Through the Heart of Labrador

Abstract

IN 1903 Leonidas Hubbard, jun., a young American journalist, conceived the idea of exploring Central Labrador and passing through the country by means of the water-way from Hamilton inlet to the shores of the Arctic Ocean at Vugara. Only one white man, the gallant Père Lacasse, has accomplished this journey if we except the wonderful pilgrimage of John McLean, who travelled up to the Arctic through Labrador and back to the St. Lawrence by a slightly different route. We know how poor Hubbard missed his way and travelled by a somewhat circuitous route to within sight of Lake Michikamats, and then, after being forced to retreat before the oncoming winter, perished miserably from starvation on the banks of the Susan River within a short distance of food and help. The hero of that journey and subsequent events was George Elson, who, with a Cree Indian, a Russian half-breed, and a young Eskimo, accompanied Mr. Hubbard's wife in the attempt to carry out the journey and the mapping of certain geographical features which the unfortunate explorer had failed to do. That the effort was successful is evinced in the interesting volume, “A Woman's Way through Unknown Labrador.”