THE ENCOUNTER BETWEEN THE LA KORRIGANE EXPEDITION AND THE WAUCHOPES Thanks to the expedition journals of Sarah Chinnery (Fortune 1998) and Monique de Ganay (Coiffi er 2014), we can closely reconstruct the events that both preceded 106 and followed the van den Broek photograph. On September 10, 1935, Ernest Wauchope and his wife, Biddy, dined with Sarah Chinnery in Angoram at the home of merchant Robert Overall (locally called Bob). They were also in the company of Patrol Offi cer Hamilton in Gregory Bateson’s large, mosquito-netted room (Fortune 1998: 160–162).8 The next day, Chinnery and the Wauchopes embarked on their boat, the Balangot, to visit Kambot village on the banks of the Keram River. They later went downriver to spend the night in Alagunam village on the Yuat River. The next day, they went up the Yuat as far as Kinakatem village, where Margaret Mead and Reo Fortune had done fi eld work three years earlier. They also visited Brenda and Dankar villages and purchased objects there (Fortune 1998: 165–170). On Monday, September 16, they continued upriver to Bun village, and the following day turned back toward the Sepik River, making stops at the villages of Andua and Yurma, where the Wauchopes completed their purchases. Biddy Wauchope fell ill and the couple decided to return to Angoram (Fortune 1998: 171–173). On Friday, September 20, District Offi cer (Kiap)9 Bloxham arrived in Angoram on the colonial administration’s schooner, the Hermes, and continued upriver toward Ambunti the next day. Chinnery took advantage of the opportunity and accompanied Hamilton and Bob Overall aboard the Hermes (Fortune 1998: 173). Two days later, on September 23, the members of the French expedition arrived in Angoram aboard their yacht, La Korrigane. Kiap Bloxham welcomed them warmly and invited them to dinner (van den Broek 1939: 190; Coiffi er 2014: 127). He introduced them to the Wauchopes aboard La Korrigane. Wauchope offered them four objects as gifts, including two of the sculpted fl ute stoppers they had just acquired on their trip along the Keram and Yuat Rivers. This was probably the day that van den Broek trained his lens on Wauchope, surrounded by his harvest of art objects, which he had presumably just unloaded onto the riverbank with his four local assistants. La Korrigane continued upriver the next day but ran aground on a sandbank in a river meander near Moiem village. The severity of the event was compounded by a violent and sudden earthquake that occurred shortly thereafter. By coincidence, the Hermes then came by on its way back from Ambunti. Being aboard it10 (Fortune 1998: 170), Chinnery was able to make the acquaintance of the French travelers and spent some time on their yacht (Coiffi er 2014: 127). She briefl y told them of her recent trip along the Yuat River with the Wauchopes (Fortune, 1998: 163–173). Three days later, on September 28, La Korrigane was fi nally pulled free of the sandbank, towed off by the Hermes and another schooner, the Win On, which belonged to Chinese trader Chu Leong, with whom Chinnery then continued on to Madang. During that time, Monique de Ganay fi nished reading the writings of Margaret Mead and Stéphane Chauvet, periodically taking time off from her literary endeavors to set up shots of whisky for their generous rescuers (Coiffi er 2014: 129). Some days later, on October 12, La Korrigane explorers met Bob Overall in the village of Mindimbit, as well as an individual named istration.4 Early in 1935, she and the museum’s trustees accepted a proposal made through a law fi rm intermediary in Sydney to recognize Wauchope as an offi cial collector for the institution.5 Other correspondence stipulates that, in keeping with Australian administration policy, he should not collect human skulls.6 The minutes of the meetings of the trustees from 1934 through 1938 indicate that there were many written exchanges between Wauchope and the Australian Museum’s administration. We also learn from these documents that he was paid the sum of £200 for one of collections that he formed.7 FIG. 4: Photograph of the yacht La Korrigane as it was sailing in the Sepik River region, 1935. Reproduced by permission of the van den Broek d’Obrenan family. FEATURE
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