ship was travelling at between a day—but to the west, steadily further from Herschel Island and from Stefansson's party who, it soon became clear, would not be able to find their way back to the ship. In an unpublished journal and later correspondence, McKinlay suggested that Stefansson's departure amounted to abandoning the ship to its fate. The expedition's historian S.E. Jenness (son of Diamond Jenness) rejects this view, pointing out that Stefansson and the hunting party members had left valuable property aboard Karluk; a possible motive for the trip, Jenness surmises, was to train the younger staff. The anthropologist Gísli Pálsson, writing of the expedition, asserts that while the anger of Bartlett and the crew is understandable, there is no evidence that Stefansson deliberately abandoned the men. It is arguable, Pálsson says, that Stefansson acted responsibly in attempting to secure a supply of fresh meat which would counter the possibility of scurvy, should Karluk be trapped in the ice for a long time. The historian Richard Diubaldo writes "The evidence suggests that this was a normal hunting trip" and "... there is strong evidence to suggest he [Stefansson] wished he had never left [the ship]". The constant snow and thick mists made it difficult for Bartlett to calculate the Karluk's position accurately, although during a brief break in the weather on 30 September they glimpsed land which they took to be Cooper Island, in the vicinity of Point Barrow where they had been at the start of August. On 3 October the anxiety of crew and staff increased when, with Point Barrow just distant, the drift turned northwards, away from the land. There were fears among some that Karluk would repeat the experience of the Jeannette, an American vessel that 30 years previously had drifted in the Arctic ice for months before sinking, with the subsequent loss of most of her crew. Bartlett became aware that Murray and McKay, the two veterans of Shackleton's Nimrod expedition, were openly contemptuous of their captain's leadership. They were making plans to leave the ship at an appropriate time, and head for land on their own. As the weather grew worse Bartlett ordered supplies and equipment to be transferred onto the ice, both to lighten the ship and as a precaution should it be necessary to abandon the vessel in a hurry. Food supplies were augmented by seal hunts—two or three seals a day