Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences at a Reception Given to the Captain and Officers of the Jeannett Search Expedition when about to Sail from this Port in the United States Exploring and Relief Steamer Rodgers, Lieutenant Robert M. Berry, U.S. Navy, Commanding: Including Papers Read, with the Discussion Thereon, Before the Academy at Its Regular Meeting Held June 6th, 1881

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On July 8, 1879, the USS Jeannette left San Francisco under the command of Lieutenant George Washington De Long. Its mission was to try to reach the North Pole via an ice-free polar sea that some geographers theorized might exist. The ship entered the Arctic Ocean on August 29; on September 6 it became stuck in pack ice north of the Chukotka Peninsula and began drifting in a northwesterly direction. On January 19, 1880, the ship began leaking as it was crushed by the ice. With great effort the crew managed to save the vessel as it continued to drift in the vicinity of Wrangel Island. The Jeannette finally sank on June 12, 1881. At about that time, the U.S. Navy dispatched the USS Rodgers on a mission to the Arctic to search for the Jeannette and for two missing American whalers. A converted whaling steamship, the Rodgers was especially equipped to operate in the Arctic and was acquired by the Navy specifically for the purpose of this search. The Rodgers never found the Jeannette or the whalers, and it was forced to abandon its mission in November 1881 after a disastrous fire in its hold. The mystery of what happened to the Jeannette ultimately was solved when several members of the ship's crew made it to a settlement on the Lena River in September 1881, from where they continued on to the town of Yakutsk. Most of the crew of the Jeannette perished, either at sea or by exposure and starvation on the north coast of Siberia. Presented here is the Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences for its regular meeting on June 6, 1881, ten days before the Rodgers departed for the Arctic. The meeting featured a reception for Lieutenant Robert M. Berry, commander of the Rodgers, and several papers or extracts from papers on Arctic-related subjects by members of the academy.

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