Adrien de Gerlache
Encyclopedia
- "Gerlache" redirects here. For his son, see Gaston de GerlacheGaston de GerlacheBaron Gaston de Gerlache de Gomery was a Belgian polar explorer.Gaston de Gerlache was the son of Adrien de Gerlache and followed in the tracks of his father by leading the second Belgian expedition to Antarctica in 1957-1958, 60 years after his father lead the first with the ship Belgica.During...
. For the saint of this name, see Saint Gerlache
Baron
Baron is a title of nobility. The word baron comes from Old French baron, itself from Old High German and Latin baro meaning " man, warrior"; it merged with cognate Old English beorn meaning "nobleman"...
Adrien Victor Joseph de Gerlache de Gomery (2 August 1866 – 4 December 1934) was an officer in the Belgian Royal Navy
Belgian Navy
The Marine Component of the Belgian Army, formerly the Belgian Naval Force, is the naval service of Belgium.-Early history:The Belgian Navy was created as the Marine Royale in 1831. This force has operated in various forms throughout Belgian history.When after the Belgian Revolution, the country...
who led the Belgian Antarctic Expedition
Belgian Antarctic Expedition
The Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897 to 1899, named after its expedition vessel Belgica, was the first expedition to winter in the Antarctic region.- Preparation and Surveying :...
of 1897 to 1899.
His early years
Born in HasseltHasselt
Hasselt is a Belgian city and municipality, and capital of the Flemish province of Limburg...
, Belgium, de Gerlache was educated in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
. He studied Engineering at the Free University of Brussels
Free University of Brussels
The Free University of Brussels was a university in Brussels, Belgium. In 1969, it split into the Université Libre de Bruxelles and the Dutch-speaking Vrije Universiteit Brussel....
(now split into the Université Libre de Bruxelles
Université Libre de Bruxelles
The Université libre de Bruxelles is a French-speaking university in Brussels, Belgium. It has 21,000 students, 29% of whom come from abroad, and an equally cosmopolitan staff.-Name:...
and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Vrije Universiteit Brussel
The Vrije Universiteit Brussel is a Flemish university located in Brussels, Belgium. It has two campuses referred to as Etterbeek and Jette.The university's name is sometimes abbreviated by "VUB" or translated to "Free University of Brussels"...
), and spent his holidays as a cabin boy on board transatlantic ocean liners. After graduating in 1885, he joined the Belgian Navy on 19 January 1886.
After graduating from the nautical college of Ostend
Ostend
Ostend is a Belgian city and municipality located in the Flemish province of West Flanders. It comprises the boroughs of Mariakerke , Stene and Zandvoorde, and the city of Ostend proper – the largest on the Belgian coast....
as first lieutenant, he was assigned to the Belgica, a hydrography
Hydrography
Hydrography is the measurement of the depths, the tides and currents of a body of water and establishment of the sea, river or lake bed topography and morphology. Normally and historically for the purpose of charting a body of water for the safe navigation of shipping...
ship. It was while serving there that he came up with his plan to explore Antarctica.
The first expedition
In 1896, de Gerlache purchased the NorwegianNorway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
-built whaling ship Patria, which, following an extensive refit, he renamed as the Belgica
RV Belgica (1884)
Belgica was a barque-rigged steamship that was built in 1884 by Christian Brinch Jørgensen at Svelvik, Norway as the whaler Patria. In 1896, she was purchased by Adrien de Gerlache for conversion to a research ship, taking part in the Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897–1901, becoming the first...
. With a multinational crew, which included Roald Amundsen
Roald Amundsen
Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912 and he was the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is also known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage....
, Frederick Cook
Frederick Cook
Frederick Albert Cook was an American explorer and physician, noted for his claim of having reached the North Pole on April 21, 1908. This would have been a year before April 6, 1909, the date claimed by Robert Peary....
, Antoni Bolesław Dobrowolski, Henryk Arctowski
Henryk Arctowski
Henryk Arctowski was a Polish scientist, oceanographer and Antarctica's explorer.Henryck Arctowski, PhD, was born in Warsaw on 15 July 1871, and educated in Paris, Liege, Zurich and Lemberg. He was in charge of physical observations on the Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897–1899...
and Emil Racoviţă
Emil Racovita
Emil Racoviţă was a Romanian biologist, zoologist, speleologist and explorer of Antarctica.Together with Grigore Antipa, he was one of the most noted promoters of natural sciences in Romania...
, he set sail from Antwerp on 16 August 1897.
During January 1898, the Belgica reached the coast of Graham Land
Graham Land
Graham Land is that portion of the Antarctic Peninsula which lies north of a line joining Cape Jeremy and Cape Agassiz. This description of Graham Land is consistent with the 1964 agreement between the British Antarctic Place-names Committee and the US Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names, in...
. Sailing in between the Graham Land coast and a long string of islands to the west, de Gerlache named the passage Belgica Strait. Later, it was renamed Gerlache Strait
Gerlache Strait
Gerlache Strait or De Gerlache Strait or Détroit de la Belgica is a channel/strait separating the Palmer Archipelago from the Antarctic Peninsula. The Belgian Antarctic Expedition, under Lt. Adrien de Gerlache, explored the strait in January and February 1898, naming it for the expedition ship...
in his honor. After charting and naming several islands during some 20 separate landings, they crossed the Antarctic Circle
Antarctic Circle
The Antarctic Circle is one of the five major circles of latitude that mark maps of the Earth. For 2011, it is the parallel of latitude that runs south of the Equator.-Description:...
on 15 February 1898.
On 28 February 1898, de Gerlache's expedition became trapped in the ice of the Bellinghausen Sea, near Peter Island. Despite efforts of the crew to free the ship, they quickly realised that they would be forced to spend the winter on Antarctica. Several weeks later, on 17 May, total darkness set in, which lasted until 23 July. What followed were another 7 months of hardship trying to free the ship and its crew from the clutches of the ice. Several men lost their sanity, including one Belgian sailor who left the ship "announcing he was going back to Belgium". The party also suffered badly from scurvy
Scurvy
Scurvy is a disease resulting from a deficiency of vitamin C, which is required for the synthesis of collagen in humans. The chemical name for vitamin C, ascorbic acid, is derived from the Latin name of scurvy, scorbutus, which also provides the adjective scorbutic...
.
Finally, on 15 February 1899, they managed to slowly start down a channel they had cleared during the weeks before. It took them nearly a month to cover 7 miles, and on 14 March they cleared the ice. The expedition returned to Antwerp on 5 November 1899. In 1902, his book Quinze Mois dans l'Antarctique (published in 1901) was awarded a prize by the Académie Française
Académie française
L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...
.
Later life
Adrien de Gerlache participated in several other expeditions, including:- a commercial and scientific expedition to the Persian GulfPersian GulfThe Persian Gulf, in Southwest Asia, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.The Persian Gulf was the focus of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War, in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers...
in 1901 - the Antarctica expedition of Jean-Baptiste Charcot, which he abandoned before they reached Antarctica due to the bad atmosphere on board (1903)
- Expedition to the Greenland SeaGreenland SeaThe Greenland Sea is a body of water that borders Greenland to the west, the Svalbard archipelago to the east, Fram Strait and the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Norwegian Sea and Iceland to the south. The Greenland Sea is often defined as part of the Arctic Ocean, sometimes as part of the...
on board the BelgicaRV Belgica (1884)Belgica was a barque-rigged steamship that was built in 1884 by Christian Brinch Jørgensen at Svelvik, Norway as the whaler Patria. In 1896, she was purchased by Adrien de Gerlache for conversion to a research ship, taking part in the Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897–1901, becoming the first...
(1905) - Expedition to the Barents SeaBarents SeaThe Barents Sea is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, located north of Norway and Russia. Known in the Middle Ages as the Murman Sea, the sea takes its current name from the Dutch navigator Willem Barents...
and Kara SeaKara SeaThe Kara Sea is part of the Arctic Ocean north of Siberia. It is separated from the Barents Sea to the west by the Kara Strait and Novaya Zemlya, and the Laptev Sea to the east by the Severnaya Zemlya....
(1907) - Expedition to Greenland, Spitsbergen and the Frans-Jozef archipelago on board the Belgica (1909)
He had two children with his first wife, Suzanne Poulet, whom he married in 1904: Philippe (born 1906) and Marie-Louise (born 1908). After this marriage ended in 1913, de Gerlache married Elisabeth Höjer from Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
. With her, he had another son, Gaston de Gerlache
Gaston de Gerlache
Baron Gaston de Gerlache de Gomery was a Belgian polar explorer.Gaston de Gerlache was the son of Adrien de Gerlache and followed in the tracks of his father by leading the second Belgian expedition to Antarctica in 1957-1958, 60 years after his father lead the first with the ship Belgica.During...
in 1919. In the 1950s, Gaston followed in his father's footsteps, participating in a Belgian research station in Antarctica.
Adrien de Gerlache died in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
in 1934, aged 68, from paratyphoid.
See also
- European and American voyages of scientific explorationEuropean and American voyages of scientific explorationThe era of European and American voyages of scientific exploration followed the Age of Discovery and were inspired by a new confidence in science and reason that arose in the Age of Enlightenment...