Farthest North describes the most northerly latitude reached by explorers, before the first successful expedition to theNorth Pole rendered the expression obsolete. TheArctic polar regions are much more accessible than those of theAntarctic, as continental land masses extend to high latitudes and sea voyages to the regions are relatively short.
The most northerly point of mainland Europe,Knivskjellodden in Norway, lies at71° 11' N. War and trade had led to voyages between western Norway and Northern Russia around Knivskjellodden and theNorth Cape since at least the 15th Century.John Davis on his third voyage to seek theNorthwest Passage in 1587 sailed up the Strait thatbears his name, betweenGreenland andBaffin Island, to a latitude of72° 12' N.[1] A Dutch expedition led byWillem Barentz, attempting theNortheast Passage reached79° 49’N on16 June 1596, on the NW coast ofSpitsbergen.[2] In 1607,Henry Hudson probably reached Hakluyt's Headland (a little south of the latitude reached by Barentz), but could not proceed further as ice lay packed alongSpitsbergen's north coast.[3] In 1612, an explorer fromHull,Thomas Marmaduke, claimed to have reached 82°N, while Dutch explorers in 1614 and 1624 claimed to have sailed even further north to 83°N.[4]
These latter claims lack basis in fact, with the second, made byJoris Carolus, impossible knowing ice conditions that season; although Marmaduke did at least reach Gråhuken, at79° 48′N. English whalers reachedSvalbard's Nordkapp at80° 32′N, in or before 1622, as shown on theMuscovy Company's Map of 1625. TheSeven Islands, at80° 49′N, north ofNordaustlandet, were first marked on a Dutch map of 1663, but were allegedly reached by a ship ofEnkhuizen as early as 1618.
In 1707, the Dutch whalerCornelis Giles rounded the northernmost point of Nordaustlandet in Svalbard, passing 81°N.[5] In 1806, theResolution of Whitby, under William Scoresby, Sr, was said to have sailed north of the Seven Islands and reached81° 50′N.[6]
One of the first expeditions with the explicit purpose of reaching the North Pole was that ofSir William Edward Parry in 1827, who reached82° 45′N, a record that stood for decades.Sir Albert Hastings Markham, a member of theBritish Arctic Expedition of 1875 was the next one to get closer to the pole 48 years later, when he reached a latitude of83° 20′26″N by a dog sledge.Adolphus Greely'sLady Franklin Bay Expedition bested Markham by a few miles, reaching83° 24′N in 1882.[7]
In 1895, NorwegiansFridtjof Nansen andFredrik Hjalmar Johansenreached latitude86° 14′N. In 1900,Umberto Cagni of theItalian Royal Navy left the base camp established byLuigi Amedeo, Duke of the Abruzzi, and reached latitude86° 34′N on April 25, beating Nansen's 1895 mark by 35 to 40 kilometres (22 to 25 mi).[citation needed]
Two American explorers claimed to reach the North Pole;Frederick Cook in 1908 andRobert Peary in 1909. Cook's claim was soon judged to be fraudulent, and Peary was credited as the discoverer of the North Pole for much of the 20th century. In recent decades, however, Peary's claim has becomethe subject of controversy,[8] though he did set a new record for Farthest North – his support party was dismissed at87° 45′N. With Peary's claim accepted at the time, overland expeditions to the North Pole came to an end.
Roald Amundsen of Norway redirected his planned Arctic expedition and instead aimed for the South Pole, which heachieved in 1911.
In 1931, an expedition led bySir Hubert Wilkins andLincoln Ellsworth and partly financed byWilliam Randolph Hearst attempted to reach the North Pole with a leased US Navy submarine namedNautilus, formerly the USSO-12. TheNautilus was modified for under ice operations by submarine designerSimon Lake so it could detect openings (or, if necessary, drill them) in the ice pack and surface to recharge her batteries. While the expedition was a failure, theNautilus did reach a latitude of 82 degrees north. In accordance with the lease agreement, theNautilus was scuttled after the expedition to prevent her reuse as a warship.
On 9 May 1926,Richard Evelyn Byrd attempted to fly over the North Pole in an airplane. He was widely credited with achieving this, but his claim subsequently became subject to doubt.
Finally, on12 May 1926, the airshipNorge carriedRoald Amundsen and fifteen other men including the craft's designer and pilotUmberto Nobile, helmsmanOscar Wisting, navigatorHjalmar Riiser-Larsen, and the expedition's sponsor,Lincoln Ellsworth, over the North Pole, en route fromSpitsbergen toAlaska, the first achievement of the Pole about which there is no controversy.[9]
The first person definitely to set foot on the Pole was the RussianAlexander Kuznetsov, who landed an aircraft there in 1948.[10]
On3 August 1958, a US Navy submarine, also namedUSS Nautilus, was the first to sail under the ice pack to reach the North Pole. On17 March 1959, theUSS Skate became the first submarine to surface at the North Pole.
Ralph Plaisted and his three companions, Walt Pederson, Gerry Pitzl and Jean-Luc Bombardier, are regarded by most polar authorities to be the first to succeed in a surface traverse by snowmobile across the ice to the North Pole on 20 April 1968, making the first confirmed surface conquest of the Pole before being airlifted out.
On 6 April 1969, British explorerSir Wally Herbert became the first person to indubitably reach the Pole on foot, having sledged from Alaska. His expedition was supported by air drops.[10]