voyage of the Jeannette. The ship and ice journals of george w. de long, lieutenant-commander u.s.n., and commander of the polar expedition of 1879–1881

The USS Jeannette left San Francisco in July of 1879 bound on a voyage of exploration to find a route to the North Pole via the Bering Strait. George W De Long had previously shown himself to be the stuff that exploration commanders were made of when, in 1873, he led a small party in the Little Juniata – a steam launch from the USS Juniata – on a search to Cape York for the US Steamer Polaris. His exploits on that trip are described in this book which consists of his journals edited by his wife, Emma. The Jeannette ended up being crushed and sunk by the arctic ice and De Long and his crew had to abandon ship into three small boats. Of these only one took its crew to safety whilst De Long and others perished slowly with his faithfully completed journal being updated to the last. The commander of one of the other vessels, Chief Engineer Melville, eventually found the remains of De Long and his party after a protracted search.
This two volume set provides a poignant and well illustrated account of the man, his missions and the whole saga of arctic exploration at this time. As the book concludes; ‘sacrifice is nobler than ease, unselfish life is consummated by lonely death, and the world is richer by this gift of suffering.’