solitude. I do not think anybody in the world could have coped with
what we have had to endure. All my companions have died one after the
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other, and the reconnaissance party which I sent to Galchikha did not
return.
I am leaving Maria and your god-daughter in difficult straits. If I knew
that they were provided for I would not be greatly distressed at leaving
this world, because I feel that our country has no reason to be ashamed
of us. We were very unlucky, but we made up for it by returning to the
land we had discovered and studying it to the best of our ability.
My last thoughts are of my wife and child. I dearly hope that my
daughter makes a success of her life. Help them, as you helped me.
Dying, I think with deep gratitude of you and of the best years of my
youth when I worked under your guidance.
I embrace you. Ivan Tatarinov.
To: His Excellency, the Head of the Hydrographical Board, From: I. L.
Tatarinov, Chief of the St. Maria Expedition
Report
I herewith beg to bring to the notice of the Hydrographical Board the
following:
On March 16th, 1915, in observed latitude 79°08' 30' and longitude
89°55' 00' East of Greenwich, from the drifting ship St. Maria, in good
visibility and a clear sky, there was sighted east of the ship an unknown
large stretch of land with high mountains and glaciers. Signs indicating
the presence of land in this area had been observed prior to this: as early
as August, 1912, we had seen large flocks of geese flying from the North
in a N.N.-E-S.S.-E direction. At the beginning of April 1913 we had seen
a sharp-cut silvery strip of the N.E. horizon, and above it clouds of a
very queer shape, resembling distant mountains shrouded in mist.
The discovery of land stretching in a meridional direction gave us the
hope of abandoning ship at the first favourable opportunity in
order, on coming ashore, to follow the coastline in the direction of the
Taimyr Peninsula and beyond, as far as the first Siberian settlements at
the mouths of the rivers Khatanga and Yenisei as the case may be. By
now the direction of our drift was clear beyond doubt. Our ship was
drifting together with the ice on a general course North 7° by West.
Even in the event of this course changing to a more westerly one, that is,
parallel to the drift of Nansen's Fram, we should not get free of the ice
before the autumn of 1916, and our provisions would last only until the
summer of 1915.
After numerous difficulties irrelevant to this report we succeeded on
May 23, 1915, in stepping ashore on the newly discovered land in
latitude 81°09' and longitude 58°36'. This was an ice-covered island,
indicated by the letter A on the attached chart. It was not until five days
later that we succeeded in reaching the second, very large, island, one of
three or four comprising the newly discovered land. The astronomical
position finding made on a jutting cape of this island and marked by the
letter G, gave the co-ordinates 80°26' 30' and92°08'00'.
Moving southward along the shores of this unknown land I explored
the coast between parallels 81 and 79. In its northern part the coast is a
low-lying stretch under an extensive icecap. Farther south it rises and
becomes free of ice. Here we found driftwood. At latitude 80° we found
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a broad strait or bay extending from the point indicated by the letter S
in an E.S.-E. direction.
From the point marked by the letter F. the coastline turns sharply
S.S.-W. I intended to explore the southern shore of the newly discovered
land, but by that time it was decided that we proceed along the coast of
Khariton Laptev in the direction of the Yenisei.
In informing the Board of my discoveries I consider it necessary to
point out that the observation for longitude may not be quite reliable, as
the ship's chronometers, though carefully looked after, have not been
corrected for more than two years.
Ivan Tatarinov
Enclosed: 1. A certified copy of the St. Maria's log.
2. Copy of chronometric record.
3. Canvas-bound notebook with calculations and survey data.
4. Map of the surveyed land. June 18th, 1915, Camp on Island 4
in Russian Archipelago.
Dear Maria,
I'm afraid it's all up with us. I am not even sure that you will ever read
these lines. We cannot go any further, we freeze as we move or halt, and
cannot get warm even when we eat. My feet are very bad, especially the
right one, and I don't even know how and when it got frost-bitten. By
force of habit I write 'we', though it is three days now since poor
Kolpakov died. I can't even bury him because of the blizzard. Four days
of blizzard has proved too much for us.
It will soon be my turn, but I am not the least afraid of death,
evidently because I have done all I could and more to stay alive.
I feel very guilty about you, and this thought is the most painful,
though there are others not much easier.
How much anxiety and sorrow you have suffered these years— and
now this, the greatest blow of all, on top of them. I don't want you to
consider yourself tied down for life. If you meet a man with whom you
feel you will be happy, remember that this is my wish. Tell Nina
Kapitonovna this. I embrace her and ask her to help you as much as she
can, especially with Katya.
We had a very hard voyage, but we stood up to it well and would
probably have coped with our task had we not been delayed by supply
problems and had not these supplies been so bad.
My darling Maria, how will you get along without me! And Katya,
Katya! I know who could help you, but in these last hours of my life I do
not want to name him. I didn't have a chance to tell him to his face
everything that had been rankling in my breast all these years. He
personified for me that force that kept me bound hand and foot, and it
