The origin of the island's name is Puerto Rico. Origin of the name of the island of Euboea
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Franz Josef Land was discovered on August 30, 1873.
The archipelago, which was discovered 144 years ago, today is the northern cluster national park"Russian Arctic".
It is noteworthy that the Austro-Hungarian expedition on the ship "Admiral Tegetthof", which was led by Lieutenant of the Austrian Navy Karl Weyprecht and Lieutenant of the Austrian Army Julius Payer, was not initially directed to Franz Josef Land, but to the east. The purpose of the expedition, which began on June 13, 1872 in Germany, was to explore and develop Northeast Passage, under favorable ice conditions, the Admiral Tegetthof was supposed to pass to Bering Strait and return through it.
But the Arctic dictates its own rules: already on August 22, north of Novaya Zemlya, the ship was caught in ice, and the expedition's attempts to free itself from ice captivity were unsuccessful. The Admiral Tegetthof drifted throughout the polar night, first to the northeast and then to the northwest. But even with the advent of spring, and then the summer of 1873, the crew failed to free the ship, although for three and a half months the ice was sawn, pricked and even blown up. August 25 ended the polar day. The second forced wintering was approaching, the mood of the expedition members was dominated by despair and severe disappointment.
But fate brought a surprise to the Payer-Weyprecht expedition: on August 30, land appeared on the horizon, which Julius Payer later described in his book as “harsh Rocky Mountains" and "beautiful alpine country". These were the rocks, which later received the name of Cape Tegethof of the island of Gall. However, the researchers were able to set foot on the archipelago only on November 1. The island, on which the first landing took place, was named Wilczek - in honor of the Austrian count Hans Wilczek, who financed the expedition.
This is how Julius Payer described the first landing: “Our joy from visiting the land was so great that everything we found here aroused undeserved delight in us. (..) We admired the most ordinary forms and contours. The first question that interested us was geological structure earth. The rock turned out to be composed of columnar dolerite. The vegetation was indescribably poor. It seemed that it consisted of only a few lichens. (..) The country seemed devoid of life.”
In the spring of 1874, Julius Payer, with part of the team, made sleigh routes along the archipelago, about 450 miles long. So, among other things, the islands of Wiener Neustadt, Wilczek Land, Rudolf Land, the Strait of the Austrian Canal were discovered and named.
In total, the expedition lasted 820 days. Researchers, in addition to the discovery of the archipelago, received data in the field of geology, glaciology, climate, flora and fauna of the islands.
Franz Josef Land is known to many by the songs of Yuri Vizbor, who traveled all over northern seas from Murmansk to Chukotka and further along the Far East!
And it's worth it, because Franz Josef Land (abbreviated - FJL) beats many Russian and world records: there is the most north point island land of Russia, the closest land to the North Pole, the northernmost frontier post of the Russian Federation, the northernmost post office and the northernmost airfield in the world, the northernmost theater of military operations in Patriotic war, the most extreme of our islands!
And this list can be continued for a long time!
And, of course, the northernmost Orthodox Cross - to our heroes, explorers and travelers who, without sparing their lives, expanded the boundaries of our boundless Motherland!
Geography: island point: Cape Fligely on Rudolf Island in the archipelago of Franz Josef Land is located to the north of all - 81 ° 49 "N, the distance from Cape Fligely to the North Pole is only 900 km.
Rudolf Island is the northernmost of the Franz Josef Land islands. Cape Fligeli on the island is the northernmost point of land belonging to Russian Federation, at the same time the northernmost point of Europe. The island is administratively owned Arkhangelsk region. Area 297 km². Almost completely covered by a glacier.
The island, like the entire Franz Josef Archipelago, was discovered in 1873 by the Austro-Hungarian expedition of the explorer J. Payer, and was named after Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria. In 1936, the base of the first Soviet air expedition to the North Pole was established on the island. From there, in May 1937, four heavy four-engine ANT-6 aircraft delivered the Papanin team to the top of the world.
The military played a leading role in the development of many remote territories of our country. Somewhere on Far North And Far East garrisons are to this day the main type settlements. True, in the post-Soviet period, the number of such garrisons and the population in them have declined sharply. However, our geography textbooks still do not write anything about "military" development, even in cases where it has long been no longer a secret. This is a little surprising, since for many old-developed regions and regions of new development, parts of various law enforcement agencies perform the functions of city-forming enterprises.
Franz Josef Land was discovered at the end of the 19th century. by the Austro-Hungarian expedition, which set off in 1872 in search of the Northeast Passage, and perhaps also to reach the North Pole, and in 1873 pressed against the shores of hitherto unknown land, named after the then emperor of Austria-Hungary *. ZFI, as it is usually called in the North, has an area of approximately 16,000 km2 and consists of 191 islands.
The first permanent settlement on Novaya Zemlya appeared in 1877. It is called Small Karmakuly. In 1896, a hydrometeorological station was established in the Small Karmakuly, which still exists today and is the oldest polar station in Russia.
Straits
The Arkhangelsk Strait runs between the Polar Pilots Peninsula and the Armitage Peninsula. South of the Arkhangelsk Strait is the Cambridge Strait, which washes southern part islands.
Bays and gulfs of Alexandra Land
Shallow Bay
Bay of St. John's Wort
Topographers Bay (between Cape Melekhov and the western coast of the Polar Pilots Peninsula)
Bay Dezhnev
Severnaya Bay
Ostrovnaya Bay
Weyprecht Bay
Gulf of Nordenskiöld
Capes of Alexandra Land
Enumeration from extreme western point clockwise:
Cape Mary Harmsworth
cape nimrod
Cape Strelka
Cape Nagursky
Cape Tempting
cape thomas
Cape Melekhov
Cape Double
Cape Babushkina
Cape Icy
Cape Abrosimov
Cape Finger
Cape Ludlov
cape lofley
mid-polar summer at FJL 
WILCHEK'S LAND
Wilchek's Land is an island in the North Arctic Ocean, the second largest island in the Franz Josef Land archipelago. It is named after Hans Wilczek, who financed the Austrian expedition of Karl Weyprecht and Julius Payer, who discovered the island in 1873.
Located in the eastern part of the archipelago. Separated from the western group of islands by the Austrian Strait, from the lying northeast of the island Graham Bell by the Morgan Strait. The surface of the island is a plateau with relative heights 400-600 m and almost completely covered by a glacier. The area of the island is about 2000 km², highest point- 606 m.
nearby small islands
9 km south of Perseus Bay lies the island of Klagenfurt, named after the Austrian city of Klagenfurt.
Close to east coast the Gorbunov Islands are located, named after the Russian naturalist Grigory Petrovich Gorbunov.
Four small islands lie 1.5 km to the southeast:
Wood
Dawes
McCult
tillo
Climate
The climate is harsh, arctic. In a year, on average, only 18 days are recorded with temperatures above 0 °C. Average annual temperature air is -12 °C, the maximum recorded temperature is +12 °C, the minimum is -42 °C. The average annual rainfall is 280 mm.
GREEHAM BELL ISLAND
Graham Bell is the most east island in the archipelago of Franz Josef Land, in northern Europe. Part of the polar possessions of Russia, is part of the Arkhangelsk region. The area is 1.7 thousand km².
It was discovered in 1899 during a sledge ride by the American meteorologist Evelyn Baldwin, named after Alexander Graham Bell.
The highest point is 509 meters, the windy ice dome.
The largest lake on the island is Melkoye, the second largest is Severnoye.
The northernmost point of the island is Cape Aerial Surveys, the eastern one is Cape Seven (Sandy Cape). most eastern point the island and the entire archipelago is Cape Olney, to the north of which Cape Kolzat is located; extreme south point Cape Leiter.
Located in the west large bay- Matusevich Bay. In the east there is a small bay of Ilistaya with many small sandy islands.
The nearest islands are the island of Perlamutrovy and Trekhluchevy. To the west, Graham Bell is separated from Wilczek Land by the Morgan Strait.
Cape Trieste, Champ Island 
JOURNEY TO FRANZ JOSEPH LAND
Franz Josef Land archipelago is not only the most remote Northern part Russia, but also, perhaps, one of the most unexplored tourist spots in the world. No, the specialists there undoubtedly worked and tried to figure out a lot, but for tourists this region of our country is still “Terra incognita”.
Indeed, firstly, the opportunity to visit these islands for domestic and foreign travel enthusiasts appeared just a couple of decades ago. Secondly, you can get there either by air, for example, by helicopter, or by sea-ocean, from Murmansk, but this is far away, or from Arkhangelsk - this, of course, is closer, but in both cases tourist trips in the FJL area do not happen often. Thirdly, it is possible to visit them for a very limited time, about three months a year.
But there is also a fourth. A trip there in any of the acceptable ways costs decent money, in other words, well, a lot of money is needed, so inquisitive foreigners from different regions The lands for which such amounts are not critical visited the archipelago much more than the Russians, although our compatriots began to get there, and the further, the more.
Miracles in the FJL are found literally on every island, but among all there is one very amazing piece of land. And his name is also unusual - Champ, so short, but very sonorous. It turned out that it was named after William Champ, who in 1905, being the personal secretary of the American millionaire Ziegler, went as a leader rescue operation to search for the missing polar expedition, financed by the same Ziegler.
So the Arctic island named after Champa is one of the most unique places on Earth - it is all littered with strange, perfectly round stones, called "spherulites", while they range from small, pocket-size, to giants with a diameter of more than two meters and weighing many tons. The nature of their origin has not yet been explained by science. All this was told to us at one of the briefings, and even photographs were shown. Very impressive photos, I must say. Imagine how we longed to be there!
Here's to it unusual island and our ship sped off. And everything would be fine, but the closer we got to the island, the denser the fog became, and the less likely it was that we would land. The main danger in such weather was represented by bears, because the animals could approach completely silently, fog was not a hindrance to them, and it was very difficult to organize one hundred percent protection of tourists. And to inspect the island in such a fog is a very dubious pleasure.
It was decided that the "50 Years of Victory" would stay for a while near the island of Champa, and we would all wait, all of a sudden the gods would be merciful, and the fog would dissipate.
After making such a decision, tourists, in order to distract them from sad thoughts, were invited to the lecture hall for another unusual and amazing event - a Charity Auction, the northernmost of all that has ever been held in the world, all funds from it should go to fund for the protection of polar bears.
We were still a little bored, but then everyone was invited to come for dinner, and we went to a restaurant. A big surprise awaited us there - a Russian dinner, all the waitresses were dressed in Russian national costumes, on the "buffet" table, along with the usual salads and snacks, there were traditional Russian products - jars of black caviar, bottles with a variety of vodka, which is just not there. it was: and Stolichnaya, and Tsarskaya, and Five Lakes, and so on, and so on. There was only Bad, but this does not happen in jokes.
Everything was fine, there was only one problem - both cans and bottles, as they were closed, were closed and remained until the end of dinner. Maybe they were dummies? We never understood.
After dinner, we were assured that if the fog dissipated at night, and this was expected around two in the morning, then we would be lifted up and we would go on an excursion on the “zodiacs”, there would be no darkness, because the polar day overboard does not stop at night .
We slept soundly, but then the speakerphone sounded:
- We invite everyone to an excursion to Champ Island.
While this message was dubbed in other languages, we managed to get dressed, and only at the door did we pay attention to the TV screen. What we saw amazed us, it turned out that it really was 2 am.
- They give, - burst out of us at the same time.
On upper deck we stood in a long line, it turned out that almost all the foreigners had already gathered, and the Chinese were the first, apparently, they were all sleeping without undressing, otherwise how could they get together so quickly.
Boarding began, "zodiac" after "zodiac" filled with tourists, but did not leave, but gathered nearby in a flock, we moved closer and closer to the gangway, the sixth boat filled up, and they all immediately disappeared into the fog. Yes, yes, it was in the fog, which had not diminished in the slightest, that it seemed to thicken even more.
- Maybe it's only here, around the ship, such a fog, but it's clear near the shore? - sounded someone's voice from behind.
We looked at each other, such a simple thought did not occur to us. But, after all, this is probably true, I thought, otherwise, why are we being dragged there in the middle of the night?
The boats left, we were told that we would have to wait at least an hour for their return. This means that they will reach the shore, disembark there, take a walk for a while and again sit in the "zodiacs" to return on board, and only after that we will sail. Some of the tourists left, deciding that waiting in the middle of the night was not justified, but we were so curious, so eager to see these round stones, and one, what to hide, secretly put in the pocket that we stayed, and did not lose. That's what finally happened.
We stood leaning on the railing, anxiously awaiting the return of the boats. Our eyes were directed into the foggy distance towards the stern of the ship, we were not worried about extraneous sounds, nothing distracted us, we were, how would it be more correct to say, probably fixated on the waiting process itself. Imagine yourself, they wake you up in the middle of the night and say: you have to stand and wait an hour. What would you do if you agreed to stand for an hour and wait at 2 am?
About half an hour passed, active stirring began on the yachts, apparently, they received the “Good” and began to prepare rubber boats for launching, but then our “zodiacs” emerged from the fog, and we turned our attention to them. Tourists climbed the ladder, mostly they were silent and somehow distressed and dull. One of the Russians who managed to make the first call explained to us that there was no less fog, there was nothing to look at, except for birds, they didn’t catch any of the living creatures, in general, it’s not worth swimming.
But we considered it unreasonable to refuse the trip, after we had already waited so long, and even at such a time, and were placed on the sides of the boat, which was driven by Dmitry. There was only one other boat next to us, more passengers not found. A few minutes later the icebreaker disappeared into the fog, the second boat kept nearby, but sometimes it also began to dissolve in space, and then its contours could hardly be seen through the oncoming waves of dense fog. We moved on a whim, the Zodiacs were not equipped with any navigational devices, but it was quite enough to slip past big island we didn’t have to, and even from the icebreaker we could correct our route by radio, because they saw us perfectly, or rather not us, of course, but the point that corresponded to our location on the locator screen.
The fog cleared a little, and it became clearer and farther away. Before us appeared the shore of the island, covered with a glacier, sliding into the sea, one of the icebergs, recently broken away from this glacier, floated very close by. There are many birds on the iceberg, which have chosen it as a mobile recreation base. Some of the birds were floating on the water.
Dmitry directed the boat towards the iceberg so that we could get a good look at the birds. And then two fast and agile figures appeared between the shore and the boat in the sea - they were young walruses. The animals, not paying any attention to us, dived, disappearing for a long time under the water.
Walruses once again dived and disappeared under water for a long time. Dmitry started the engine and started moving in the direction where the walruses had recently been.
We won't scare them? someone asked.
Yes, no, on the contrary. They are curious, they will come closer to the noise.
That's how it all happened. The walruses surfaced next to our boat and swam nearby for a while, as if posing so that we could get a good look at them. Interesting fact: according to evolutionary theory, a walrus is a bear that has gone under water. We tried to find similarities between a bear and a walrus, sometimes it worked out, but more often the walrus looked like anything but a bear.
Journey through FJL - icebreaker Kapitan Dranitsyn 
GALL ISLAND
We were walking at this time cruising speed towards the island of Gall, one of the southernmost islands of the archipelago. It was there that we planned the last helicopter landing on the table mountain of Cape Tegetthoff. Table Mountain - so in a scientific way, they call all peaks with a truncated, flat top. There are an innumerable number of such mountains in the world, their formation is explained by the weathering of sedimentary rocks from which they are composed. We saw a lot of them at FJL. But it seemed to me that there the tops of the mountains were simply simply licked by a glacier, or crushed so that a flat surface was formed.
The sea was calm, the fog swirled somewhere in the distance, the visibility was very acceptable, so for a very long time we, those who were on the navigation bridge, saw huge iceberg lying alone on the surface of the sea.
The captain immediately appeared, ordering to slow down and approach this handsome man. And there was something to see. lump blue ice lay motionless on the sea surface, it seemed that it was just lying at the very top, stretching out in length for a good hundred and more meters and rising up to the height of a ten-story building, such a mountain arose in front of us.
Behind the iceberg we could already see the islands to which we aspired, but there was no time for them. We saw a real iceberg for the first time and were eager to see it from all sides. The reason for the death of the Titanic became clear, stumble at full speed on such an obstacle and nothing will survive, not a single ship, perhaps even the same as our icebreaker.
The icebreaker approached ice mountain almost close, and then lightly poked his nose into the edge of this wall, and pieces and pieces immediately fell from it, the wall turned out to be weak.
There was mass photography against the backdrop of this miracle of nature. People took the most bizarre poses, just to catch the angle they liked. We are not far behind everyone.
We stood high above the water level and looked down, so we clearly saw that the mountain goes right under the water. It was impossible to determine how far, or rather, how deep it continues under water, but it is obvious that the experts are right, and most of the ice is down there, exactly under water, but about 90%, I don’t know, it seems to me that this figure is somewhat exaggerated.
The nuclear-powered ship slowly walked around the icy mountain, it was obvious that nature knows its business well, the ice was all eaten away by the cool sun, fogs and rains. It was clear that this piece of ice in the ocean would not swim for a long time, it would soon come to an end, and the volume of sea water would not be much replenished.
We swam around the iceberg and saw it reverse side, it seemed to be the creation of human hands, such a smooth, slightly inclined, upwardly aspiring surface, appeared before us, well, just the take-off deck of an aircraft carrier, and immediately a handsome Admiral Kuznetsov appeared in my mind's eye.
That's it, the iceberg was left far behind, and we continued on our way to the island of Gall. Before us lay, it seemed, an endless strip of islands covered with snow and ice, perhaps the Austrian sailors, the discoverers of these islands, saw just such a picture.
The ship anchored near the famous Cape Tegetthoff. Well, since I wrote that the cape is famous, it is necessary to explain why. The fact is that the history of the development of the Franz Josef Land archipelago began from this cape. After all, it was precisely in the region of the island of Gall, or, to be more precise, to this very cape, on August 30, 1873, the ice brought the schooner "Admiral Tegetthoff" of the Austrian expedition - the discoverers of the FJL. In memory of their landing, a monument to a schooner was erected on the cape.
We looked from the deck of the nuclear-powered ship at sharp kekurs sticking straight out of sea depths, which the famous Russian polar explorer Viktor Boyarsky figuratively called “Dragon Fangs”, and indeed they really resemble something like that, however, the dragons themselves could not be seen, but their fangs could only be like that and no other, and the place, it would seem, is right - made for them.
There was a long wait for our turn for a helicopter tour. In fairness, the management changed the order of flights, and this time the first to fly were tourists from the very last group. The procedure was built as follows. First of all, the guard flew to the mountain, you can expect anything from the bears. By the way, the first tourists saw a white bear below, but, most likely, he was greatly frightened by the helicopter crash, and he preferred to hide, we did not see him anymore. Together with the guards, Yan and his friend also flew there, who led all the landing and disembarkation operations.
The empty helicopter returned to the ship, the Chinese comrades loaded into it, and the carousel spun - the helicopter dangled back and forth, carried the next group from the icebreaker, then took the previous group from the island, and so on until the very end, when it made last flight, taking Yana and the guards out of the island. We were now almost at the end, but the queue, no matter how slowly it crawled - after all, it took about 10-12 minutes for a two-way flight with two take-offs and landings and a change of tourists - they nevertheless reached us, and we, sitting in helicopter, this time next to the pilot, in order to better see everything, went to the island.
So, jumping from stone to stone, we moved from the landing site, perhaps the only truly flat place suitable for a helicopter, to the edge of the summit, from where we could take decent photographs of the cape, the sea and the ship, and then back to the landing site .
From above, of course, the view of the cape is even nothing, two rocks are perfectly visible - remnants, 25 and 60 meters high. There is a border at the cape - they go south, and in the north lies Surovaya Bay, which is already part of the Arctic waters, like this. It must be said that this boundary is not clearly demarcated.
Slowly moving up the mountain, we tried to find at least some signs of life, but around there were only stones, stones, ice and snow, but no, in one place there was a tiny island of greenery that pleased us with its love of life.
Everything is over, the helicopter came for us, it's time to go down to the ship, but first we need to look at the island from above.
Down from the top of the mesa, the Gall Islands extend beautiful rocks, named in memory of the outstanding Soviet geologist Academician Alexander Nikolaevich Zavarnitsky, Zavarnitsky rocks, stretching 15 kilometers inland, reaching maximum height at 500 meters.
Well, the helicopter propeller froze, everyone returned on board, you can go further. We were surprised to hear the announcement that the icebreaker was turning around and we would go back to Champ Island. We really liked this decision, maybe we will still be able to get to the island with stone balls.
Moving on, we last time cast their eyes on the "fangs of the dragon", from this point they could be mistaken for a kind of gate blocking the path to the island of Gall and to the cape itself with two outliers decorating it.
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SOURCE OF INFORMATION AND PHOTO:
Team Nomads
Savatyugin L.M., Dorozhkina M.V. Archipelago Franz Josef Land: history, names and titles. - St. Petersburg: AARI, 2012. - 484 p. — ISBN 978-5-98364-054-2
Sergei V. Popov, Vladilen A. Trinity Archipelago Franz Josef Land // Toponymy of the seas of the Soviet Arctic / Ed. L. A. Borisova. - Leningrad: Geographical Society of the USSR, 1972. - S. 85-128. — 316 p. - 1000 copies.
Franz Josef Land: Collection of articles / USSR, Nauch.-tekhn. ex. VSNKh No. 352. - M .: State Technical Publishing House, 1930. - (Proceedings of the Institute for the Study of the North; issue 47).
Mikhail N. Ivanychuk 14 months in the land of Franz Josef. Impressions of a winterer. - Kharkov: Ukrainian Robotnik, 1934. - 122, p.
http://greenbag.ru/russia/
Martynov V. | Novaya Zemlya - military land | Newspaper "Geography" No. 09/2009
Island of Captain Kuchiev | Ship side April 2, 2008 | Publishing house "Northern week"
Kryukov V. D., Zatsepin E. N., Sergeev M. B. Historical outline Polar Marine Exploration Expedition. "Exploration and protection of mineral resources" No. 8, 2012
Most northern branch Russian Post.
Two million barrels await Putin's partners in the Arctic
Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: In 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - St. Petersburg: 1890-1907.
http://www.photosight.ru/
photo V. Balyakin, O. Parshina, A. Zolotina, S. Anisimov
OPENING
Paradox. These oceanic islands were discovered by a sea expedition of the Austrians, a landlocked nation. Yes, even on a ship named after the Austrian admiral. In those days, however, Austria controlled a completely different territory in Europe than it does now.
This land was discovered in 1873 Austrian expedition led by lieutenants Julius Payer And Karl Wyprecht. Accidentally.
The purpose of the expedition was to discover the Northeast Passage from Atlantic Ocean to Quiet. Purpose built wooden steam room ship "Admiral Tegethof" left the German Bremerhaven on June 13, 1872. On August 21 at west coast Novaya Zemlya ship froze into the ice and with it began to drift to the northwest. A year later, on August 30, 1873, the ice brought the Admiral to the shores predicted by Lomonosov, Schilling and Kropotkin, Z.F.I. - NAME, .
Quote. About noon we stood, leaning on the side of the ship, and looked aimlessly into the fog, which here and there began to break. Suddenly, in the northwest, the fog cleared completely, and we saw the outlines of rocks. And a few minutes later, a panorama unfolded before our eyes in all its brilliance. mountain country sparkling with its glaciers. At first, we stood as if paralyzed and did not believe in the reality of the picture that was opening before us. Then, realizing our happiness, we burst into stormy cries: “Earth, earth!” We were given her whim of the ice floe that captivated us ... We were brought here by chance.
Y. Payer
In honor of their monarch, the Austrians named the discovered land Kaiser Franz Josef Land. Discovered, but not yet touched by the foot.
Only two months later, when a ship drifting with ice froze into the fast ice, the expedition members were able to land on the shore of a small island in the southeast of the archipelago. The island was named after the count Wilchek who subsidized the expedition (later he became president of the Austrian geographical society) .
Then - the polar night, the beginning of scurvy, the hunt for polar bears. With the advent of the sun - exploration of the archipelago.
In May 1874, the expedition left the Tegetthof, which remained in ice captivity, and on a sleigh over the ice, overcoming the ice in boats, reached Novaya Zemlya in 96 days. There they were lucky enough to meet with the artel of the Pomors, led by Voronin. Having taken the victims on board his schooner Nikolai, he delivered them to the Norwegian port of Vardø. From there, the Austrians, on the 812th day from the start of the expedition, returned to their homeland.
For the Austrian expedition, as well as for many explorers who aspired to the poles in those years, such trips were to a large extent extreme sports for the rich. How alien and incomprehensible those exploits were to the people, the Czech Yaroslav Gashek, once also a subject of Franz Joseph, showed with humor.
Quote
I remember it was said that Austria had colonies, uttered Schweik, somewhere in the north. Some kind of land of Emperor Franz Josef.
Drop it, guys, - one of the escorts intervened. “Today it is dangerous to talk about some kind of Emperor Franz Josef Land. The best thing is don't name names.
And you look at the map, - the volunteer interrupted him. - In fact, there is the Land of our most merciful monarch, Emperor Franz Joseph. According to statistics, there is only ice, which is taken out on icebreakers belonging to Prague refrigerators. Our ice industry has earned high appraisal and respect abroad as well, since it is a very profitable enterprise, although dangerous. The greatest danger when exporting ice from Franz Josef Land is the crossing of ice through the Arctic Circle. Can you imagine it?
The escort muttered something indistinct, and the head of the escort, a corporal, came closer and began to listen to the volunteers' explanations. He continued thoughtfully:
This single Austrian colony can supply all of Europe with ice and is a major economic factor. Of course, colonization is progressing slowly, since some of the colonists do not want to go there at all, and some of them freeze there. Nevertheless, with the improvement of climatic conditions, in which the Ministries of Trade and Foreign Affairs are very interested, there is hope that the vast glacial areas will be properly used. After the construction of several hotels, masses of tourists will be attracted there. Of course, for convenience, it is necessary to lay tourist paths and paths between the ice floes and paint tourist signs on the glaciers. The only difficulty remains the Eskimos, who hinder the work of our local authorities…
The corporal listened with interest. He was a long-term soldier, in the past a farm laborer, a tough and narrow-minded man who tried to pick up everything he had no idea about. His ideal was to rise to the rank of sergeant major.
- ... scoundrels Eskimos do not want to study German, - continued the volunteer, - although the Ministry of Education, Mr. Corporal, did not stop at the expense and loss of life, built schools for them. Then five architects-builders froze and...
The masons escaped,” Schweik interrupted him. They warmed themselves by smoking pipes.
Not all, - the volunteer objected, - misfortune happened to two. They forgot to inhale, their pipes went out, they had to bury the poor fellows in ice. But the school was finally built. It was built of ice bricks with reinforced concrete. It's very durable! Then the Eskimos lit fires around the entire school from the wreckage of ice-covered merchant ships and carried out their plan. The ice on which the school stood melted, and the whole school fell into the sea along with the director and the government representative, who was supposed to be present at the solemn consecration of the school the next day. At this terrible moment, all that was heard was the representative of the government, already up to his neck in the water, shouting: “Gott strafe England!” Now troops will probably be sent there to restore order among the Eskimos. Of course, it is difficult to fight them. Most of all, our army will be harmed by their trained polar bears.
This was still not enough, - the corporal remarked thoughtfully ...
Yaroslav Gashek.
The adventures of the good soldier Schweik during the World War
A group of islands, led by a very large one, is also named after him. This is Wilczek Land in the east of W.F.I.
Fedor Ivanovich Voronin - grandfather of the famous Soviet captain icebreaker fleet Vladimir Ivanovich Voronin, fur trader, tradesman of Sumsky Posad (now in Karelia, east of Belomorsk).
In the late sixties of the nineteenth century, the famous Russian meteorologist A.I. Voeikov raised the question of organizing a large expedition to explore the Russian polar seas.
This idea was strongly supported famous geographer and revolutionary, theorist of anarchism, Prince P.A. Kropotkin. Various considerations, and mainly observations of the ice in the Barents Sea, led Kropotkin to the conclusion that " between Svalbard and Novaya Zemlya there is still undiscovered land, which extends north beyond Svalbard and holds ice behind it ... The possible existence of such an archipelago was indicated in his excellent, but little known report on currents in the Arctic Ocean by the Russian naval officer Baron Schilling". In 1870, Kropotkin drafted an expedition. However, the tsarist government refused to provide funds, and the expedition did not take place.
Cover of the illustrated magazine "Illustriertes Wiener Extrablatt" (September 25, 1874) with portraits of Julius von Payer (left) and Karl Weipracht (right)
Shortly thereafter, a plan arose abroad for a large expedition to explore the area northeast of Novaya Zemlya - at that time this area was a blank spot on the map. This plan was proposed by Lieutenants of the Austrian Navy Julius Payer and Karl Weyprecht. They were able to convince several wealthy individuals of the importance of the projected study. The necessary money was collected, and on June 13, 1872, the wooden steam vessel Tegetthof, specially built for this expedition, left the German port of Bremergafen and headed for the Barents Sea.
Steamboat "Tegetthoff", jammed in ice (1872)
That year was very ice-covered in the Barents Sea, as we have already noted. The Tegetthof did not even manage to reach the northern tip of Novaya Zemlya, since at the end of August the ship was covered with ice near West Bank this island, somewhat north of the small islands of the Barents.
When the Tegetthoff was squeezed by ice near Novaya Zemlya, no one thought that the ice captivated the ship forever.
All members of the expedition believed that in a few days, or at most weeks, the ice would break up, and the ship would again be able to move. " If we knew, that evening, when the ice came together around the "Tegetthof", - writes Payer, - that from now on our ship is cursed to limply follow the whim of the ice, that it will never be a real ship, we could fall into despair».
In the fall, the Tegetthoff, along with the ice, was washed out to the open sea. The polar night came with its storms and snowstorms. The ice pressed against the ship with terrible force, threatening to crush it like a nutshell. Everything was prepared in case we had to leave the ship. Almost every day, when the rumble of ice and the crack of the ship announced the beginning of compression, the members of the expedition rushed to the cabins, hastily dressed and ran out onto the deck, ready to jump onto the ice at any moment. " Those were creepy moments., - says Pier, - when you had to dress, feeling the walls of the ship tremble, while outside the ice cracked and creaked. You run out on deck with a knapsack in your hand, ready to abandon the ship and start wandering - where, none of us knew. And the ice floes all around continued to pile up one on top of the other, climbing onto the deck. Nothing was left alone».
Julius von Payer (1842-1915), polar explorer, officer, artist and writer
Karl Weyprecht (1838-1881), naval officer and polar explorer
One hundred and thirty days the ship was under constant threat of being crushed by ice and sinking. By spring, when the ice floes around the Tegetthof froze into large fields a calmer time has come. By this time, the winds and currents had carried the ship far from where it had been captured by the ice: it was 250 kilometers north of Novaya Zemlya, in waters that had not yet been visited by man.
Summer came, but the Tegetthof's position did not change. As before, the ship was in a strong grip of ice, and around it a white desert stretched to the very horizon. Hopes for the release of the ship from the ice collapsed, and sailors have already begun to get used to the idea of a second forced wintering in floating ice. For the time being, there was enough food, since the expedition, leaving Bremergafen, prudently captured it with the expectation of two and a half to three years.
But then, quite unexpectedly, on August 30, 1873, an important event took place in the monotonous life of a ship worn out in ice. " around noon, says Pier, we stood, leaning on the side of the ship, and looked aimlessly into the fog, which here and there began to break. Suddenly, in the northwest, the fog cleared completely, and we saw the outlines of rocks. A few minutes later, before our eyes, in all its brilliance, the panorama of a mountainous country, sparkling with its glaciers, unfolded. At first, we stood as if paralyzed and did not believe in the reality of the picture that was opening before us. Then, realizing our happiness, we burst into stormy cries: "Earth, earth !!!"».
Kropotkin's assumption about the existence of land in the north of the Barents Sea was brilliantly justified. The Austrians named it Franz Josef Land.
"Austro-Hungarian Arctic Expedition" - this engraving from an illustrated magazine falsely shows the reality, since there were only three dogs
Soon after the expedition saw this archipelago for the first time, northern winds"Tegetthof" began to be attributed to the south. The Austrians managed to enter the newly discovered land only on November 1. First visited small island in the southeast of Franz Josef Land, named Wilczek Island - in honor of the person who financed the expedition. At this time, the polar night has already come again. " When we stepped onto land, we did not notice that it consisted only of snow, bare rocks and frozen stones, and that, in fact, there could hardly be a more sad and hopeless corner on earth than this island. It seemed to us a real paradise.". This is how Payer describes his first impression of Wilczek Island.
Darkness prevented immediate exploration open land. We had to wait for the end of a long, one hundred and twenty-five-day polar night. Once again, life on the ship flowed monotonously.
The incidence of scurvy, which occurred in the first winter, intensified. In early March, the machinist Krish died of this disease. In the spring, the diseases stopped. This was facilitated mainly by successful hunting for polar bears, which were killed by 67 pieces.
Cape Tegetthoff on Gallia Island
As soon as the sun rose, the Austrians began to prepare for sledge trips to explore Franz Josef Land. The first excursion was undertaken in mid-March. Payer visited Cape Tegetthof and climbed the Sonklar Glacier on Hall Island. The weather was not windy, but it was very cold, and on the top of the glacier the Celsius thermometer showed 50 ° below zero. This is the lowest temperature ever recorded in Franz Josef Land. Travelers not well equipped for such a cold, while spending the night in a tent, suffered greatly from the cold.
At the end of March, Payer, accompanied by six other members of the expedition, went on a large sledge expedition. The Austrians had only three dogs, and therefore people had to drag the sled. On this expedition, Payer managed to reach the extreme northern tip of Franz Josef Land, which he called Cape Fligeli. Payer, however, did not know that this cape was the northernmost point of the archipelago discovered by the Austrians, it seemed to him that there was another land further north, he even gave this land a name - Petermann Land. Subsequently, other expeditions found out that no land north of Cape Fligeli exists. Obviously, Payer mistook a ridge of hummocks for land. Such a mistake is quite possible, and the cases when polar explorers mistook heaps of hummocks for land are far from isolated. The non-existent Peterman Land was placed on geographical maps for a long time, until Payer's mistake was finally proved. In 1900, the Italian Cagni passed by the place where Payer marked his Petermann Land, and in 1914 by the navigator Albanov. There was no land there, the ice-covered sea stretched all around to the horizon.
Franz Josef Land map by Julius Payer
Payer wandered around Franz Josef Land for a whole month, collecting samples rocks, studying the structure of the islands and the glaciers covering them, getting acquainted with the animal life of the archipelago. Most of Franz Josef Land was photographed by Payer and put on the map. But his map is very wrong. Oddly enough, Payer, traveling through Franz Josef Land, did not notice that it consists of many islands. There are only about seventy-five of them, not counting the very small ones. It seemed to Payer that Franz Josef Land was two large land masses separated by a strait, to which he gave the name Austrian. So Payer depicted Franz Josef Land on his map. Obviously, the Austrian explorer took the straits separating the islands for valleys filled with glaciers. Payer traveled through Franz Josef Land in the spring, when all the straits are still covered with unbroken ice, and, therefore, such a mistake, especially with frequent fogs, is quite possible.
There were also some adventures. While crossing the glacier of Rudolf Island, the sleigh with the dogs and the musher Tzaninovich fell into a glacial crack to a depth of 12 meters. Such cracks, formed in glaciers as a result of their movement, are completely masked by snow in Franz Josef Land in spring. The position of Tzaninovich, who had fallen into the crack, was unenviable, since Payer did not have a long enough rope with him to help the fallen man get out. I had to go for a rope to the camp, which was quite far from the place of adventure. Only four and a half hours later, Payer, taking another companion in the camp, approached the crack. He bent over the yawning abyss and listened: not a sound could be heard there. Only when he called several times into the fissure did he hear the faint squeal of a dog. Having tied himself with a rope, the end of which Pier held in his hand, his companion began to descend into the crack and soon disappeared into the darkness. Fortunately, Tzaninovich was alive. It turned out that he did not reach the end of the crack, lingering in its narrowing, formed by a small ledge of ice. With great difficulty, they pulled out the almost frozen Tsaninovich, and after him the dogs, who began to roll in the snow with joy.
Meanwhile, May had already come, and the Tegetthof was still standing motionless, bound by ice. Hopes for the release of the ship finally abandoned the travelers. There was only one way to get out of the ice trap - to try to get to Novaya Zemlya on boats. There one could meet Russian industrialists who would have assisted the expedition.
Hastily there was preparation for a long and risky journey. Four boats were repaired, which at the beginning of the journey had to be dragged on a sled across the ice. The question of what should be taken with you from equipment and food was discussed for a long time. After all, everything had to be carried on one's own shoulders, and therefore it was necessary to limit oneself to only the most necessary. On the other hand, the duration of the transition could not be determined in advance; consequently, food had to be stocked up for a long time. It consisted mainly of pemmican, sausage with peas and canned meats. In spite of the austerity, the cargo, in the end, was decent: two and a half thousand kilograms of food and two thousand kilograms of equipment, not counting boats and sledges. With this cargo, twenty-three brave sailors set off, sending the last “forgiveness” to the gloomy rocks of Franz Josef Land and the ship standing near them. It was May 20, 1874.
Journey on floating sea ice- one of the most difficult. Irregularities in the ice, soft melted snow in which the legs get stuck above the knee, and now and then encountered spaces of open water between the ice - all this made it possible to move forward very slowly. Straining all their strength, travelers dragged heavily loaded boats across the ice. Day after day passed in this exhausting work, but success was small. The travelers soon became convinced that all their work was in vain, since the southerly winds carried the ice back at the same speed with which the Austrians went south. As a result, for the whole month they managed to cover only 1.25 miles of the upcoming 250 miles. The masts of the derelict ship were still visible behind them. It was especially depressing that during this month of fruitless work, a third of all food was eaten.
At the end of June, ice began to appear in the ice, which travelers could swim across in boats. Again there were hopes, but - alas! - how quickly they came, just as soon they disappeared.
At the beginning of July, the ice again converged, and the travelers found themselves among the chaos of ice floes piled one on top of the other. There was no water to be seen anywhere. " If worsening our situation was even conceivable, - writes Payer, - then it happened now, at the beginning of July". And yet, with unwavering perseverance, step by step, the Austrians, among the labyrinth of hummocks, made their way to the south - to where the open sea should have been, and with it salvation.
Julius von Payer "Never Back!" (Military History Museum, Vienna, 1892)
But then the south winds blew again and began to drive the ice to the north. The result was that in mid-July, the unlucky travelers were only 15 kilometers away from the ship, abandoned two months ago. " We clearly saw the cliffs of Wilchek Island. There was something mocking in these rocks, bathed in the white light of the polar day. It seemed that after all this long and unspeakably tedious struggle with the ice, we were left with one outcome: the return to the ship and the third polar night. Well, if we fail to find a ship, then the icy sea is destined to become our grave ... It was happiness for us then that the earth is a sphere and that we therefore could not see what a long way we still had to go on ice before we reached before high seas. If we were able to survey this icy desert, we would fall into despair.". This is how Payer recalls those dark days of the expedition.
Finally, in the second half of July, the situation improved. The ice began to part from time to time, and travelers got the opportunity to move along the canals and polynyas on a boat. But these divorces appeared only for a short time. Every now and then the ice was compressed, and then it was necessary to pull out the boats and patiently wait for the appearance of a new lead. The average daily passage at this time was already 4 nautical miles.
Oberleutnant Julius von Payer (two awards on the chest: "3rd class of the Order of the Iron Crown" and "3rd class of the Military Merit Cross with Military Distinction")
Route of the Austro-Hungarian northern polar expedition 1872-1874.
August 15 was a joyful day for the expedition - the day of liberation from the ice. The holes got wider and wider.
A ripple appeared. Finally, the edge of the ice appeared, and behind it - the boundless expanse of the open sea. " At the sight of the surging sea, - wrote Payer, - it seemed to us that we had come out of a dark, cold tomb into a new life. But, despite all the insane joy that seized us at the thought of our liberation, nevertheless we could not think without pain that we now have to say goodbye forever to the frozen polar kingdom, to the kingdom of ice, which sparkled behind us in all their dazzling beauty. .»
These last words of Payer are very characteristic. The polar countries powerfully attract a person who has once visited them, even if this stay was associated with severe hardships.
Out on the open sea, the travelers headed for New Earth. The weather was not windy, and almost the entire journey had to be done by oars. On the night of August 17-18, they landed at Cape Cherny on Novaya Zemlya. It was the first land that travelers set foot on after three months of wandering on the sea ice.
On August 23, the expedition reached Cape Britvin at south island New Earth. By that time, there was only ten days of food left. But deliverance was near. Unexpectedly, travelers saw two Russian fishing schooners anchored in Pukhovaya Bay. One of them, the schooner Nikolai, was commanded by the industrialist F. Voronin, who tells the following about the rescue of the Austrians: “ That year I was late in my trades and only at the end of August I left Small Karmakul for Arkhangelsk. As soon as we went out to sea, we saw four boats under the shore, on which there were a lot of people and from which they gave us signals. Approaching the boats, we saw that they were foreigners, wrecked. Placed on the ship, they warmed up and came to life". On the schooner "Nikolai" the Austrian expedition was taken to Varde.
Commemorative coin issued by the Austrian National Bank
Austrian 2.50 shilling commemorative postage stamp issued for the 100th anniversary of the polar expedition
In 1930, the Norwegian geologist Gunnar Horn published a book about Franz Josef Land, in which he claims that the archipelago was discovered not by the Austrians, but by the Norwegian industrialists Rennbeck and Eidiervi in 1865. Horn bases his statement solely on the stories of Norwegian industrialists, for almost all the old ship's logs stored in Northern Norway, burned down in a fire a few years before the publication of Horne's book. Horne's attempt to attribute the discovery of Franz Josef Land to the Norwegians is based on data so shaky that it cannot be taken seriously.
It should be noted that a contemporary of the two Norwegian industrialists mentioned, who allegedly discovered Franz Josef Land, the famous Norwegian scientist H. Mon, was extremely interested in all the voyages of the Norwegian hunters in the Arctic waters and in the discoveries they made. Mon studied these voyages from the original ship's logs (later burned down) and wrote several very valuable and important articles for the history of geography about them, but he does not say a word about the discovery of Franz Josef Land. If among Norwegian industrialists there really was a rumor about the discovery of Franz Josef Land by Rennbeck, then it could not help but reach Mohn, and he would undoubtedly check this rumor against documentary data, that is, ship logs. Horn's statement is clearly without any basis and cannot even serve as an object of historical speculation, such as, for example, the voyage of the Dutch whaler Rowle around 1675, which, perhaps, was on Franz Josef Land.
