Do you remember that time when you explored one of the harshest lands in the world, amputated your own gangrenous toes, used your feces to dig yourself out of an avalanche, brawled with a polar bear, and fought the Nazis? Peter Freuchen does.
Freuchen is one of those people whose lives seem out of an over-the-top action film. Seriously. The amount of incredible and diverse feats he accomplished makes you wonder why the heck is his story not better known across the world. If you, like me, have been ignorant of the tale behind this man’s imposing pose and photos, you’re in for a treat. This is the story of one of the most badass explorers the world has ever seen.
Peter Freuchen (wearing the skin of a polar bear he killed himself) and designer Dagmar Freuchen-Gale, his third wife.
A quiet life for a disquiet soul
Freuchen was born in Nykøbing Falster, Demark, in 1886. He was the son of a strict businessman who was bent on order, routine, and stability, and expected his son to grow up into a respectable doctor. After studying medicine at his behest at the University of Copenhagen for a little while, Freuchen realized that life simply wasn’t for him. He wanted adventure in the great wilderness, to explore the farthest corners of Earth. So he left.
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To join in an adventure
He first travelled to Greenland in his quest for action and discovery. It was 1906, and Freuchen was getting started in what would be one of the most epic exploration lives on record. By 1924, he had already become a seasoned explorer with many expeditions under his belt. Freuchen often collaborated with famed Polar adventurer Knud Rasmussen, the father of Eskimology. Together, they crossed the Greenland Ice Sheet, the single largest ice body in the Northern Hemisphere.
The two also established the Thule Trading Station at Cape York, Greenland, to serve as a trading port. The name comes from Ultima Thule, a Greco-Roman expression that refers to the farthest known location in the north. Since Thule was the most northerly trading post in the world, the name was fitting. After some time, Thule became the home base for several expeditions (aptly called The Thule Expeditions) between 1912 and 1933.
Out of the ice with knives of feces
On the very first of these expeditions, something both terrible and amazing happened. Freuchen and Rasmussen set out to test American explorer Robert Peary’s infamous claim that a channel divided Greenland from Peary Land. They managed to prove this false, but not before almost dying on their 1,000 km (620 mi) trek into the heart of the frozen continent.
At some point during the journey, a violent blizzard caught the adventurers off guard. Freuchen managed to take cover under a dogsled, but the powerful storm soon buried him completely under snow, which then turned to ice and formed a small cave. At that time, Freuchen didn’t have his usual assortment of tools and weapons with him, so he ended up trapped, alone, and utterly hopeless.
But Freuchen was nothing if not resourceful. And persistent. And unbelievably tough. After a while inside the ice cave, he fashioned a makeshift dagger out of his own feces, which he used to dig his way out. If this wasn’t enough, when he realized his toes and leg had become gangrenous due to frostbite, he amputated the toes himself, without anesthesia, and replaced his leg with a peg. Talk about a hardened explorer.
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The spirit of the Inuit people
During his travels, Freuchen became very familiar with the Inuit people. He learned their language, studied their culture, and participated with them in several adventures and hunting expeditions. The hunters relied on walruses, whales, seals and even polar bears for their survival, and Freuchen took this all to heart. Standing at 6’ 7″, he was a big man. If anyone could possibly face a polar bear and survive, it would be him. And of course, it happened: Freuchen hunted a polar bear himself and famously made a coat with its skin. Gruesome, perhaps—but such are the lengths one must go to for survival in the wild.
He also lectured tourists about Inuit culture and became a vocal critic of the Church’s attempts to proselytize the Inuit people without understanding the nuances of their civilization and traditions. In fact, after his first wife, Mekupaluk, died of the Spanish flu, he expected the church to help him bury her. Since she was never baptized, the priests refused, so Freuchen buried her himself in a solemn act of love.
A man of many talents
Freuchen occasionally returned to his native Denmark. During one of his visits in the ‘20s, he joined the Social Democrats political party there and became a contributor to a local newspaper called Politiken. This awakened a thirst in him for the publishing world, as he went on to become the editor-in-chief of the general interest magazine Ude og Hjemme, owned by the family of his second wife.
He was also the leader of a film company, so he was actively involved with the cinematic industry. By 1932, he had returned to Greenland on an expedition financed by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studios. Soon, the film industry was hiring him as a consultant and scriptwriter, in which capacity he greatly contributed to the Oscar-winning film Eskimo/Mala the Magnificent, based on one of his own books.
Funnily enough, Freuchen also participated in an American TV quiz-show, The $64,000 Question. He won, of course. After all, a man who hunts polar bears and climbs his way out of a death-trap by wielding his own excrement wouldn’t be stopped by a few trivia questions.
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One against the Nazi army
In spite of having lost his leg, Freuchen was a keen and active fighter with the Danish resistance movement against the Nazis in World War II. He would openly claim to be Jewish whenever he saw antisemitism and was eventually arrested by the Germans and sentenced to death.
With all his resourcefulness, it’s no surprise he managed to escape. He fled to Sweden, where he married Danish-Jewish designer Dagmar Freuchen-Gale. The couple ultimately moved to New York City and lived happily for years thereafter.
Freuchen died of a heart attack in 1957, in Anchorage, Alaska. His ashes were scattered just outside of Thule.
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