“A cursed affair”—how a Norwegian expedition to Greenland became the USA’s first maritime capture in World War II

Abstract

Last year, Frode Skarstein contributed an essay to Polar Research in which he related the failed attempt by a coterie of nationalistic Norwegians to annex part of Greenland— “Erik the Red’s Land”—for Norway during the early 1930s. In the following essay, Skarstein tells the story of how the same group of Norwegian nationalists tried to resurrect Norwegian claims to the east coast of Greenland during the Second World War—and how the colliding interests of the Germans and the Americans made for a dramatic finale to the Norwegian adventures in Erik the Red’s Land.

Keywords:

• Greenland
• Arctic imperialism
• Adolf Hoel
• World War II
• Hallvard Devold
• Norway