Wrangel Island

 

or Wrangell Island (răng'gəl) , Rus. Ostrov Vrangelya, island, 1,740 sq mi (4,507 sq km), in the Arctic Ocean, between the East Siberian Sea and the Chukchi Sea, off NE Russia. It is separated from the mainland by Long Strait. Generally barren, frozen, and rocky, it has an arctic station and a permanent settlement. The island is a breeding ground for polar bears, polar foxes, seals, and lemmings. During the summer it is visited by numerous varieties of birds. The island was sought by Russian Baron Ferdinand von Wrangel during his arctic expedition of 1820–24; he had heard of it from Siberian natives, but he did not succeed in finding it. It was finally discovered by Thomas Long, captain of an American whaling ship, who named it for Wrangel. Later George W. De Long, an American explorer, discovered that it was a small island and not a part of the mainland, as at first believed. In 1911 a group of Russians made a landing on the island, and in 1921 Vilhjalmur Stefansson, the Canadian explorer, sent a small party to Wrangel with a view to claiming it for Great Britain. In 1926 the Soviet government established the first permanent colony there, ousting the few of Stefansson's Eskimo settlers who had remained. The Soviet freighter Chelyuskin, trying to discover (1933) whether an ordinary cargo ship could navigate the Northeast Passage, was crushed in the ice off Wrangel Island. The party was marooned on the island but was later rescued.

Natural System of Wrangel Island Reserve*
UNESCO World Heritage Site
State Party	Russian Federation
Type	Natural
Criteria	ix, x
Reference	1023
Region†	Europe and North America
Inscription History
Inscription	2004  (28th Session)
* Name as inscribed on World Heritage List. † Region as classified by UNESCO.

Wrangel Island (Russian: о́стров Вра́нгеля, ostrov Vrangelya) is an island in the Arctic Ocean, between the Chukchi Sea and East Siberian Sea. Wrangel Island lies astride the 180° meridian. The International date line is displaced eastwards at this latitude to avoid the island as well as Chukotka Autonomous Okrug on the Russian mainland. The island is about 125 km (78 miles) wide and 7,300 sq. km (2,800 sq. miles) in area. The highest point on the island is Sovetskaya Mountain (1,096 meters, or 3,596 feet).

Nature

The rocky island has a weather station and two permanent Eskimo fishing settlements on the southern side of the island, and is a breeding ground for polar bears (having the highest density of dens in the world), seals, and lemmings. During the summer it is visited by many types of birds.

During the last ice age, mammoths lived on Wrangel Island. It has been shown that mammoths survived on Wrangel Island until 1700 BC, which is the most recent survival of all known mammoth populations. However, due to limited food supply, they were much smaller in size than the typical mammoth.

Its flora includes 417 species of plants, double that of any other arctic tundra territory of comparable size and more than any other Arctic island. For these reasons, the island was proclaimed the northernmost World Heritage Site in 2004.

History

The island is named after Baron Ferdinand von Wrangel (1797–1870), who, after hearing of stories of land at the island's coordinates from some Chukchi, set off on an expedition (1820–1824) to discover the island, with no success.

In 1849, Henry Kellett, captain of HMS Herald, landed on and named Herald Island, and thought he saw another island to the west; thereafter it was indicated on British Admiralty charts as "Kellett Land."

In August 1867, Thomas Long, an American whaling captain, "approached it as near as fifteen miles. I have named this northern land Wrangell [sic] Land ... as an appropriate tribute to the memory of a man who spent three consecutive years north of latitude 68°, and demonstrated the problem of this open polar sea forty-five years ago, although others of much later date have endeavored to claim the merit of this discovery."

George W. DeLong, commanding USS Jeanette, led an expedition in 1879 attempting to reach the North Pole, expecting to go by the "east side of Kellett land," which he thought extended far into the Arctic. His ship became locked in the polar ice pack and drifted eastward within sight of Wrangel before being crushed and sunk. The first known landing on Wrangel Island took place on August 12, 1881, by a party from the USRC Corwin, who claimed the island for the United States [1]. The expedition, under the command of Calvin L. Hooper, was seeking the Jeannette and two missing whalers in addition to conducting general exploration. It included naturalist John Muir, who published the first description of Wrangel Island.

In 1911, a group of Russians made a landing on the island, and in 1914, the survivors of the ill-equipped Canadian Arctic Expedition, organized by Vilhjalmur Stefansson, were marooned there for nine months after their ship, the Karluk, was crushed in the ice pack. The survivors were rescued after Captain Robert Bartlett walked to Siberia to summon help.

In 1921 Wragel Island would become the stage for one of history's tragedies when Stefansson sent five settlers (one Canadian, three Americans, and one Inuit) in a speculative attempt to claim the island for Canada. The explorers were handpicked by Stefansson based upon their previous experience and academic credentials. Steffanson considered those with advanced knowledge in the fields of geography and science for this expedition. The initial group consisted of Fred Maurer of America, Allan Crawford, Lorne Knight and Milton Galle of Canada. In 1923, the sole survivor of this expedition, the Inuk Ada Blackjack, was rescued by a ship that left another party of 13 (American Charles Wells and 12 Inuit). In 1924, the Soviet Union removed the members of this settlement and established the settlement that survives to this day on the island.

In the 1930s, Wrangel Island became the scene of a bizarre criminal story when it fell under the increasingly arbitrary rule of its appointed governor Konstantin Semenchuk, who controlled the local populace and his own staff through open extortion and murder. He forbade the local Eskimos to hunt walruses, which put them in danger of starvation, while collecting food for himself. He was then implicated in the mysterious deaths of some of his opponents, including the local doctor. The subsequent Moscow trial in June 1936 sentenced Semenchuk to death for "banditry" and violation of Soviet law [2].

According to [3] during and after World War II many German SS POWs and the remnants of Andrey Vlasov's renegade Russian army were imprisoned and died on Wrangel Island. A prisoner who later emigrated to Israel, Efim Moshinsky, claims to have seen Raoul Wallenberg there in 1962.[4]

According to some U.S. individuals, including the group State Department Watch, eight arctic islands currently controlled by Russia, including Wrangel Island, are claimed by the United States. However, according to the U.S. Department of State, no such claim exists. The 1990 USSR/USA Maritime Boundary Treaty, which has yet to be approved by the Russian Duma, does not address the status of these islands.

References

• Niven, Jennifer. Ada Blackjack: A True Story Of Survival In The Arctic. Hyperion Books. 2003.
• Wrangel Island. The Geographical Journal, Vol. 62, No. 6. (Dec., 1923), pp. 440-444. Online version through JSTOR

External links

• UNESCO Link to Wrangel Island page at World Heritage site
• The Cruise of the Corwin John Muir's description of the 1881 exploration of Wrangel Island
• The Ice Master and Ada Blackjack Jennifer Niven's non-fiction works on Wrangel Island
• Adventure Associates Icebreaker journey to Wrangel Island
• Run For Wrangel Tourist's account
• Isolation, Desolation and Tragedy Historical overview by Roderick Eime
• Radiocarbon Dating Evidence for Mammoths on Wrangel Island
• Status of Wrangel and Other Arctic Islands U.S. Department of State Fact Sheet on Wrangel Island
• The First Landing on Wrangel Island, available at Project Gutenberg. by Irving C. Rosse, (1883)

World Heritage Sites in Russia

Central Sikhote-Alin · Curonian Spit (with Lithuania) · Ferapontov Monastery · Golden Mountains of Altai · Church of the Ascension, Kolomenskoye · Kazan Kremlin · Kizhi Pogost · Lake Baikal · Citadel, Ancient City and Fortress Buildings of Derbent · Historic Monuments of Novgorod and Surroundings · Moscow Kremlin and Red Square · Ensemble of the Novodevichy Convent · Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments · Cultural and Historic Ensemble of the Solovetsky Islands · Struve Geodetic Arc (with nine other countries) · Architectural Ensemble of the Trinity Sergius Lavra in Sergiev Posad · Uvs Nuur Basin (with Mongolia) · Virgin Komi Forests · Volcanoes of Kamchatka · Western Caucasus · White Monuments of Vladimir and Suzdal · Natural System of Wrangel Island Reserve · Historical Centre of the City of Yaroslavl

Coordinates: 71°14′N, 179°25′W

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