Peary and Frederick Cook over which, if either, of them had first reached the top of the world. In 1910 Whitney chartered a steamship, SS Beothic, for a cruise to the Arctic, and engaged Bartlett as the captain . Bob Bartlett shook his head watching, as the party of sportsmen shot polar bears, musk ox and walrus at random. The captain would later describe it as "hunting, if you can call it that." When they returned, the newspapers were full of stories about British Captain Robert Scott's attempt, already under way, to be fi rst to reach the South Pole, now that the race to the North Pole had supposedly been decided. Whitney announced to the press that he and Captain Bartlett were planning an expedition to overtake Scott and plant the American fla g atop the southern pole. The Stars and Stripes would wave both at the top and bottom of the earth! Whether or not Bartlett was aware of the scheme, it did not m aterialize. Sadly, Scott and his party perished in their quest. Harry Whitney, who could recount any number of hunting exploits to breathless table companions, was a favo rite on the society circuit. H e added to the attraction by introducing at his club dinners the colorful Newfoundland captain, who had his own stock of tales of adventure in the high Arctic. Bartlett was an obliging friend ; when Whitney married Eunice C hesebro Kenison in 1916, Captain Bob was an usher at the wedding.
It was now a dozen years later when Whitney wrote this letter. H e knew it would not be sent until he reached Seattle, but writing helped to pass the time. Their days onboard were not all tedium; when the ship transited through the Panama Canal, Captain Bar tlett received an invitation to visit the governor of the Canal Authority. H e took H arry Whitney with him , and they were lunch guests of Governor Burgess and his wife at the splendid Governor's House. After that it was a return to the rigors of life aboard a small sailing vessel. When he sat down to write the letter, he had been onboard for fifty-six days since they left New York. H e wrote to Ketchum that they had been living on an unva ried diet of canned food , and that he had to brush his teeth wi th salt water after kegs of fresh water were stove in during a storm. Storms and gales of wind, he said, had persisted since they left the Doldrums near the Equator. He wrote of a three-day storm that was "about all the old Morrissey could stand." By contrast, Captain Bob later described the sam e cruise as one of pure bliss: "I don't pretend to be able to describe the beauty of that trip," he wro te, ".. . the gorgeo us colors of the sunset and sunrise ... And in the midst of it all, a tiny speck, the Morrissey, plodding along to the northward." Bartlett did mention one episode that lent a discordant note to his idyllic cruise.
Harry Whitney's decision to sail aboard the Morrissey with Captain Bartlett to the Pacific Northwest was one he made folly understanding the nature ofthe voyage, as he had traveled with Bartlett to andfrom Greenland in 1908-09 with the Robert E. Peary polar expedition, and in 1910 aboard SS Beothic. Although he was a passenger, life on board a sailing vessel outfittedfor a polar expedition was hardly lux urious. The vessel and decks were jam packed with supplies and equipment, and the schooner operated under sail most ofthe time to conserve foe!.
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SEA HISTORY 151 , SUMMER 2015
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