Editing Vitus Bering (section)

===First Kamchatka expedition===
{{main article|First Kamchatka expedition}}

====St. Petersburg to Okhotsk====
On 29 December 1724 <small>&#91;[[Adoption of the Gregorian calendar#Adoption in Eastern Europe|N.S.]] 9 January 1725]</small>, [[Peter I of Russia]] ordered Bering to command a voyage east, probably to map the lands (and possibly seas) between Russia's eastern boundary and the North America continent.<ref name="frost30">{{harvnb|Frost|2003|pp=30–40}}</ref> Preparations for the trip had begun some years before, but with his health rapidly deteriorating, the Tsar had ordered that the process be hurried, and it was with this backdrop that Bering (with his knowledge of both the Indian Ocean and the eastern seaboard of North America, good personal skills and experience in transporting goods) was selected ahead of the experienced cartographer K. P. von Verd.<ref name="frost30"/> His lieutenants for the journey, which would become known as the First Kamchatka Expedition, were the hardened Danish-born Russian [[Martin Spanberg]] and the well-educated but relatively inexperienced Russian [[Aleksei Chirikov]], a respected naval instructor. They would receive annual salaries of some 180 [[rouble]]s during the trip; Bering would be paid 480. The final papers from Peter before his death on 28 January made it clear to Bering that he should proceed to the [[Kamchatka peninsula]], build one or two ships there, and, keeping the land on his left, sail northwards until the land turned westwards, making it clear that there existed sea between Asia and North America. Instructions were left on how to proceed if North America was sighted during the voyage, which was scheduled to last three years.<ref name="frost30"/> The natural route to Kamchatka was along tributaries of the [[Lena River|Lena]]; but after the [[Treaty of Nerchinsk]] (1689) this looked politically infeasible. Instead, Bering's party, it was decided, would travel over land and river from St. Petersburg to [[Okhotsk]], a small port town on Russia's eastern coast, and then by sea from Okhotsk to the Kamchatka peninsula, where they could start their voyage of exploration. On 24 January, Chirikov departed with 26 of the 34-strong expedition along the well-travelled roads to [[Vologda]], {{convert|411|miles|km}} to the east. Having waited for the necessary paperwork to be completed, Bering and the remaining members of the expedition followed on 6 February. Bering was supplied with what few maps Peter had managed to commission in the preceding years.<ref name="frost30"/>

[[File:Vitus Bering.jpg|left|180px|thumb|A portrait once believed to be of Vitus Bering (according to later data, it is probably of [[Vitus Bering (1617–1675)|his uncle]])<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.kamlib.ru/resourses/epishkin.htm|title=Vitus Bering. Question of biography|last=Epishkin|first=Sergey|publisher=Kamchatsky region science library|language=ru|access-date=15 March 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.litera-ib.ru/pages/archiv/ib_4_2013.pdf |script-title=ru:КАМЧАТСКИЕ ЭКСПЕДИЦИИ |trans-title=KAMCHATKA EXPEDITIONS |last=ПУЛЕНКОВА |first=Юлианна |title=Litera-ib.ru |language=ru |access-date=15 March 2018}}</ref><ref name="1991 expedition" group="nb">In 1991 a Russian-Danish expedition found Bering's burial site. Analysis of Bering's skull also showed that Bering could not have had such a round face, as is depicted in most pictures. The analysis showed a man of strong stature and a more angular face. The portrait most frequently attributed to Bering may possibly be the writer [[Vitus Bering (1617–1675)|Vitus Pedersen Bering]], who was Bering's uncle.</ref>]]
Both parties used horse-drawn sledges and made good time over the first legs of the journey. On 14 February they were reunited in Vologda, and, now travelling together, headed eastwards across the [[Ural Mountains]], arriving in the small city of [[Tobolsk]] (one of the main stopping points of the journey) on 16 March. They had already travelled over 1750 miles.<ref name="frost30"/> At Tobolsk, Bering took on more men to help the party through the more difficult journey ahead. He asked for 24 more from the garrison, before upping the request to 54 after hearing that the ship the party required at Okhotsk{{mdash}}the ''Vostok'' ({{lang|ru|Восто́к}}, "East"){{mdash}}would need significant manpower to repair. In the end, the governor could spare only 39, but it still represented a significant expansion in numbers for the party. In addition, Bering wanted 60 carpenters and 7 blacksmiths; the governor responded that half of these would have to be taken on later, at [[Yeniseysk]]. After some delays preparing equipment and funds, on 14 May the now much enlarged party left Tobolsk, heading along the [[Irtysh River|Irtysh]]. The journey ahead to the next major stopping point [[Yakutsk]], was well-worn, but rarely by groups as large as Bering's, who had the additional difficulty of needing to take on more men as the journey progressed. As a result, the party ran behind schedule, reaching [[Surgut]] on 30 May and [[Makovsk]] in late June before entering Yeniseysk, where the additional men could be taken on; Bering would later claim that "few were suitable". In any case, the party left Yeniseysk on 12 August, desperately needing to make up lost time. On 26 September they arrived at [[Ilimsk]], just three days before the river froze over. After the party had completed an eighty-mile trek to [[Ust-Kut]], a town on the Lena where they could spend the winter, Bering travelled on to the town of [[Irkutsk]] both to get a sense of the conditions and to seek advice on how best to get their large party across the mountains separating Yakutsk (their next stop) to Okhotsk on the coast.<ref name="frost41">{{harvnb|Frost|2003|pp=41–44}}</ref>

After leaving Ust-Kut when the river ice melted in the spring of 1726, the party rapidly travelled down the River Lena, reaching Yakutsk in the first half of June. Despite the need for hurry and men being sent in advance, the governor was slow to grant them the resources they needed, prompting threats from Bering. On 7 July, Spanberg left with a detachment of 209 men and much of the cargo; on 27 July apprentice shipbuilder Fyodor Kozlov led a small party to reach Okhotsk ahead of Spanberg, both to prepare food supplies and to start work repairing the ''Vostok'' and building a new ship, the ''Fortuna'' ({{langx|ru|Фортуна}}, "[[Fortuna (goddess)|Fortune]]"), needed to carry the party across the bay from Okhotsk to the Kamchatka peninsula. Bering himself left on 16 August, whilst it was decided that Chirikov would follow the next spring with fresh supplies of flour. The journeys were as difficult as Bering had worried they would be. Both men and horses died, whilst other men (46 from Bering's party alone) deserted with their horses and portions of the supplies as they struggled to build roads across difficult marshland and river terrain.<ref name="frost41"/> If Bering's party (which reached Okhotsk in October) fared badly, however, Spanberg's fared far worse. His heavily loaded boats could be tugged at no more than one mile a day&nbsp;– and they had some 685 miles to cover. When the rivers froze, the cargo was transferred to sleds and the expedition continued, enduring blizzards and waist-high snow. Even provisions left by Bering at [[Yudoma Cross]] could not fend off starvation. On 6 January 1727 Spanberg and two other men, who had together formed an advance party carrying the most vital items for the expedition, reached Okhotsk; ten days later sixty others joined them, although many were ill. Parties sent by Bering back along the trail from Okhotsk rescued seven men and much of the cargo that had been left behind. Okhotsk's inhabitants described the winter as the worst they could recall; Bering seized flour from the local villagers to ensure that his party too could take advantage of their stocks and consequently the whole village soon faced the threat of starvation. The explorer later reported how it was only the arrival of an advance party of Chirikov's division in June with 27&nbsp;tons of flour that ensured his party (by then diminished in numbers) could be fed.<ref name="frost44">{{harvnb|Frost|2003|pp=44–47}}</ref>

====Okhotsk to Kamchatka and beyond====
The ''Vostok'' was readied and the ''Fortuna'' built at a rapid pace, with the first party (48 men commanded by Spanberg and comprising those required to start work on the ships that would have to be built in Kamchatka itself as soon as possible) leaving in June 1727. Chirikov himself arrived in Okhotsk soon after, bringing further supplies of food. He had had a relatively easy trip, losing none of his men and only 17 of the 140 horses he had set out with. On 22 August, the remainder of the party sailed for Kamchatka.<ref name="frost44"/> Had the route been charted, they should have sailed around the peninsula and made port on its eastern coast; instead, they landed on the west and made a gruelling trip from the settlement of Bolsheretsk in the South-West, north to the [[Upper Kamchatka Post]] and then east along the [[Kamchatka River]] to the [[Lower Kamchatka Post]]. This Spanberg's party did before the river froze; next, a party led by Bering completed this final stint of approximately 580 miles over land without the benefit of the river; and finally, in the spring of 1728, the last party to leave Bolsheretsk, headed by Chirikov, reached the Lower Kamchatka Post. The outpost was six thousand miles from St. Petersburg and the journey itself (the first time "so many [had] gone so far") had taken some three years.<ref name="frost44"/> The lack of immediate food available to Spanberg's advance party slowed their progress, which hastened dramatically after Bering's and Chirikov's group arrived with provisions. As a consequence, the ship they constructed{{mdash}}the ''St. Gabriel'' ({{lang|ru|Святой Гавриил}}, ''Sviatoi Gavriil''){{mdash}}was ready to be launched as soon as 9 June 1728 from its construction point upriver at [[Ushka]]. It was then fully rigged and provisioned by 9 July, and on 13 July set sail downstream, anchoring offshore that evening. On 14 July, Bering's party began their first exploration, hugging the coast in not a northerly direction (as they had expected) but a north-easterly one. The ship's log records a variety of landmarks spotted (including [[St. Lawrence Island]]) many of which the expedition took the opportunity to name. Translation problems hindered the exploration attempt, however, as Bering was unable to discuss the local geography with locals he encountered. Sailing further north, Bering entered for the first time the strait that would later bear his name.<ref name="frost48">{{harvnb|Frost|2003|pp=48–55}}</ref>

Reaching a cape (which Chirikov named [[Cape Chukotsky]]), the land turned westwards, and Bering asked his two lieutenants on 13 August 1728 whether or not they could reasonably claim it was turning westwards for good: that is to say, whether they had proven that Asia and America were separate land masses. The rapidly advancing ice prompted Bering to make the controversial decision not to deviate from his remit: the ship would sail for a few more days, but then turn back.<ref name="frost48"/> The expedition was neither at the most easterly point of Asia (as Bering had supposed) nor had it succeeded in discovering the Alaskan coast of America, which on a clear day would have been visible to the east.<ref name="armstrong161"/><ref name="frost48"/> As promised, on 16 August, Bering turned the ''St. Gabriel'' around, heading back towards Kamchatka. Not before a storm forced hasty repairs, the ship was back at the mouth of the Kamchatka River, fifty days after it had left. The mission was at its conclusion, but the party still needed to make it back to St. Petersburg to document the voyage (thus avoiding the fate of [[Semyon Dezhnyov]] who, unbeknownst to Bering, had made a similar expedition eighty years previously).<ref name="frost56">{{harvnb|Frost|2003|pp=56–62}}</ref> In the spring of 1729, the ''Fortuna'', which had sailed round the Kamchatka Peninsula to bring supplies to the Lower Kamchatka Post, now returned to Bolsheretsk; and shortly after, so did the ''St. Gabriel''. The delay was caused by a four-day journey Bering had embarked upon directly eastwards in search of North America, to no avail. By July 1729 the two vessels were back at Okhotsk, where they were moored alongside the ''Vostok''; the party, no longer needing to carry shipbuilding materials made good time on the return journey from Okhotsk, and by 28 February 1730 Bering was back in the Russian capital. In December 1731 he would be awarded 1000 roubles and promoted to captain-commander, his first noble rank (Spanberg and Chirikov were similarly promoted to captain). It had been a long and expensive expedition, costing 15 men and souring relations between Russia and her native peoples: but it had provided useful new (though not perfect) insights into the geography of Eastern Siberia, and presented useful evidence that Asia and North America were separated by sea.<ref name="frost56"/> Bering had not, however, proved the separation beyond doubt.<ref name="armstrong161"/>