Eduard Dallmann (11 March 1830 – 23 December 1896) was a German whaler, trader, and Polar explorer. Dallmann was born in Blumenthal, at-the-time a village just to the north of

Bremen Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (, ), is the capital of the States of Germany, German state of the Bremen (state), Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (), a two-city-state consisting of the c ...

. He began his adventures as a young sailor at the age of 15. In 1866, he became captain of the Hawaii-registered ship ''W.C. Talbot'' and undertook trading trips through the Bering and

Chukchi Sea The Chukchi Sea (, ), sometimes referred to as the Chuuk Sea, Chukotsk Sea or the Sea of Chukotsk, is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is bounded on the west by the Long Strait, off Wrangel Island, and in the east by Point Barrow, Alaska, ...

s to locations in

Alaska Alaska ( ) is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is also considered to be the north ...

and Chukotka. He was the first European to set foot on

Wrangel Island Wrangel Island (, ; , , ) is an island of the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia. It is the List of islands by area, 92nd-largest island in the world and roughly the size of Crete. Located in the Arctic Ocean between the Chukchi Sea and East Si ...

. From 1867 to 1870, he commanded the ''Count Bismarck'' on a whaling cruise to the Pacific tropics and the Bering and Chukchi seas.''Friend'', of Honolulu, December 1, 1869, Vol. 19, No. 12, p. 104. From 1872 to 1874, when whales became more of a rarity in Arctic waters, Dallmann was commissioned to explore the Antarctic seas on the sailing-steamer ''Grönland''. The operation was moderately successful from a whaling point-of-view, but more importantly, Dallmann made many discoveries around

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. ...

—among others the Bismarck Strait. Of great value as well was his charting of Anvers, Brabant, Liege, and Kaiser-Wilhelm Islands. Still on the ''Grönland'', he spent the 1875 whaling season as expert on the

Davis Strait The Davis Strait (Danish language, Danish: ''Davisstrædet'') is a southern arm of the Arctic Ocean that lies north of the Labrador Sea. It lies between mid-western Greenland and Baffin Island in Nunavut, Canada. To the north is Baffin Bay. The ...

and

Baffin Bay Baffin Bay (Inuktitut: ''Saknirutiak Imanga''; ; ; ), located between Baffin Island and the west coast of Greenland, is defined by the International Hydrographic Organization as a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is sometimes considered a s ...

whaling grounds. Between 1877 and 1884, on behalf of Russian financier Baron von Knoop, Dallmann made annual attempts to haul freight to the

Gulf of Ob The Gulf of Ob (), also known as the Bay of Ob (), is a bay of the Arctic Ocean, located in northern Russia at the mouth of the Ob River. It is the world's longest estuary. Geography The mouth of the Gulf of Ob is in the Kara Sea between the ...

and the Yenisei Gulf, to be exchanged for grain and other cargoes brought down the great

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

n rivers by means of barges. Owing to the ice conditions in the

Kara Sea The Kara Sea is a marginal sea, separated from the Barents Sea to the west by the Kara Strait and Novaya Zemlya, and from the Laptev Sea to the east by the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago. Ultimately the Kara, Barents and Laptev Seas are all ...

, only four out of seven attempts were successful. Finally, von Knoop stopped the difficult venture so as to cut his losses. Despite the few failures, Dallmann had received the rare opportunity to explore many of the Kara Sea-islands and shores seen by few Europeans. After leaving the Arctic waters forever, Dallmann became the captain of steamer ''Samoa'' in 1884. His ship brought the " Otto Finsch Scientific Expedition to the then-little-explored northern coast of New Guinea. Between 1887 and 1893, he continued his exploration of New Guinea's northern coast on behalf of the German New Guinea Company. Numerous islands and straits in the area were named by him. Dallmann died in Blumenthal on 23 December 1896 at the age of 66.

Honors

* Mount Dallmann of Antarctica's Shcherbakov Range * The Alfred Wegener Institute has named a research station on King George Island in Dallmann's honor * In Blumenthal, a street and fountain in the old market have been named after him * Dallmann Harbour in

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

bears his name * Dallmann Seamount is named in his memory

References

* Barr, W., Krause, R., Pawlik, P. ''The polar voyages of Captain Eduard Dallmann, whaler, trader, explorer 1830–96''.
History of Russian Arctic Exploration

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dallmann, Eduard 1830 births 1896 deaths Chukchi Sea East Siberian Sea Explorers of the Arctic German polar explorers German people in German New Guinea Kara Sea Laptev Sea People from Bremen (city) Wilhelm Archipelago