Taissumani, May 24

A plaque from 1922 graces the wall of a day care centre in Sisimiut, Greenland.” The building, a former hospital building, served as living accommodation for the crew of the wrecked ship, Vera, who dubbed the building “Vera Villa.” (PHOTO BY KENN HARPER)

In 1920 the small racing yacht, Vera, working as a supply ship for the Sabellum Company, deposited Hector Pitchforth at Niaqungnaq on the Cape Henry Kater peninsula on the Baffin Island coast.

Pitchforth had sailed as engineer on the company’s ill-fated vessel, Erme, in 1918, and again the following year on the Vera’s first trip to the Arctic. But this year, his role would be different. He was a trader but also intended to explore his little-known coast in detail.

Pitchforth had been born in India in 1886 and his hearing had been impaired during infancy. This may have accounted in part for his tendency to be a loner. In England during the first World War, he sought to join the Royal Navy reserve as an engineer, but his deafness prevented it.

And so he ended up working for the Sabellum Company. During his first year in the Arctic he suffered badly from snow-blindness, and this would plague him even more on his second sojourn in the Arctic.

Inuit gave Pitchforth the Inuktitut name Aullaq. The reason for this was that, when people were preparing to depart on a trip or returning to their camps from a trading visit, he would invariably rush outside just prior to their departure and inquire “Aullaqpiit? Aullaqpiit?” (“Are you leaving? Are you leaving?”) He always repeated the phrase twice.

He spent his first Arctic winter active and healthy, surveying and exploring the country near his post, making geological observations and compiling detailed maps. Sometimes he travelled with Paniluk, who worked as a kind of agent for the Sabellum Company, and his family.

Of one small bay near Cape Henry Kater, he wrote, quite unbelievably, “The traveller enters a small fiord. None of the Eskimos questioned knew its name, and my guide did not even know of its existence. Therefore I took the liberty of applying my own name to it, Pitchforth Fiord, and carefully impressing the nomenclature upon the Eskimos.” What the Inuit made of this misunderstanding is not recorded, for the feature in question must certainly have had an Inuktitut name.

The following summer, he returned to England, via Scotland, on the Vera. When the vessel reached Peterhead, a local newspaper reported, “Mr. Hector (sic), a Leeds gentleman, who had wintered at Cape Kater, came home with the ship. He had good sport shooting big game, and secured a number of bear, walrus, and deer. He did a bit of exploring on his own, and traversed regions which previously had never been reached by Europeans, and in course of his peregrinations penetrated into the mountains. Mr. Hector is suffering from snow-blindness, and states that the weather was extremely cold, the thermometer at times reaching 54 degrees below zero.” He spent the winter writing up his observations of his travels.

Pitchforth did not return to the Arctic in 1922. It is just as well, for the trip was a disaster. The Vera, newly fitted with diesel engines, was under the command of Captain John Pearson, but James Mutch was aboard, which meant that he was really in charge. The ship made good time crossing the Atlantic, but once she reached the Baffin shore ice prevented her from reaching the company post at Singaijaq (Cape Haven), so they made for the post manned by Kanaaka farther north.

The engines allowed the ship to force her way through the ice, but the ice crushed the stern-post and the vessel began to leak. The captain decided that he would have to beach her for repairs, and headed across Davis Strait to Sisimiut, then known as Holsteinborg. In the harbour there, the ship was beached and supported for repairs, but the supports gave way and the ship fell over, breaking its mast on the sheer rock alongside the harbour. The tide rose and filled the ship — the Vera was officially a wreck.

The crew spent the rest of the summer living in a hospital building across from the governor’s residence. They named it “Vera Villa.” (Today it is a day care. The name remains on a wooden plaque tucked up under the eves, forgotten by almost everyone in Sisimiut.) Eventually the crew were taken aboard a Danish vessel to Copenhagen, from where they made their way to Peterhead.

Failure of the Vera to reach any of Sabellum’s posts was a tragedy for the Inuit and for the company, for it meant that no new trade goods reached the posts. But, earlier in 1922, another tragedy had befallen some of the Inuit associated with the company at Kivitoo. An Inuk, Niaqutsiaq, had been caught up by religious fervour, and ordered two of his supporters to kill two other men. They followed his orders. More loss of life might well have ensued had not another man shot and killed Niaqutsiaq.

It appears that the men on the Vera never heard about this tragedy. Ice had prevented them from making contact with Inuit on the Baffin coast. This was also the last voyage for the veteran trader and ice-master, James Mutch. He was now 75 years old, and began his well-earned retirement in Peterhead. He died in 1931 in South Africa.

In 1923 Hector Pitchforth returned to Baffin Island. It would be his final trip, a voyage from which there would be no return to England.

Next Week – The Last Days of Hector Pitchforth

Taissumani recounts a specific event of historic interest. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.