Taissumani: March 9, 1955 – Matthew Henson: the end of the trail that is always new

KENN HARPER

The question of who discovered the North Pole is an ongoing controversy. It is marred by sometimes vicious partisan debate, invective and occasional nonsense by the supporters of the establishment’s man, Robert E. Peary, and the underdog, Frederick Cook. Cook claimed to have been first to reach the elusive spot in April 1908. Peary denounced Cook as a fraud, and claimed that he reached it first almost a year later, in April 1909.

The debate has been muddied in recent years by the forces of political correctness. Cook was accompanied by two Inuit, Ittukusuk and Aapilak. Peary’s companions were four Inuit, Uutaaq, Ukkujaaq, Iggiannguaq and Sigluk, and one African-American, Matthew Henson. The forces of political correctness have coalesced around the figure of Henson, one of the Arctic’s greatest travelers.

Matthew Henson was born in 1866 in Maryland. Orphaned at 13, he went to sea the same year, and was fortunate to attract the attention of the captain, who recognized the boy’s innate intelligence and taught him reading, writing and navigation. At the age of 21, working in Washington, D.C., Henson met Robert Peary, then a young naval lieutenant, and agreed to accompany him on a surveying expedition to Nicaragua. This was the start of Henson’s long association with Peary. In 1891 he accompanied Peary to northwestern Greenland on an expedition that was the first of many and that would culminate in Peary’s “assault” on the Pole in 1909.

Peary was insufferably arrogant. A biographer once wrote that “many in Peary’s command used to return hating him in a way that murder couldn’t gratify.” He also believed in the supremacy of the white race, believing that Henson and the Inuit were inferior to him. Once he berated Henson for not calling him “Sir” often enough, and wrote that Henson was “as subject to my will as the fingers of my hand.” His opinion of the Inuit was no more complimentary; he felt that “although they were not qualified to lead, they could follow another’s lead and drive dogs much better than any white man.”

Peary may not have respected Henson for anything but his abilities on the trail, but the Inughuit of northern Greenland loved and admired him. He is remembered as an excellent dog driver and the only member of Peary’s expeditions, despite all their years in the Arctic, to learn to speak the local language with native fluency. They gave him a name, Maripaluk, by which he is remembered in north Greenland to this day.

On Peary’s final dash for the Pole, he sent back all his supporting parties to his base camp on Ellesmere Island, proceeding to his final destination with only Henson and the four Inuit. He sent back the last white member of his supporting parties, the ship’s captain, Bob Bartlett, because he was unwilling to share the glory of reaching the Pole with another white man but didn’t mind sharing it with members of what he viewed as inferior races.

Herein lies the irony. In recent years, African-American writers have made the case that Matthew Henson may have been the first person at the North Pole. The reasoning is this: Peary was virtually crippled, many of his toes amputated and his feet badly frostbitten. He rode on the sled while Henson walked ahead. Henson himself wrote, “I who had walked know that we made exceptional distances those five days. So did the Eskimos, for they also walked. Lieutenant Peary… had ridden the sledges the greater part of the journey…” Thus, if Peary reached the North Pole, Henson reached it first.

The result of this reasoning is that those who claim that Henson was the first man at the Pole must also be supporters of Robert Peary, the racist who denigrated Henson’s abilities in everything but sled travel. In doing so, many claim that there was an unspoken bond of friendship and respect between the two men. It’s wishful thinking, not supported by the evidence.

Matthew Henson left a child in the Arctic, a boy named Anaukkaq, his son from a loving relationship with a woman named Aqattannguaq. When I first met Anaukkaq in the 1970s he was an elderly man with an insatiable curiousity about his father, the legendary Maripaluk. He asked what I knew of him and whether he had had any children in the South.

What I learned was the long and sad conclusion of the life of the legendary explorer. The glory was all for Peary. Henson found a job as a parking lot attendant in Brooklyn, and later as a messenger at the U. S. Customs House in New York City. Eventually it dawned on a changing world that this man was a hero. In 1945 he received a medal for his work on Peary’s expedition. In 1954 President Eisenhower received Henson and his wife, Lucy, at the White House. Similar honours were never accorded the four Inuit who had helped Peary achieve his farthest north. The following year, Matthew Henson died on March 9 of a cerebral hemorrhage. He was 88.

In 1988 Matthew Henson, in death, was again honoured by the nation he had served. His body was disinterred from his grave in the Bronx and reburied, with full honours, in Arlington National Cemetery, where Peary’s body had lain since 1920. On his tombstone are inscribed his own words, “The lure of the Arctic is tugging at my heart. To me the trail is calling. The old trail. The trail that is always new.”

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History recounts a specific event of historic interest, whose anniversary is in the coming week. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.