RETROSPECT

Returning from the North, in September, 1909, while being honored in Copenhagen for my success in reaching the North Pole, there came, by wireless from Labrador, messages from Robert E. Peary, claiming the attainment exclusively as his own, and declaring that in my assertion I was, in his vernacular, offering the world a "gold brick."

On April 21, 1908, I had reached a spot which I ascertained, with as scientific accuracy as possible, to be the top of the axis around which the world spins—the North Pole.

On April 6, 1909, a year later, Mr. Peary claimed to have reached the same spot.

To substantiate his charge of fraud, Peary declared that my Eskimo companions had said I had been only two sleeps from land. Why, he further asked, had I not taken reputable witnesses with me on such a trip?

I had taken, on my final dash, two expert Eskimos. Mr. Peary had four Eskimos and a negro body servant.

Before launching further charges, Mr. Peary delayed his ship, the Roosevelt, at Battle Harbor, on the pretext of cleaning it, that he might digest my New York Herald story, compare it with his own, and fabricate his broadside of abuse. There he was in constant communication with the New York Times, General Thomas Hubbard—president of the Peary Arctic Club and financial sponsor of the "trust"—and Herbert L. Bridgman. The Times, eager to "beat" the Herald, was desirous of descrediting me and launching Peary's as the bona-fide North Pole discovery story. General Hubbard, Mr. Bridgman, and the "trust" were eager for a publicity and acclaim greater than that which might attach to any honorable second victor. Dishonor and perjury, to secure first honors, were not even to be weighed in the balance.

When I arrived in New York, I was confronted by a series of technical questions, designed to baffle me. These questions, I learned, had been sent to the Times by Mr. Peary with instructions that the Times "get after" me.

I answered these questions. I had answered them in Europe. Mr. Peary, when he arrived at Sydney, and afterward, refused to answer any questions. He continued simply to attack me, to make insinuations aspersing my honesty, playing the secret back-hand game of defamation conducted by his friends of his Arctic Club.

Why had I not, on my return from my Polar trip, told anyone of the achievement, Mr. Peary asked in an interview, aiming to show that my Polar attainment was an afterthought.

On my return to Etah I had told Harry Whitney and Pritchard. They, in turn, told Captain Bob Bartlett. Captain Bartlett, as well as the Eskimos, in turn told Peary at Etah that I claimed to have reached the Pole. At the very moment when this charge was made, Peary had in his pocket Captain Adams' letter which gave the same information. Why did Mr. Peary suppress this information, convicting himself of insinuating an untruth from three different sources to challenge my claim. Returning from the North with the negro, Henson, and Eskimos, Mr. Peary himself had not told his own companions on the Roosevelt of his own success. Why was this?

In a portentous statement Mr. Peary and his party declared my Eskimos said I had not been more than two sleeps from land.

I had instructed my companions not to tell Peary of my achievement. He had stolen my supplies. I felt him unworthy of the confidence of a brother explorer. I had encouraged the delusion of E-tuk-i-shook and Ah-we-lah that almost daily mirages and low-lying clouds were signs of land, so as to prevent the native panic and desertion on the circumpolar sea. They had possibly told this to Peary in all honesty; but other natives also told him that we had reached the "Big Nail."

Why was the news to Mr. Peary's liking given, while that which he did not like was ignored?

Not long ago, Matthew Henson, interviewed in the south, was quoted as saying that Peary did not get to the Pole. In another interview he said that Peary, like a tenderfoot, rode in a fur-cushioned sledge until they got to a place which was "far enough." I still prefer to believe Peary rather than Henson. Peary's Eskimo companions of a former trip positively deny Peary's claimed discovery of Crocker Land. I still prefer to believe that Crocker Land does deserve a place on the map. Peary's last Eskimo companions say that he did not reach the Pole. But I prefer to credit his claim. Mr. Peary's spirit has never been that of fairness to others when a claim impinges upon his own. He has always adopted the tactics of the claim-jumper.

In a like manner, and with similar intent, Mr. Peary had attacked many explorers before me. To prevent his companions from profiting by their own work, members of each expedition were forced to sign contracts that barred press interviews, eliminated cameras, prohibited lecturing or writing, or even trading for trophies. To insure Mr. Peary all the honor, his men were made slaves to his cause.

In a quarrel which resulted from these impossible conditions, Eivind Astrup was assailed. Broken-hearted, he committed suicide. Captain Otto Sverdrup was made to feel the sting of the same grasping spirit. General A. W. Greely has been unjustly attacked. All of this detestable selfishness culminated in the treatment of Captain Bob Bartlett. When the Pole, to Peary, seemed within reach, and the glory of victory was within grasp, the ever-faithful Bartlett was turned back and his place was taken by a negro, that Peary might be, to quote his own words, "the only white man at the Pole."

When, on my return to New York, I found myself attacked by a man of this caliber, I decided that the public, without any counter-defamation on my part, would read him aright and see through the unscrupulous and dishonest campaign. So I remained silent.

Coming down to Portland from Sydney, where he had landed, Mr. Peary gave out an interview insinuating that I had had no instruments with which to take observations. "Would Dr. Cook," he asked, "if he had had instruments, have left them in the hands of a stranger (Harry Whitney), when upon these depended his fame or his dishonor?"

On his return to this country, Mr. Whitney corroborated my statement of leaving my instruments with him. Mr. Peary's own captain, who had cross-questioned my Eskimos for Mr. Peary, later stated to two magazine editors that my companions had described to him the instruments I had had. Is it reasonable to suppose that Mr. Peary did not know of this? I know that he knew. If he is an honest man, why did he stoop to this dishonesty? Even if he believed me to be dishonest, dishonest methods only placed him in the class of the one he attacked as dishonest.

By using the same underhand methods, as when he got the New York Times to cross-question me for himself, Peary now got his friends of the Geographic Society, who had boosted him, to call for "proofs." Such proofs, it appeared, should always be presented before public honors were accepted or the returns of a lecture tour considered. But Peary had engaged in exploration for twenty years, and had always given lectures at once, without ever offering proofs. I was asked to cancel lecture engagements and furnish what Peary knew neither he nor anybody else could furnish offhand. For the proof of an explorer's doings is his final book, which requires months and years to prepare.

With much blaring of trumpets, the Peary "proofs" were submitted to his friends of the National Geographic Society. With but a casual examination of copies of data, claimed at the time to be original field notes, with no explanation of the wonderful instruments upon which it had been earlier claimed Polar honors rested, an immediate and favorable verdict was rendered.

A huge picture was published, showing learned, bewhiskered gentlemen examining the Peary "proofs," and reaching their verdict. Mr. Peary's case for a rediscovery of the Pole was won—for the time. The public were deceived into believing that positive proofs had been presented; that the society, acting as a competent and neutral jury, was honest. Later it was shown that its members were financially interested in Mr. Peary's expedition, and still later it was admitted that the Peary proofs contained no proof. All of this later development has had no publicity.

In the meantime, I was attacked for delay. My data was finally sent to the University of Copenhagen. A verdict of "Unproven" was rendered.

Thereupon, Mr. Peary and his friends at once shouted "Fraud!" The press parrot-like re-echoed that shout. With this unfair insinuation there came to me the biting sting of a burning electric shock as the wires quivered all around the world. At the Congressional investigation, a year later, the Peary data was shown to be useless as proof. It was a verdict precisely like that of Copenhagen on mine, but the press did not print it. Did the Peary interests have any control over the American press or its sources of news distribution?

After the call for "proof" came charges, from members of the Peary cabal, that I was unable to take observations. Mr. Peary was so much better equipped than I to do so! Moreover, he had had the able scientific assistance of Bartlett and—the negro.

When I was at the Pole the sun was 12° above the horizon. At the time Peary claims he was there it was less than 7°. Difficult as it is to take observations at 12°, because of refracted light, any accurate observation at 7° is impossible. It is indeed, questionable if an observation could be made at all at the time when Peary claims to have been at the Pole.

Finding that, despite all charges, the public believed in me, Mr. Peary, through his coöperators, attempted to discredit my veracity. An affidavit, which was bought, as I have evidence to prove, was made by Barrill to the effect that I had not climbed Mt. McKinley. The getting of this affidavit is placed at the door of Mr. Peary.

Do honest men, with honest intentions, buy perjured documents?

Do honest men, believing in themselves, besmirch their own honor by deliberate lying?

Dunkle and Loose came to me, offered to look over the observations in my Herald story, and—suddenly—to my amazement—offered a set of faked observations, manufactured at the instigation of someone. I refused the batch of faked papers, and turned the two nefarious conspirators out of my hotel.

A comparison of my Copenhagen report with the Dunkle perjured story, later printed in the New York Times, proves I used not one of their figures. Mr. R. J. McLouglin later proved that the hand which signed "Dunkle" also signed "Loose" to that lying document. It is, therefore, not only a perjury, but a forgery.

Recently, Professor J. H. Gore, a member of the National Geographic Society, and one of Peary's friends, acknowledged to Evelyn B. Baldwin that he had in his possession the faked observations which were made by Dunkle and Loose.

How did he come by them? Why does he have them? What were the relations between Dunkle and Loose, Peary's friends, the New York Times, and the National Geographic Society? Do honest men, with honest intentions, conspire with men of this sort, men who offered to sell me faked figures—most likely to betray me had I been dishonest enough to buy them—and who, failing, perjured themselves?

Disgusted, I decided to let my enemies exhaust their abuse. I knew it eventually would rebound. Determined to retire to rest, to resolve my case in quietude and secrecy, I left America. My enemies gleefully proclaimed this an admission of imposture.

Yet, after they had turned almost every newspaper in the country against me, having rested, having resolved my case, having secured damaging proofs of the facts of the conspiracy against me, I returned to America.

Realizing my error in so long remaining silent; realizing the power of a sensation-seeking press, which has no respect for individuals or of truth, I determined, painful as would be the task, to tell the unpleasant, distasteful truth about the man who tried to besmirch my name. This may seem unkind. But I was kind too long. Truth is often unpleasant, but it is less malicious than the sort of lies hurled at me.

After I had left America, the newspapers, desirous of sensation, had played into the hands of those who, with seeming triumph, assailed me. But meanwhile, however, I was taking advantage of the opportunity to rest and gain an accurate perspective of the situation. I thought out my case, considered it pro and con, puzzled out the reasons for, and the source of, the newspaper clamor against me. Through friends in America who worked quietly and effectively, I secured evidence, which is embodied in affidavits, which laid bare the methods employed to discredit me in the Mt. McKinley affair. I learned of the methods used, and just what charges were made, to discredit my Polar claim. Damaging admissions were secured concerning Mr. Peary's fabricated attacks from the mouths of Mr. Peary's own associates. Knowing these facts, at the proper time, I returned to my native country to confront my enemies. I have proceeded in detail to state my case and reveal the hitherto unknown inside facts of the entire Polar controversy. I have stated certain facts before the public. Neither Mr. Peary nor his friends have replied. One point in the Polar controversy has never reached the public. Both Mr. Peary and many of his friends asserted that I left the country just in time to escape criminal prosecution. They said the charge was to be that I had obtained money on a false pretence by accepting fees for lecturing on my discovery. I returned to America. I have been lecturing for fees on my discovery since; I have not yet been prosecuted.

Were Mr. Peary not the sort of man who would stoop to dishonor, to discredit a rival in order to gain an unfair advantage for himself, were he not guilty of the gross injustice I have stated, he would have had all the opportunity in the world for effectively coming back at me. But he has remained silent. Why?

I have, as I have said, absolute confidence in the good sense, spirit of fair-play, and ability of reasoning judgment of my people. My case rests, not with any body of armchair explorers or kitchen geographers, but with Arctic travelers who can see beyond the mist of selfish interests, and with my fellow-countrymen, who breathe normal air and view without bias the large open fields of honest human endeavor.

In this book I have stated my case, presented my proofs. As to the relative merits of my claim, and Mr. Peary's, place the two records side by side. Compare them. I shall be satisfied with your decision.

Frederick A. Cook.

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