Emil Bessels

From Freepedia

Emil Bessels (1846 1888) was a German physician and arctic explorer. In 1871 he joined the crew of the American Arctic explorer Charles Francis Hall as the ship's doctor and naturalist. Bessels and Hall soon came into conflict over control of the scientific research on the expedition. When Hall became ill in October 1871, Bessels was by his bedside for several days. But, as Hall soon suspected that Bessels was poisoning him, he was banned from seeing him. However, just before Hall's death, Bessels was allowed to see him again. After Hall's death, Bessels was among those who remained with their ship, the Polaris, when most of the crew lost contact with it while trying to rescue their supplies. Bessels and his party were eventually forced to abandon the ship, but were rescued and were back in the United States by 1873, when he was questioned by a naval board of inquiry as was the rest of the expedition crew.

Bessels then returned to Germany. He considered mounting his own Arctic expedition, but decided against it. In 1879 he published a book in German about the expedition, which contained quotes from Hall's supposedly lost journal. Bessels died of a stroke. It is suspected, particularly by recent scholars, that Bessels murdered Hall.