Victoria Island (russian: Остров Виктория; ''Ostrov Viktoriya'') is a small Arctic island of the Russian Federation. It is located at , halfway between the Norwegian archipelago of

Svalbard Svalbard ( , ), also known as Spitsbergen, or Spitzbergen, is a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. North of mainland Europe, it is about midway between the northern coast of Norway and the North Pole. The islands of the group range ...

and the Russian archipelago of Franz Josef Land.

Geography

This westernmost of all

Russian Arctic islands The Russian Arctic islands are a number of islands groups and sole islands scattered around the Arctic Ocean. Geography The islands are all situated within the Arctic Circle and are scattered through the marginal seas of the Arctic Ocean, name ...

is administered as part of Franz Josef Land and belongs to the

Arkhangelsk Oblast Arkhangelsk Oblast (russian: Арха́нгельская о́бласть, ''Arkhangelskaya oblast'') is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (an oblast). It includes the Arctic Ocean, Arctic archipelagos of Franz Josef Land ...

administrative division of the Russian Federation. The maximum height of Victoria Island is . The Northwestern cape is known as Cape Knipovich (russian: Мыс Книповича; ''Mys Knipovicha'').

Ice cap

Victoria Island has a surface area of and was formerly almost completely covered by an

ice cap In glaciology, an ice cap is a mass of ice that covers less than of land area (usually covering a highland area). Larger ice masses covering more than are termed ice sheets. Description Ice caps are not constrained by topographical features ...

where the highest point reached above sea level.Andrey F. Glazovskiy: ''Russian Arctic'', Ch. 2.7 in: Jacek Jania, Jon Ove Hagen (Ed.)
''Mass Balance of Arctic Glaciers''
(PDF; 132 kB), IASC Report No. 5, Sosnowiec-Oslo 1996. In the 1990s there was an area of about at the northern end of the island that was unglaciated. Since then the ice cover has retreated and has remained a narrow strip of unglaciated shore stretching along the northwestern side. By 2012 the surface of the ice cap was only .Victoria Ice Cap (Victoria Island)
, GLIMS Glacier Database, 2008

History

The island was discovered on 20 July 1898 by two Norwegian sealing captains, Johannes Nilsen and Ludvig Bernard Sebulonsen. The next day, captain P. W. Nilsen of the steam yacht ''Victoria'', owned by the English adventurer Arnold Pike, sighted the island and named it after the yacht. Although Victoria Island is situated only less than off

Kvitøya Kvitøya (English: "White Island") is an island in the Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, with an area of . It is the easternmost part of the Kingdom of Norway. The closest Russian Arctic possession, Victoria Island, lies only to the ea ...

in the

archipelago, it lies east of the territories put under the sovereignty of Norway according to the Spitsbergen Treaty in 1920. Consequently, the island was considered Terra nullius, until a Soviet decree of 15 April 1926 that claimed a Soviet sector in the Arctic region that also included Franz Josef Land and Victoria Island. Norway was notified on 6 May and officially protested on 19 December, contesting the Soviet claim. The following years Norwegian authorities put much effort into annexing Victoria Island and Franz Josef Land. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not wish to take any measures to lay official claims but had no objection to private initiatives. In 1929 consul Lars Christensen of Sandefjord, a whaling tycoon whose expeditions had annexed Bouvet Island and

Peter I Island Peter I Island ( no, Peter I Øy) is an uninhabited volcanic island in the Bellingshausen Sea, from continental Antarctica. It is claimed as a dependency of Norway and, along with Bouvet Island and Queen Maud Land, composes one of the three No ...

in the

Antarctic The Antarctic ( or , American English also or ; commonly ) is a polar region around Earth's South Pole, opposite the Arctic region around the North Pole. The Antarctic comprises the continent of Antarctica, the Kerguelen Plateau and other ...

, funded an expedition of two vessels, SS ''Torsnes'' and MC ''Hvalrossen''. Upon departure from Tromsø the crew were given detailed instructions to erect a staffed wireless station and leave a wintering crew on Franz Josef Land, and also to claim Victoria Island on behalf of Christensen. The expedition never reached Franz Josef Land nor Victoria Island due to severe ice conditions. On 29 July 1929, Professor

Schmidt Schmidt may refer to: * Schmidt (surname), including list of people with the surname * Schmidt (singer) (born 1990), German pop and jazz singer * Schmidt (lunar crater), a small lunar impact crater * Schmidt (Martian crater), a List of craters on ...

of the Soviet Sedov Expedition raised the Soviet flag at Tikaya Bay, Hooker Island, and declared that Franz Josef Land was a part of the Soviet Union. Norway did not officially contest the Soviet annexation of Franz Josef Land itself but continued their efforts regarding Victoria Island and a new attempt was made the following year. The ship MS ''Bratvaag'' arrived at Victoria Island on 8 August 1930. At 04:30 a group of seven men went ashore, among them the expedition leader

Gunnar Horn Gunnar Hansen Horn (25 June 1894 – 15 July 1946) was a Norwegian petroleum geologist and Arctic explorer. He is most renowned as the leader of the Bratvaag Expedition that found the long-lost remains of S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition o ...

and the ship's captain Peder Eliassen. Horn claimed the island and raised a sign on the beach, stating the claim, and left building materials for a cabin, nails and a hammer. The true purpose of the

Bratvaag Expedition The ''Bratvaag'' Expedition was a Norwegian expedition in 1930 led by Dr. Gunnar Horn, whose official tasks were hunting seals and to study glaciers and seas in the Svalbard Arctic region. The name of the expedition was taken from its ship, M/S ...

was however kept secret, and Norway never officially claimed the island later, probably due to fear of upsetting the Soviet Union. In September 1932, it became known that the Soviet Union had annexed the island. The Bratvaag Expedition nevertheless became well-known due to the findings of the long-lost remains of the

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

explorer

S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition of 1897 S is the nineteenth letter of the English alphabet. S may also refer to: History * an Anglo-Saxon charter's number in Peter Sawyer's, catalogue Language and linguistics * Long s (ſ), a form of the lower-case letter s formerly used where "s ...

on nearby

References

{{Reflist

Bibliography

* I. Gjertz, B. Mørkved, "Norwegian Arctic Expansionism, Victoria Island (Russia) and the ''Bratvaag'' Expedition", Arctic, Vol. 51, No. 4 (December 1998), P. 330-335
Available as PDF
Islands of the Arctic Ocean Islands of Arkhangelsk Oblast Norway–Soviet Union relations Territorial disputes of the Soviet Union Territorial disputes of Norway

Geography

Ice cap

History

See also

References

Bibliography