stefansson-wrangel-09-30-003-001

Appendix IV

The Charge of Mr. Harold Noice that Ada Blackjack
was Responsible for the Death
of Lorne Knight

As stated in the "History of the Wrangell Island
Documents," Mr. Noice first wrote and published through newspapers
having an aggregate circulation of many millions a romantic story
of Ada Blackjack as "the heroine of Wrangell Island." Then, months
later, he published a newspaper attack upon her (quoted in full
in Chapter IX) as having played "a mean role in a grim tragedy
she could have averted." This had a circulation almost if not
quite as large as the original favorable account , andthis created
an unpleasant situation which has to be faced, for the alternative
of silence is worse in most respects and bad especially in its
injustice to Ada Blackjack who, if not quite the sensational heroine
Mr. Noice at first represented, is much farther still from being
a vindictive criminal sitting fat and comfortable while a man she
could have saved died of hunger.

Since people differ so much in their opinions of right
and wrong, we originally had some idea of omitting from this book,
as not forming any enlightening part of the narrative, certain
entries in Lorne Knight's diary which a few readers might consider
to reflect seriously upon the character of Ada Blackjack and
which others might think it bad taste for us to print. But after this
last newspaper publicity we had no choice. There must be not even
this simple discretionary omission from a book which is the official
account of the Wrangell Island expedition. I felt much better
when that decision had been made, for one is never wholly