Secret Arctic. A forgotten mystery of the Arctic
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In 1931, cooperation between the USSR and Germany was no longer as broad as two or three years earlier, but it was still very active in many areas of science, technology and industrial production. The countries also cooperated in the military field. Therefore, the Soviet leadership and state security representatives did not see anything reprehensible in the invitation received from the German aeronaut Eckener to a number of Soviet scientists to take part in the Arctic air expedition.
The famous German aeronaut and designer of airships, who were then predicted to have a great future, Dr. Hugo Eckener (1868–1954) arrived in Leningrad on June 25, 1931 on the huge airship “Graf Zeppelin”. The northern capital of Russia greeted him and forty-two other German researchers with orchestras and great enthusiasm. Much was written about the upcoming expedition in newspapers and broadcast on the radio.
Eckener planned to go from Leningrad over the ice of the Barents Sea to Franz Josef Land, from there to Severnaya Zemlya, then fly over the Taimyr Peninsula and Lake Taimyr, head for Novaya Zemlya, and from there return to Berlin. The Soviet leadership gave permission for flights over the territory of the USSR. In those years, there lay an absolutely deserted wilderness, devoid not only of any industry, but even practically of human habitation, a wilderness. Moreover, the terrain is inaccessible even for aviation and airships, and navigation in northern waters has always been a difficult and dangerous matter. Therefore, in the USSR they believed that no one could find out any secrets there, and geographical maps exist regardless of the flights of Graf Zeppelin.
The Germans invited the former head of the polar expedition on the icebreaker Krasin, which took place in 1928, the famous professor R. L. Samoilovich, aerology specialist Professor P. A. Molchanov, engineer F. F. Assberg and radio operator of the highest qualifications of E. T. Krenkel. All of them received the go-ahead from the Soviet authorities to cooperate with the Germans in exploring the Arctic - the country's leadership also had considerable interest in information about the inaccessible northern region, which conceals in its depths many different riches.
Before the flight, the Graf Zeppelin airship was quite thoroughly modified in Leningrad to prepare it for work in the Arctic. Some of the equipment was removed from the airship, but to make it possible to land on water, the bottom of the gondola was made waterproof and additional floats were installed, like on seaplanes. In addition, they added scientific equipment and cameras for perspective and vertical aerial photography and installed additional radio navigation equipment, without which there was simply nothing to do in Arctic conditions at that time.
Finally, all the work was completed and the “Graf Zeppelin” headed across the Barents Sea to Franz Josef Land, where in Tikhaya Bay the icebreaker “Malygin” was already waiting for the arrival of the airship to exchange mail - then this served as the most reliable way of communication in the vast Arctic expanses. The journey from Leningrad to Franz Josef Land took the airship about a day and a half. In Tikhaya Bay he landed on the water for a very short time. Then he got up again and continued the flight along a predetermined route: just in case, the Soviet authorities and state security agencies firmly insisted on strict adherence to the pre-agreed and laid out route.
Later, Professor Samoilovich said and wrote that in almost five days of flight on the Graf Zeppelin airship, it was possible to do such scientific work and achieve such results, which under normal conditions would have required expeditions on icebreakers for several years.
Below, under the airship, completely unexplored areas of the Arctic lay covered with unmelting snow, and members of the expedition continuously conducted aerial photography of the coast, aerological and meteorological observations, took measurements of geomagnetic anomalies, which is very important for navigation, and studied the patterns of ice movement. Previously completely unknown islands abandoned in deserted spaces were mapped. At the end of the expedition, the airship arrived in Berlin without any incident.
At that time there was the International Society for Arctic Exploration. On behalf of this international organization, the Germans soon published a scientific report on the air expedition, richly illustrating it with many photographs. In the country of socialism, the research results of a joint scientific expedition with the Germans to the Arctic were practically not covered either in the general press or in scientific publications.
Now it is difficult to prove irrefutably that the expedition started by Eckener was not at all purely scientific and was not inspired by the German General Staff. However, it can be assumed with a high degree of probability that among the more than forty crew members of the Graf Zeppelin airship who arrived in Leningrad from Berlin, there were probably purely military specialists and intelligence officers who were extremely interested in obtaining information about the Arctic territories of the USSR. This is confirmed by the fact that the German General Staff, the naval forces and, in particular, Admiral Karl Dönitz, who was appointed commander of the German submarine fleet in 1939, did not fail to take advantage of the results of the German-Soviet Arctic “scientific” expedition when developing plans for military operations in the northern communications.
Here it is necessary to pay tribute to Soviet intelligence - albeit not in all details, but the Center became aware of the developments of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht and the German Navy, as well as the sources of their information. There was no longer any possibility left to prevent the Germans, and Professor Samoilovich answered for the “expedition” to the security officers: he was repressed as a spy of the Germans and an “enemy of the people.”
Meanwhile, Admiral Dönitz developed an original, bold and detailed doctrine for submarine operations in the northern seas. It should be noted that among the senior officers of the German Navy, Karl Dönitz was the only convinced National Socialist, loyal to the Fuhrer to the point of fanaticism and enjoying his complete trust: it was not for nothing that in 1945, before his death, Hitler appointed Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz as his successor .
The admiral also tirelessly built up his submarine fleet. In 1935, Germany had only eleven small submarines, and supporters of a “large” surface fleet treated submarines with a certain degree of contempt and distrust. But the stubborn Dönitz saw a great future in them and, as time has shown, he was completely right. He reported his doctrines personally to Adolf Hitler and received his approval and money. By the beginning of World War II, Germany already had fifty-seven well-armed submarines in service, and during the war years the Germans managed to build one thousand one hundred and fifty-three submarines, which sank three thousand Allied ships and two hundred warships.
At the insistence of Dönitz, special submarines were built for war in the Arctic and navigation in the northern seas near the coast - they have their own specific navigation features. Quite naturally, these boats needed special reliable bases for refueling, resting the crews, repairing the chassis and hull, as well as replenishing ammunition and ensuring stable communications with the command and exchange of mail. In the end, even with a significant amount - more than eight thousand miles! - the range of action of German submarines, they still could not sail indefinitely.
Dönitz put forward an extremely bold idea, based on the results of the “scientific” expedition of Eckener-Samoilovich to the Arctic: to create secret bases for German submarines on deserted islands at the mouths of rivers in Soviet northern territory. At that time, it was practically uninhabited and the border of the state was actually not guarded there - from whom should we protect the vast deserted spaces covered with eternal ice, terribly far from other powers?
The admiral’s daring idea became very relevant when allied convoys went to Murmansk, and the Nazis were faced with the task of cutting this artery, which supplied warring Russia with military equipment, food and strategic materials, at all costs. The convoys were subjected to constant air attacks, they were guarded by German raiders and... submarines hiding in secret Arctic bases, putting the sea hunters trying to destroy them at a dead end. The submarines disappeared, and no one could then understand where?
Admirals Dönitz and Raeder were completely confident that the secret submarine bases would not be discovered by Soviet aviation and sailors, and they should be reliably protected from enemy intelligence by the Abwehr. The construction of the necessary structures - buried in ice or even permafrost - was carried out by Todt's department. In 1942, Dönitz moved his headquarters to Paris and from there directed work in the Arctic. It is clear that the German submariners could not manage with one super-secret base; they required several such objects, which, in the event of the sudden discovery and destruction of one or more of them, could duplicate each other. The builders were transported to the work site by submarine, as were the materials necessary for the construction of the facilities. And the Germans already had sufficient experience of construction in snow and ice - during the First World War, German, Italian and Austrian troops fought in the ice in the Alps, building tunnels, bunkers in glaciers and cutting long galleries.
Discovering such secret submarine bases was indeed a very difficult matter - the Third Reich knew how to reliably keep its innermost secrets, and during the war period, Soviet planes practically did not fly over remote areas of the Arctic. Fuel was in short supply, everything was used for the front and for victory, and what should planes do where there were no shipping routes and no housing?
Most likely, the Soviet state security agencies received information about the secret bases of German submarines in the Arctic only after the victory, while actively working with prisoners of war, who no longer had anything to hide, or they found out everything about this unexpected move of Admiral Karl Dönitz from captured secret trophy documents. However, the Soviet special services also know how to keep their secrets, and the presence of German bases in our northern rear dealt a terrible, almost irreparable blow to the prestige of state security: why would you miss such a thing under your nose! Therefore, neither side officially acknowledged the existence of secret bases.
In the early 60s of the 20th century, on one of the islands at the mouth of the Lena, local residents allegedly discovered a long-abandoned German secret base. They even planned to send an expedition there with the participation of journalists, but the collapse of the USSR began and everyone had no time for secret Nazi bases.
On the coast of the Kara and Barents seas, in the vicinity of Tiksi and on Taimyr, many iron barrels are found that have remained since the time of the American Lend-Lease, but among them there are no, no, and there are barrels with a white spread out eagle clutching a wreath with a swastika in its talons - markings of the Nazi Wehrmacht. Where did they come from? Did the sea really bring it?
Geologists told how on the coast of Taimyr, in the permafrost, they found plaques with swastikas from German naval belts, spoons “decorated” with swastikas and other utensils made of aluminum: it was a very popular metal among the Germans. Did the sea also bring all this into the permafrost?
The Arctic, the North, unknown distances... They have always attracted romantics seeking the unknown, scientific researchers seeking to discover new lands.
This year marks the anniversary of two Arctic expeditions and the 160th anniversary of the birth of the legendary polar explorer Baron Eduard Toll. These expeditions are connected with Yakutia, with its Arctic zone.
The Second Kamchatka (Great Northern) Expedition - the largest Russian expedition of the 18th century, lasted from 1733 to 1743. It took place under the command of Vitus Bering. Its goals were a comprehensive study of Siberia, clarification of state borders in the East of Russia, studying the possibilities of navigation on the Arctic Ocean, resolving the issue of the existence of a strait between North Asia and America, searching for routes to Japan and the shores of North-West America. These tasks were solved mainly by the Marine detachments of the expedition under the leadership of V. Valton, V. V. Pronchishchev, A. I. Chirikov, M. P. Shpanberg, brothers Khariton and Dmitriev Laptev and others.
The expedition also included an Academic detachment, which was engaged in a comprehensive natural science and historical-geographical description of Siberia and its peoples. The Academic team included professors - historians G.F. Miller and I.E. Fisher, naturalists I.G. Gmelin and G.V. Steller, astronomer L. Delisle de la Croyère, translators, students, including Stepan Krasheninnikov, subsequently the first Russian professor of natural history and botany of the Academy of Sciences.
The Great Northern Expedition for the first time made an inventory of individual sections of the coast of the Arctic Ocean, confirmed the existence of a strait between Asia and America, discovered and mapped the Southern Kuril Islands, examined the coast of Kamchatka, the Sea of Okhotsk and individual sections of the coast of Japan.
Many species of flora and fauna were described and sketched, among them there are now extinct ones, the most famous of which is the “Steller's cow”.
Based on the results of the expedition, the world-famous works of G.F. Miller were published - “History of Siberia”, “Description of the Siberian Kingdom and all the affairs that happened in it from the beginning, and especially from its conquest by the Russian state to this day”, “Description of the Tomsk district of the Tobolsk province in Siberia in its current situation, in October 1734." and other works.
Studies by I.G. Gmelin were published - “Siberian flora”, “Travel through Siberia from 1741 to 1743”, S.P. Krasheninnikov - “Description of the land of Kamchatka”.
75 years since the start of the First Kolyma Geological Exploration Expedition.
On July 4, 1928, the first Kolyma geological exploration expedition landed on the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, near the village of Ola. It was headed by engineer-geologist Yuri Bilibin. The result of Yu.A. Bilibin’s expedition of 1928-1929 was the discovery of industrial gold-bearing areas in the areas of the Utina River, the Kholodny and Yubileiny springs, which became the main gold mining sites in Kolyma until 1933. Gold was also discovered in other valleys, and some patterns of its distribution and the geological structure of the area began to become clear. Bilibin put forward a hypothesis about the existence of a gold-bearing zone here hundreds of kilometers long.
The third anniversary date is associated with the name of Baron Eduard Toll, a famous polar explorer, zoologist and geologist, a man with a mysterious fate. This is the 160th anniversary of the birth of this scientist and traveler. Today we will pay our attention to this researcher.
The mysterious disappearance of Eduard Toll in the Arctic ice still remains a mystery for two centuries... Eduard Toll devoted his entire life to searching for the legendary Sannikov Land.
The first to see this unknown, uncharted land was the merchant and mammoth ivory collector Yakov Sannikov from Yakutia. This happened in 1810 during the first Russian expedition to the New Siberian Islands. From the northern tip of Kotelny Island, Sannikov clearly saw high stone mountains located at a distance of 70 miles.
And it was not a hallucination or a mirage. Firstly, the fact of the “vision” was officially certified by the head of the expedition, collegiate registrar Matvey Gedenshtrom. Secondly, Sannikov was an experienced person, capable of distinguishing a mirage from a real picture. It was they who discovered three islands of the Novosibirsk archipelago - Stolbovoy, Faddevsky, Bunge Land.
Ten years later, with the specific goal of exploring Sannikov Land, an expedition was equipped under the command of naval lieutenant Pyotr Fedorovich Anzhu. But Anjou did not find any land, although he was armed with excellent optical tubes. Having wandered with dog sled guides in the area where Gedenstrom had marked “Sannikov’s Land” with a dotted line, he returned to St. Petersburg with nothing.
However, they did not stop searching for Sannikov Land, although it was believed that no land existed north of the New Siberian Islands. And suddenly, in 1881, the American George DeLong discovered an archipelago of small islands located much north of the dotted line drawn by Gedenstrom.
A new round of searches began for a land that could conceal priceless treasures. These primarily included mammoth tusks.
There was a number of evidence that Sannikov Land could have unique natural and climatic characteristics. For example, in the fall, polar geese from the northern coast flew not to the south, but to the north, approximately in the direction of Sannikov Land. And with the onset of the warm period they returned with offspring. The mythology of indigenous peoples should not be discounted. According to ancient legends, far in the north there was a “mainland of mammoths”, where they grazed freely in green meadows. However, evil underground forces intervened in this happiness, destroying the idyll.
De Long's discovery spurred American industrialists who began to create a joint stock company to develop northern resources. Naturally, Russia could not help but react to this.
In 1885, a research expedition led by Baltic Fleet medic Alexander Bunge was sent to distant shores. Zoologist and geologist Baron Eduard Vasilyevich Toll was appointed his assistant. Russia was in a hurry to formalize its right to the legendary Land.
On August 13, 1886, Toll, standing on the same shore of the same island as Sannikov, saw the same mountains and literally became ill with the thought of searching for an unknown land. He saw these massifs quite clearly, determined the distance to them (about 160 kilometers), and did not even allow the thought that there, in the distance, were only ice blocks. For many years, Baron Toll built a theoretical proof of his theory.
The next expedition, led by Toll, took place in 1893. And finally, on July 4, 1900, Eduard Vasilyevich set off from Kronstadt on the whaling ship Zarya to put an end to the protracted dispute about the existence of Sannikov Land. He was absolutely sure of its reality.
The expedition was well prepared, helped by 150 thousand rubles in gold allocated by the Ministry of Finance. Young scientists were recruited - energetic enthusiasts for studying the Far North. The most advanced equipment and equipment were purchased. The food supply allowed autonomous existence for up to three years.
Toll, considered one of the leading experts in the field of practical research of the circumpolar territories, was perfectly suited to the role of leader of the expedition. He looked with great interest for answers to the mysteries of the recent geological past: did a continent exist in the area of the modern New Siberian Islands, when and why did it break up, why did mammoths become extinct?
The voyage of Toll's expedition lasted three years. Toll was sure that the land Sannikov saw really existed. But Eduard Vasilyevich could not fulfill his dream.
Having remained to spend the winter on one of the islands, he planned to resume his search in the spring. Toll's group, without waiting for the schooner "Zarya", decided to independently move south towards the continent, but further traces of these four people have not yet been discovered.
In 1903, a search expedition led by Admiral Alexander Kolchak discovered Toll's site on Bennett Island, his diaries and other materials.
In his diary, Toll announced his departure. Since then, no one has seen either him or the people who were with him. Many mystics associate the mysterious disappearance of Eduard Toll and three other scientists with the mysterious Sannikov Land.
Toll's diary, according to his will, was given to his widow. Emmeline Toll published her husband's diary in 1909 in Berlin. In the USSR, it was published in a greatly truncated form, translated from German in 1959.
Another scientist was fascinated by the idea of searching for the mysterious land of Sannikov. This was Vladimir Obruchev - a major scientist, holder of the Order of St. Vladimir, 4th degree, Lenin and Red Banner of Labor, academician, geologist, paleontologist and geographer, researcher of Siberia and Central Asia, author of numerous scientific works and textbooks on geology, which have remained relevant until our days.
The northern Yakuts have a myth about a mysterious warm land, lost somewhere far away in the Arctic Ocean. Birds fly there every year to winter and the Onkilons went there - a semi-legendary people who allegedly lived on the territory of Chukotka, and then were expelled by other tribes to the islands of the Arctic Ocean. Obruchev combined this beautiful fairy tale with reports about Sannikov Land and the truly unresolved question of migratory birds that return after wintering with their offspring.
At the very beginning of the twentieth century, Obruchev worked on a geological and geographical expedition in Yakutia. From local residents, Vladimir Afanasyevich heard a mysterious legend about a flowering land located among the endless expanses of the Arctic Ocean. They said that the presence of a warm oasis in the coldest ocean is indicated by flocks of migratory birds that annually fly north at certain times towards the snow-covered and deserted expanses of the Arctic. It was in that direction, according to local residents, that the Onkilon tribe once went.
Since Obruchev was primarily a scientist, he had to present the legend in such a way as not to contradict scientific data. As a result, his Sannikov Land remained warm and fertile due to the fact that it was formed by volcanic activity, and this volcano had not yet cooled down. Together with the Onkilons, there live Wampus - people from the Paleolithic - and fossil animals led by mammoths. This is how the novel “Sannikov’s Land, or the Last Onkilons” appeared.
In 1924, Obruchev completed work on the novel “The Land of Sannikov, or the Last Onkilons.” But it was just a novel - the fantasy of a talented writer. But the plot was still based on real events. The prototype of the main character may have been the scientist, Arctic explorer, and talented geologist Eduard Vasilyevich Toll.
But what did Sannikov and Toll actually see? Mirage? Pile of ice floes? The most popular theory now is that they actually saw an island of fossil ice that melted before its discovery. This is confirmed by the fate of two other islands of the Novosibirsk archipelago - Vasilievsky and Semyonovsky. They were discovered at the beginning of the 19th century and completely disappeared by the 30-50s of the 20th century.
The search for Sannikov Land did not stop in the 20th century. There are modern legends about this amazing Earth, exciting the fantasies of researchers and our time. At various times, inexplicable notes began to appear in the press. Whether there is some truth in them or whether they are fiction, we will not judge, we will simply consider these myths of our days.
In the middle of the 20th century, military specialists tried to reach Sannikov Land. For their hikes they use the northern mode of transport - reindeer and dog sleds. There were several of these attempts. All expedition participants claim that they saw this uncharted land from afar. But every time an insurmountable obstacle arose in their path in the form of a huge hole. Until now, this mythical land remains inaccessible to researchers.
There are stories among sailors that confirm the legends about an inhabited island in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. Only this can explain the finds of various objects floating from the direction of the Pole. And this was at a time when there was not a single expedition to this area. Polar travelers unanimously talk about the fact that temperatures increase as they move towards the Pole. Another amazing phenomenon: among the solid ice, huge open spaces of water suddenly appear, completely free of ice cover.
Of course, modern space technology makes it possible to take a very good picture of any territory on the surface of the Earth. There are such photographs and Poles. Strange shadows are visible on them. The Americans assumed that these were Russian military facilities. The surprising thing is that it was not possible to find these “shadows,” but they are visible from space.
Not only Russian researchers were engaged in the search for “Sannikov Land”. So, in the twentieth century, an amazing report was received by the British Admiralty. British sailors landed on one of the Scottish islands. Unusual events happened to them. Suddenly people who didn't look like the English appeared. Quite strange things began to happen to the consciousness and vision of the sailors. They managed to return safely to the ship, but were completely demoralized.
In addition, according to the testimony of a famous pilot who flew over the Pole in the 30s, he saw a large green oasis among the polar ice. No one believed his story; they assumed that the pilot had seen a mirage.
Participants of the American expedition, having found the ruins of an ancient city on one of the Arctic islands, believed that they had found traces of the mythical Atlantis or the so-called Arctida - an island where an ancient highly developed civilization lived. In their report, the travelers described the structures they found. These include houses, temples, palaces and cultural sites. Although most of the buildings are under a layer of eternal ice and only the tops of the buildings are visible, scientists believe that they were built several thousand years ago. It is very difficult to carry out excavations in Arctic conditions, but, according to experts, the architectural style of the city is reminiscent of ancient Greek. Perhaps this city was built at a time when there was a subtropical climate and was a paradise.
Recently, scientists have found that a so-called fusion strip often appears near the mainland and large islands. According to observations, such a confluence strip often occurs in the Laptev Sea, not far from Tiksi. This optical phenomenon occurs in three places: off the coast of the mainland, near the New Siberian Islands and north of the Archipelago. That is, exactly where the merchant Sannikov first saw the new Earth, later called Sannikov Land. Given this discovery, we can say with a high degree of probability that Sannikov Land does not exist.
There is also a Tibetan legend about the White Island. It says that this island is the only territory that will escape the fate of all continents. It cannot be destroyed by fire or water - this is the Eternal Earth.
It is possible that it was this land that the merchant and Christian writer Cosmas Indikoplovtus spoke about in the sixth century after the Nativity of Christ in his theological and cosmographic treatise “Christian Topography”. He argued that in the North there was a land where human life originated.
Helena Blavatsky believed that the land of Sannikov was that polar country inhabited by creatures living for ten thousand years. There are no diseases here, and the people living on this earth are perfect.
It is surprising that many travelers have seen Sannikov Land, but no one has been able to set foot on its shores. What do the prophets say about this?
Nostradamus wrote that a select few would live beyond the Arctic Circle, the rest near the Equator. There will be no politics in the lives of these people.
The medieval prophet and astrologer Ragno Nero wrote in his manuscript of predictions “The Eternal Book” that the time would come when the ice would melt in the North and a flowering land would appear there. Or maybe Sannikov Land is this mysterious land?
This mysterious Earth still excites the imagination of many.
In connection with these significant dates, within the framework of the “Arctic Days in Neryungri”, the department of local history literature of the Neryungri Library held the event “Arctic. Autograph on the map", where readers got acquainted with the history of the development of the northern lands and met with representatives of the indigenous peoples of the Arctic represented by students of the Arctic School of Education, heard the ancient speech of the peoples of the North, fascinating songs and legends of distant times.
Varvara KORYAKINA, leading librarian of the local history literature department of the Neryungri City Library.
Chapter 10
SECRETS OF THE ARCTIC
From the high cape of Fligel, the northernmost point of Franz Josef Land, the Austrian polar explorer Julius Payer saw on April 11, 1875 the blue mountains of the island, which he called “Petermann Land, in honor of the great geographer, my friend and teacher.” To the northwest of Rudolf Island, Payer mapped the contours of another island - King Oscar Land. However, no one after Payer managed to discover either the Peterman Lands or the King Oscar Lands. The same fate befell the Eskimo Takupuka Land, which he saw northwest of the Alaskan coast, Bradley Land and Cracker Land, indicated on maps north of the islands of the Canadian Arctic archipelago, Peasant Island in the area of Wrangel Island, Gillis Land “a large island to north of Spitsbergen, whitening in the distance like the magical castles of the northern saga.” Most likely, these were mirages and not real islands in the ocean. However, reports about Andreev Land and Sannikov Land cannot in any way be considered an optical illusion and the fruit of a mirage.
In 1763, Sergeant Stepan Andreev was sent to check information about the islands lying north of the mouth of the Kolyma, covered with many bear tracks, with a fortress “established by unknown people.” He reached the islands, later called Bear Islands. Although they were uninhabited, everywhere Andreev encountered traces left by people: yurts dug into the ground, collapsed dugouts, and even a fortress made “with great labor... it was only built not by Russian people, but by others, but it is impossible to know which ones.” On the easternmost of the Bear Islands, Andreev and his companions “went up to the top of the mountain and looked in all directions. In the midday direction you can see the Holomenit stone, which, according to our reasoning, is the Kolyma stone, and to the left, on the eastern side, you can barely see, the blue is turning blue, or to name what kind of rabble: what it is, land or sea, I can’t convey in detail in the original "
The next year, Andreev with five Cossacks again headed to the Bear Islands and, having climbed to the top of the mountain of Four-Pillar Island, saw on a clear sunny day the same “sin”, or “rabble”, and he and his people “sat down to the designated place.” On the sixth day of the sleigh run across the frozen sea, “the island was quite large.” There are no mountains or standing forest visible on it, it is low-lying, with one end to the east and the other to the west, and in length, for example, it is about seventy miles.” Andreev and his companions headed to the “western head” of the island, however, “without reaching there 20 miles, they ran into fresh tracks of an excellent number on reindeer and on sleighs of unknown peoples and, being sparsely populated, returned to Kolyma.”
Based on Andreev’s report, Lieutenant Colonel F. X. Plenisnir, who decided to find out the question of the large island stretching from the mouth of the Yenisei to the mouth of the Kolyma, drew up a map. The Bear Islands were shown there. Andreev's land to the east of them, the fantastic outlines of the "American Motherland with a standing forest of land" and the land of Kitigen (or Tikigen), on which the "Hrohai reindeer people" live, as the Chukchi Daurkin informed Plenisnir. To establish contacts with the “reindeer people” and describe the Land - Andreev, in the spring of 1769, three warrant officers-surveyors I. Leontyev, I. Lysov and A. Pushkarev set off on dog sleds. To begin with, they took a survey of the Bear Islands, because Sergeant Andreev “due to ignorance of the sciences, what position they had on the map, could not explain.” From the easternmost of these islands they set out in search of Andreev Land... and, having traveled about 300 kilometers across the ice on dogs, they did not find any land.
However, surveyors in their search were guided by an inaccurate map of Plenisnir and looked for Andreev Land in the north-east direction, while it should have been looked for in the north-west. In 1785, Gabriel Sarychev, exploring the northeastern shores of Siberia, wrote in the ship’s log that when the ship was at Baranov Kamen, the ice conditions indicated that there should be some kind of land nearby: “Opinion about the existence of hardened land in the north confirms the southwest wind that occurred on June 22, which blew with cruelty for two days. By its force, of course, the ice should have been carried far to the north, if something had not prevented this. Instead, the next day we saw the entire sea covered with ice. Captain Shmelev told me that he heard from the Chukchi about the hardened land lying to the north, not far from the Shelagsky Nose, that it is inhabited and that the Shelag Chukchi sometimes move there in one day over the ice on reindeer in the winter.”
But it was not possible to discover this inhabited and “hardened”, that is, not composed of ice, land, just as M. M. Gedenshtrom, who explored the islands between the mouths of the Lena and Kolyma, did not find land in the Baranov Kamen area. “Having traveled 150 versts,” Gedenstrom reported, “we began to come across blocks of earth on ice floes. This land was of a completely different kind, like being located in the ravines of the hardened shore of Siberia. It completely resembled the land of New Siberia, although the remoteness of this place does not allow us to think that ice floes passed near the coast of New Siberia and tore these blocks from them. On May 1, we saw a flock of geese flying to the north-northeast, and a white eagle owl. Clouds were rising in the north. The depth of the sea, measured by me in the crevices, was constantly decreasing. All this proved the proximity of the earth. But we soon found insurmountable obstacles to continuing our path.” Gedenstrom's path was blocked by hummocks and ice holes, and he was forced to turn back, although his confidence in the reality of the earth was so great that Gedenstrom put Andreev's Land on the map.
In 1820, “to inventory the shores from the mouth of the Kolyma to the east of Cape Shelag and from it in the north to the discovery of inhabited land, which, according to the Chukchi legend, is not far away,” an expedition was sent under the command of two naval lieutenants - F, P. Wrangel and P. F. Anjou. They failed to discover Andreev’s Land - and yet, in the same 1823, when the expedition ended, a publication was published in the Sibirsky Vestnik magazine, from which it followed that other people, in addition to Andreev, had seen this land. “Other news proves that this land has inhabitants who call it Tikigen, and they themselves are known under the name of the Hrokhai and consist of two tribes. Some of them are bearded and look like Russians, others are of the Chukotka breed. Centurion Kobelev and interpreter Daurkin, who were with Billings’ expedition, confirmed Andreev’s description and even provided an outline of the land they saw.”
But the search for Andreev Land was in vain both in the past and in the present century. Neither the icebreakers nor the aircraft from which the search was carried out found her. No less mysterious is the disappearance of another land - Sannikov Land.
In 1805, while summering on Kotelny Island, Sannikov saw high mountains of an unknown land to the north of it. The following year, from the “High Cape” he noticed another land, or rather, “blue”, indicating that there should be land somewhere in the north-northeast. When Gedenstrom came to describe the islands of the Novosibirsk archipelago in 1810, Sannikov told him that from the northwestern coast of Kotelny Island “high stone mountains are visible at an approximate distance of 70 miles.” Gedenstrom himself saw Sineva, “completely similar to a distant land,” while standing on the Kamenny Cape of the island of New Siberia. Gedenstrom set out to this land on the ice, but a huge ice hole prevented him, and through the telescope he could only discern “a white ravine, dug by many streams.” But the next day it turned out that this was not land, but “a ridge of the highest ice masses.”
An expedition was sent to check Sannikov’s information under the command of Lieutenant (later Admiral) Pyotr Fedorovich Anzhu. For two years, from 1821 to 1823, the Anjou expedition described the northern coast of Siberia between the Olenek and Indigirka rivers and the Novosibirsk archipelago. Anjou himself walked about 10 thousand kilometers on dogs in the winter, and covered about four thousand kilometers on horses or with the help of boats in the summer. He discovered the small island of Figurina and the northern shore of Kotelny Island. Lieutenant Anjou did not see any land in the ocean north of the latter. Then he moved across the ice to the northwest, walked over 40 versts, but his path was also blocked by the same huge ice hole that prevented Sannikov and Gedenstrom.
The land, however, was not visible. And Anzhu decided that Yakov Sannikov saw only “fog that looked like earth.” But from the northwestern cape of Faddeevsky Island, Anzhu, like Sannikov, discerned blue, “exactly similar to the visible distant land.” The traces of deer that had gone towards this blue were also clearly visible. But this time, the ice hole blocked the researchers’ path.
In 1881, sixty years after Anisu, the crew of the American ship Jeannetta, drifting in the ice, discovered three islands northeast of the Novosibirsk archipelago, named Henrietta, Jeannetta and Bennett Island.
In 1885, a scientific expedition set off to the New Siberian Islands, which included the talented Russian scientist E.V. Toll.
On June 21, 1900, the ship “Zarya” set sail from the 17th line of Vasilyevsky Island, carrying 19 people with a supply of food for three years. “The expedition that I have been preparing for so long has begun! - Toll wrote in his diary that day. - It has begun. Is this the right word? When did it start? Was it in 1886, when I saw Sannikov Land, or in 1893, when on the Novosibirsk island of Kotelny, dreaming of Sannikov Land, I was going to give in to my desire and reach this land by dog sled? Was it the beginning after the first publication of my plan in 1896, or when I submitted a report to the Grand Duke from the ship “Ermak”. Konstantin? When was the beginning?
In the fall of 1900, “Zarya” had to spend the winter off the coast of Taimyr. In his diary, Toll was more than once annoyed at Anzhu, who only walked a dozen miles along deer tracks, apparently leading from Thaddeevsky Island to the north (although local residents claimed that the deer were looking for salt on the ice, and were not going to an unknown land at all). Only in August 1901, “Zarya” was able to set a course for the New Siberian Islands, but, having reached almost 80 degrees north latitude, due to impassable ice it was forced to turn south. “The shallow depths indicated the proximity of the earth,” Toll wrote in his diary, “but to this day it has not been visible.” The fogs were so dense that “it was possible to walk past Sannikov Land ten times without noticing it,” for “it was as if an evil polar wizard was teasing us.” The expedition had to winter again, this time on Kotelny Island. In early spring, when the Zarya was still captivated by ice, three members of the expedition headed to the island of New Siberia, and from there, in December 1902, they returned to the mainland. Toll himself, with the astronomer Seeberg and two industrialists, walked across the ice from Kotelny Island to Faddeevsky Island, from there they reached Cape Vysoky on the island of New Siberia and finally stopped on Bennett Island. In autumn, when the sea is free of ice. Toll and his companions were to be removed from this island by the Zarya.
Lieutenant F.A. Mathisen, who took command of the Zarya, had clear instructions from Toll: “As for the instructions regarding your task of removing me and the party from Bennett Island, I will only remind you of the rule known to you that you should always retain the freedom of action of the ship in surrounding its ice, since the loss of freedom of movement of the vessel deprives you of the opportunity to complete this task. The time limit when you can abandon further efforts to remove me from Bennett Island is determined by the moment when the entire fuel supply of up to 15 tons of coal on the Zarya has been used up.” The group exploring the island of New Siberia returned to the mainland in December 1902. And in the spring of the next year, 1903, the search for Toll and his companions began.
Rescuers found the wintering place of Toll and his companions. In a note addressed to the President of the Academy of Sciences, Toll spoke about the geology of Bennett Island, about its fauna and flora, about the birds flying over the island from north to south: “Due to the fogs, the land from where these birds came was just as invisible as during the past navigation of Sannikov Land.”
The last entry read:
“We’re heading south today. We have provisions for 14–20 days. Everyone is healthy. Pavel Köppen's lip.
26.X/8.XI 1902 E. Toll"
Since then, no one has been able to find traces of the missing expedition... Just like the Sannikov Land, the search for which cost the lives of the brave Russian explorer and three members of his squad.
In March 1941, the famous polar explorer I. I. Cherevichny discovered at 74 degrees north latitude in the East Siberian Sea an island with a wavy surface, clearly visible river beds, composed of ice rather than rocks. In 1945, pilot A. Titlov and navigator V. Akkuratov, walking at low altitude over an area of the ocean that no one had visited before, noticed a three-peaked mountain - an island... which actually turned out to be a huge iceberg, 30 kilometers long and 25 kilometers wide, surprisingly similar to “real” earth.
Here is what V. Akkuratov says about the discovery of this “island” on the pages of the magazine “Around the World” (N2 6, 1954): “On a sunny March night we were returning from the north. About 700 kilometers before Wrangel Island, our attention was suddenly drawn to the outline of an unknown land. There, far to the south, it was already deep night. Against the background of the dark, almost black southern part of the horizon, a huge hilly island, illuminated by the rays of the midnight sun, stood out especially sharply.” The plane was unable to land on the surface of this island due to deep snow. The coordinates of the island were determined from the air - 76 degrees north latitude, 165 degrees west longitude. An act on the discovery of a new land was also drawn up, which was signed by all crew members and scientists on board the plane.
“Two months later we were tasked with confirming the existence of this island. But we did not find it in the indicated location. Only a year later it was discovered much to the north-west. It turned out that it was a huge iceberg. It drifted from the shores of the Canadian archipelago and passed by Wrangel Island in the place where we mistook it for an island,” says Akkuratov. “The resemblance to the real island was truly amazing. Frozen river beds and rocks protruding from the snow were clearly visible on it, and only its steep banks were completely icy, but they also resembled the shores of the Franz Josef Land islands.” American pilots, who also observed it from the air, called this iceberg island “T-1” (from the English word “targit” - “target”).
It is very likely that a number of “closed lands” are just such giant iceberg islands. But the mystery of Sannikov Land and, possibly, Andreev Land is most likely associated with another phenomenon, and not at all with the drift of ice islands circling in the central part
Arctic basin, far from the shelf zone. In 1947, Professor V.N. Stepanov at the II All-Union Geographical Congress put forward the hypothesis that Sannikov Land and Andreev Land are not the fruit of a mirage or iceberg islands, but very real lands that cannot be found only because they ... melted because they were composed of fossil ice. Recent discoveries in the Arctic convincingly support just this explanation of the mysterious lands. On the shelf of the Arctic seas there are not only real islands composed of stone monoliths of continental rocks, and not only ice islands-icebergs, but another unique form of islands - fragments of the ice cover that bound the waters of the Arctic Ocean during the last glaciation, “covered” with soil, which They were brought here by dry winds from the mainland and the shelf, which in that era was also dry land.
Hitler hoped to find a way to the mysterious "Wonderland"
“” - such information published these days by many media outlets has attracted attention. Sensation? However, we received “intelligence” about this mysterious Nazi object several years ago thanks to a meeting with the famous Arctic explorer, historian, Doctor of Sciences Pyotr Boyarsky.
From him we were able to learn details about the German base set up on a distant northern island that belonged to the USSR.
Pyotr Viktorovich Boyarsky, who currently holds the post of adviser to the director of the Russian Research Institute of Cultural and Natural Heritage named after. D.S. Likhacheva, for many years has been leading the Marine Arctic Complex Expedition (MAEC), organized by this institute. It was during one of the expeditionary trips to the distant northern regions that Boyarsky managed to visit the site of the former Nazi Arctic base.
I first heard about this secret Nazi facility back in 1985 from the famous polar pilot Akkuratov,” Pyotr Vladimirovich recalled during our meeting. - He said that shortly after the end of the war, he once flew over Alexandra Land, part of the Franz Josef Land archipelago, and noticed an incomprehensible white rectangular spot off the coast against the backdrop of the rocky thawed tundra.
Intrigued by what they saw, the aviators decided to sit nearby and see what it was. When we came close to the mysterious spot, it became clear that it was the roof of a dugout, painted white. The door leading inside opened easily.
The pilots, turning on their hand-held flashlights, went inside and were dumbfounded. German uniforms are scattered on the couches, cans of canned food, spoons, bowls are in the middle of the table... And “Schmeissers” hang on the walls.
One got the feeling that soldiers of the Third Reich were still living here, who had literally left for a minute. In fact, the dugout had been uninhabited for a long time, but its appearance suggested that the Nazis had once left their shelter in great haste.
Historians know many facts about German actions to seize the Soviet Arctic.
The Nazis needed bases and weather stations to support raids of cruisers and submarines along the Northern Sea Route, explained Pyotr Boyarsky. - In addition, many of the top leadership of the Third Reich, as you know, were fond of all sorts of mysticism and held very peculiar views. Among them, for example, there was a belief that the Earth was hollow, and one could get inside it through ice caves found in the polar zones.
The Nazi “bonzes” knew about the existence of vast caves on Novaya Zemlya, on Franz Josef Land, and they were sure that this was the real path to the underground world. Therefore, the special maritime expeditions organized by the Reich to our Arctic rear had not only military, but also scientific research purposes.
Among others, there was a project coded as “Wonderland”. The talk was about creating a base on the island of Alexandra Land. The Germans carried out this operation in 1943. The Nazis called the weather station installed there “Treasure Hunter.” They delivered the necessary equipment, materials and supplies to the island on ships and submarines, and dropped some by parachute in special bomb-shaped containers.
According to Boyarsky, the assumption he heard from Akkuratov that the Germans were leaving their secret base in a hurry is fully confirmed by facts that were discovered later: “As far as I was able to find out, the Nazis urgently evacuated from Alexandra Land in July 1944. This did not happen for military-strategic reasons. The Nazis were let down by their own stomachs and lack of everyday knowledge about the rules of life in the Arctic.
These warriors once shot a polar bear and decided to feast on an exotic northern dish. However, the occupiers did not know that this bear meat must be cooked for a very long time. And in the end we got a severe stomach illness. They were so overwhelmed that they had to radio a plane and urgently take the entire team out of the base. They did not have time to find replacements for the evacuees in a hurry, but soon this became completely unnecessary. The last months of the war passed, Nazi Germany was no longer interested in the Arctic...”
In the mid-2000s, Pyotr Boyarsky managed to visit the site of the former Nazi base. Together with several MACE colleagues, he disembarked from the Somov expedition ship to examine what was left of the Treasure Hunter.
What we saw showed that the Germans were settling here for a long time. The location for the base was chosen very well - on the shore of a deep bay, adjacent to a vast strip of tundra, free of glacial shell. A little to the side there is a lake with fresh water. To protect the base from land, the Nazis laid minefields to the north and east of it. And on the side of the bay, a machine-gun pillbox was installed as cover, the ruins of which are still visible.
The huge amount of shoes and other equipment brought by the Germans to the island is surprising,” Pyotr Vladimirovich emphasized. - It seems that they intended to significantly expand this military base.
Some of the German supplies are still lying around on the territory of the former Treasure Hunter. In addition, I was told that in the 1960–1970s, when our border post appeared on Alexandra Land (it is located about 10–15 kilometers from the former Nazi special facility), its garrison removed a lot of usable ammunition from the abandoned fascist base. For a long time, the border guards used German boots, which they “inherited” from the war years.
In addition to the pillbox, the “Treasure Hunter” also preserved the remains of a house and a dugout... While exploring the territory of the German base, our scientists found several of those same bomb-like containers for aviation “parcels”. Scraps of old camouflage nets also survived, and inside the abandoned dugout there were sheets of books with Hitler’s speeches...
In fact, there may be even more German “souvenirs” from the war in these places. Indeed, strong winds often blow in the area of Franz Josef Land, and therefore some of the containers dropped by parachute could be carried away by the air flow far to the side.
An interesting find awaited us closer to the shore of the bay. Here we saw some kind of pipe going deep into the earth. Perhaps this is part of the ventilation system of some secret structure. It is impossible to exclude the existence of a natural grotto, which the Germans managed to find and adapt for their purposes.
I fully admit that the dimensions of this cavity in the bowels of the stone island are so large that submarines could enter it. At least the existence of similar huge caves on other Arctic islands, connected to the sea by underwater corridors, is known. And in German sources there is information that they managed to find such caves in the north and even launch their submarines in them.
Such natural bunkers are very convenient for arranging secret storage facilities in them, and the leaders of Nazi Germany took advantage of this. Materials preserved in the archives report that at the end of the war, transports and submarines left German ports, on which the Nazis transported somewhere certain equipment, documents, valuables... The destinations and fate of many of these ships are still unknown. Perhaps some of them reached the distant Arctic land of Alexandra. In this case, the name of the base established here by the Nazis and then hastily abandoned by them - “Treasure Hunter” - takes on a special meaning for us.
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The Nazis began making active attempts to “colonize” the Soviet Arctic from the very beginning of the war. The invaders needed bases and weather stations that would help support raids of cruisers and submarines deep into our territorial waters along the Northern Sea Route. In addition, many of the top leadership of Nazi Germany were fond of all kinds of mysticism and adhered to very peculiar “scientific” views. Among the top officials of the Third Reich, for example, there was a belief that the Earth was hollow, and one could get inside it through ice caves located in the polar zones. The Nazi “bonzes” knew about the existence of vast caves on Novaya Zemlya, on Franz Josef Land, and they were sure that this was the very path to the underworld. Therefore, the naval special expeditions organized by the Reich to the Soviet Arctic rear pursued not only military, but also scientific research purposes.
It is known that the Germans managed to equip several weather stations in the Arctic that operated autonomously. On Novaya Zemlya, such stations operated at Cape Pinegin and Cape Medvezhiy (this “point” appeared among the Nazis under the code designation “Erich”). The Krot station operated on Mezhdusharsky Island, near which a runway for aircraft was cleared.
But perhaps the most interesting for researchers is the project coded by the fascists under the name “Wonderland”. The talk was about creating a base on the island of Alexandra Land, part of the Franz Josef Land archipelago. The Germans carried out this operation in 1943. They delivered all the necessary equipment, materials and supplies to the island on ships and submarines, and dropped some from airplanes. The Nazis called the weather station equipped here “Treasure Hunter”. It worked until July 1944, and traces of this fascist special facility are still preserved.
Almost a quarter of a century ago, Pyotr Boyarsky had a chance to hear an interesting story from the famous polar navigator Valentin Akkuratov: “Several years after the end of the war, we once flew over Alexandra Land and noticed off the coast, against the backdrop of the rocky thawed tundra, a bright white spot of a rectangular shape. It was completely unclear what it was. We decided to sit down and check it out. When we approached the spot, it became clear: in front of us was the roof of a dugout, painted white. The door opened easily. We went inside, shined a flashlight, and there... Schmeisser machine guns hang on the walls, German uniforms are scattered on the benches, and in the middle of the table are cans of canned food, spoons, and bowls. It feels like people are still living here... Apparently, the Nazis at one time left this base in great haste..."
“The story of the hasty evacuation really happened,” says Pyotr Boyarsky. — As far as I was able to find out from archival materials, in the summer of 1944 the fascists were let down by the lack of Arctic experience. They shot a polar bear and decided to enjoy an exotic northern dish. The Krauts didn’t know that such bear meat had to be cooked for a very long time, and they ended up with a severe stomach illness. They were so overwhelmed that they had to radio the plane and urgently take the entire team out of the base. Of course, they didn’t have time to find replacements in a hurry, and then it became useless: the last months of the war were going on, and the Nazis had no time for the Arctic...
Pyotr Vladimirovich and his colleagues from MACE not long ago managed to visit Alexandra Land. Unfortunately, the “visit” turned out to be short - only three days, but the members of the expedition still managed to examine what was preserved from Hitler’s “Treasure Hunter”.
Pyotr Boyarsky says that at one time the Germans settled here quite thoroughly. The location for the base was chosen very well: a large deep bay, and adjacent to it is a multi-kilometer strip of gravelly tundra - the largest piece of land in the entire archipelago free of glacial shell; and a little to the side there is a lake with fresh water. From the side of the bay, the base was covered by a machine-gun bunker; its ruins are quite clearly visible. To protect the site from land, minefields were laid. The remains of a house and a dugout have also been preserved... Metal containers, similar to aerial bombs, are lying among the stones - in them the Nazis dropped part of the cargo delivered to the Treasure Hunter by air. In addition, Russian researchers saw scraps of old camouflage nets, sheets from books with Hitler’s speeches about the importance of the Aryan race... According to Pyotr Boyarsky, they were surprised by the huge amount of shoes and other equipment brought by the Germans to the island - it can be assumed that their Arctic military base on They intended to subsequently significantly expand Franz Josef Land. Some of this stuff is still lying around on the territory of the former weather station.
By the way, in the 60-70s. last century, when our border post appeared on Alexandra Land (it is located about 10-15 km from the former German base), its garrison took out a lot of usable ammunition from the Treasure Hunter, and the border guards then sported good-quality German boots for a long time.
“Closer to the water, we discovered a pipe going into the bowels of the island,” says Pyotr Boyarsky. “Perhaps this is part of the ventilation system for some secret structure.” I do not exclude the existence of a natural grotto in that place, which the Germans managed to find and adapt for their purposes. It is quite possible that this cavity in the rock mass of the island is so large that submarines could enter it. The existence of similar huge caves connected to the sea by underwater corridors is known to exist on other Arctic islands. German sources contain information that the Nazis managed to find such caves in the north and even launch their submarines in them.
Such natural bunkers are very convenient for arranging secret storage facilities in them. There is information that at the end of the war, transports and submarines left German ports, on which some equipment, archives, and valuables were sent to an unknown direction. Some of them died, some reached the shores of South America... But some of the ships could deliver their cargo to the deserted Arctic islands, where it was safely hidden in huge caves. It seems quite plausible to assume that the famous Amber Room is still located in one of these Nazi “caches”...
The existence of a well-hidden grotto on Alexandra Land is very likely. Now MAKE specialists intend to go to this island again at the first opportunity with divers and carefully examine its coast in the area of the former German base. Scientists have no doubt that they have yet to reveal the main secrets of Wonderland.
Alexander DOBROVOLSKY
Photo by Oleg POPOV
