In the Kingdom of Ice

Leave it to Hampton Sides to resurrect the almost-forgotten tale of the USS Jeannette, a harrowing story that details Captain George De Long’s ill-fated 1887 voyage to the North Pole. Wrongly convinced by several of the world’s leading scientists of an unfrozen, open-polar sea, De Long and crew sailed into directly into a disaster of their own making that included an ice-crushed vessel, heavy casualties, and permanent relegation to the “failures” chapter of maritime history.