First International Polar Year of 1882-1883. Led by Lt. Adolphus W. Greely, the expedition settled into its base at Lady Franklin Bay on the northern coast of Greenland in August 1881 and began making observations of the auroras, magnetism, gravity, geography, and weather. When after two years the expected relief ships failed to arrive, the party began a long, harrowing trek south. Cold, starvation, and exhaustion claimed the lives of 17 of the original 25 members of the expedition. Of the 8 that finally were rescued in June 1884, only the 6 shown here lived to make it back to the United States. Greely survived and eventually became head of the U.S. Army Signal Corps.