France Rivet - In the Footsteps of Abraham Ulrikab

IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF
ABRAHAM ULRIKAB

THE EVENTS OF

18801881

FRANCE RIVET

Published by Polar Horizons Inc.
ISBN 978-0-9936740-8-2 (epub)

Other versions available:
ISBN 978-0-9936740-6-8 (Softcover)
ISBN 978-0-9936740-3-7 (PDF)

Cataloguing data available from Bibliothque et Archives nationales du Qubec

Author, editor, French-English translation: France Rivet

German-English translations of Abraham's diary and of a subset of other related texts: Hartmut Lutz and his students from Greiswald University.

German-English translation of J. A. Jacobsen's diary: Hartmut Lutz

Editing and proofreading: Line Fortin

copyright Polar Horizons, 2014
English translation of Abrahams diary: copyright Hartmut Lutz, 2005
English translation of Johan Adrian Jacobsens diary: copyright Polar Horizons and Hartmut Lutz, 2014

Cover by Sumit Shringi. Abrahams portrait by Jacob Martin Jacobsen, 1880 (Moravian Archives, Herrnhut). Background photo of Saglek Fjord: copyright France Rivet, Polar Horizons, 2009.

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Polar Horizons Inc.
d e Cotignac Street , Gatineau ( Q u e bec) J8T 8E4

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To the memory of:
Abraham
Maria
Nuggasak
Paingu
Sara
Tigianniak
Tobias
Ulrike

To all Nunatsiavummiut:

May this book provide
the essential elements to allow you to
reclaim a part of your history
and enable you to close the loop on the fate
of eight of your fellow countrymen.

Table of contents

Foreword

Fig . Poster Die Eskimos von Lavrador , 188

Illustration by J. H. Fischer. Published in Deutsche Illustrirte Zeitung.
N o 13, p. (Collection Hans-Josef Rollmann)

Foreword

V icom te DE C HALLANS
Chronique p arisienne, La Presse , Paris, February 10, 1881

Obituary

If you do not mind, lets not talk about divorce. [...] Lets not touch either on the front page news, the sensational trials, or the weeks premieres. All these things represent the jobs benefits; there will be no shortage of columnists to exploit them.

Lets talk, if you wish, about a simple fact which caused neither surprise nor resulted in any protest.

The thing happened in a public place, in the Jardin dacclimatation in the Bois de Boulogne; the place where you go to admire a number of exiled creatures, most of which have that sad and dreamy look of people hit by nostalgia!

All these creatures are beasts or rather animals the word beast is too easily given to fools for it to not be an insult.

But in the midst of these animals doomed to the miseries of forced civilization, I do not know who was the fierce scholar who had the unfortunate idea to bring an Eskimo family.

What type of bait was used to attract them here?

I do not know! In any case, they were here. In any case, they are no longer here.

They are dead, all of them! From the first to the last. They died of smallpox, it seems; smallpox is so serious when complicated by acclimatization.

After the first loss, the survivors must have ardently aspired to their motherland.

Oh, I understand that by representing their snow-covered country, their smoky huts in the open, the sad vegetation of lichens and some culinary preparations that would turn a Frenchmans stomach, we can exclaim like the legendary soldier: "They call it a home!..."

But each area has its splendours. Walks of snow and ice, wonderfully irradiated by the sun, may have their charm too.

And the Eskimos, accustomed to the fantastic lights of the aurora borealis, the eternal mirage of glittering ice floes did not easily get acclimatised to our beautiful land of France, where very often the sky looks macadamized.

To think that there may be, over there, near the pole, rather naive creatures to believe that their countrymen settled in the land of Cockaigne.

Certainly, those who watch us from afar, and who see us through the fanciful tales of vain sailors and of acclimatization philanthropists, believe we live in the best of all possible worlds.

Now, what would be useful from the standpoint of future acclimatizations, would be to fully know the impressions of the poor dead Eskimos. They have not, as far as I know, left behind a sentimental notebook as the heroines of the courts of assize do. They must have died, like most variolous people, quietly, in the state of prostration which usually follows the great fever. It is true that they did not need to show their faces in public.

What if we did a little investigation? What if we appointed a commission, a sub-commission and ad hoc agents to establish, after examination, what part of the responsibility each person should bear?

Because they are dead, poor souls, and it is someones fault if they are not, at this time, gathered in the hut where they were born.

Since you were bringing them here, in our friendly and peaceful Republic, you needed to plan for these probable downsides. Why did you not have them vaccinated? Let this be a lesson.

What a chance that they were put up in this beautiful garden, where the air was not lacking. At least they did not experience the sad existence of large cities.

I have never been to the Jardin dacclimatation without, along the way, a great expenditure of emotion and pity. Whenever I hear the voice of a wild beast, whenever my eyes meet those of the antelope, the aurochs or bison, it seems that all these exiles must miss their native air. []

I come back to the Eskimos. Do you want me to tell you what I really think?

Despite our grand ideas about the brotherhood of man, I bet that many French stopped in front of the Eskimos simply out of curiosity and as if there were just a few new animals over at the bois de Boulogne.

Also, when these poor people succumbed to the terrible evil that has befallen them, the newspapers were satisfied with publishing this short snippet:

"The Eskimos of the Jardin dacclimatation are dead!"

Just as it is written from time to time: "The giraffe died of consumption."

Oh sorry! Not so long ago, every morning, the health report of a phthisic monkey was published. But the Eskimos!...

Listen, the toys are so sophisticated that there is nothing new to see. We now need toys made of flesh and bone. When will a young Samoyed be displayed in Alphonse Girouxs window ?

Fig. 2 Saglek Fjord, Torngat Mountains National Park
(copyright France Rivet, Polar Horizons, 2009)

Fig. 3 Nachvak Fjord, Torngat Mountains National Park
(copyright France Rivet, Polar Horizons, 2009)

Chapter Endnotes

[1] In French, there are two distinct definitions for the word 'bte' used by the author: the noun meaning 'animal' and the adjective referring to a stupid, not very bright person.