Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld

Baron (Nils) Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld, also known as A. E. Nordenskioeld (November 18, 1832, Helsinki, Finland (then the Grand Duchy of Finland) — August 12, 1901, (Dalby, Skåne, Sweden) was a geologist, mineralogist and arctic explorer of Finland-Swedish extraction. Born in Finland, he was later forced to live in political exile in Sweden. He is most remembered for the Vega expedition along the northern coast of Europe and Asia. He was also the uncle of Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim.

Expeditions

• In 1858, 1861, and 1864 he went with expeditions to Spitsbergen, and in 1868 he went in a small vessel farther north than any vessel had ever been in the Eastern hemisphere. In 1861 he took part in Torell's second Spitsbergen expedition and in 1864 he lead the expedition promoted by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.
• In 1870, he visited Greenland and in 1871 went again to Spitsbergen and stayed there all winter, nearly starving to death.
• In the expeditions of 1872 and 1875, he headed a well-organized expedition in the iron steamer Sofia, and reached the highest northern latitude (+81° 42 min) then attained in the eastern hemisphere.
• In 1875, he went to the Yenisei River in Siberia, in a small vessel, which he sent back while he went up the river and returned home by land. The next year he went to the United States and was a juror at the Centennial Exhibition.
• In 1878 he sailed around the north coast of Asia, returning home by way of the Bering Strait, being the first to make the whole length of the Northeast passage. This he accomplished in the voyage of the Vega, navigating for the first time the northern coasts of Europe and Asia. Starting from Karlskrona on June 22, 1878, the Vega doubled Cape Chelyuskin in the following August, and after being frozen in at the end of September near the Bering Strait, completed the voyage successfully in the following summer.