Angikuni Lake (variant: Lake Anjikuni) is an uninhabited lake in Kivalliq Region, Nunavut, Canada. It is one of several lakes located along the Kazan River; Ennadai Lake is to the south and Yathkyed Lake is to the north.

Geography

The lake’s shore is notable for rocky outcroppings of the Precambrian Shield, being part of the Hearne Domain, Western Churchill province of the Churchill craton.

Fauna

Barren-ground caribou migrate through the area. The lake contains Lake trout, Northern Pike and Arctic grayling.

Ethnography

During his 1948 trip, Canadian explorer Farley Mowat arrived at Angikuni Lake, then part of the Northwest Territories, and found a cairn, constructed in a fashion uncommon to area Inuit. It contained pieces of a hardwood box with dovetailed corners. Mowat, knowing that only one other European explorer, Samuel Hearne, had been in this region previously, but that was in 1770, speculated that the monument was built by Francis Crozier who vanished in 1848 during the ill-fate Northwest Passage Expedition, originally led by Sir John Franklin.(Woodman, 1991, pg.317)

Unsolved mystery

In 1930, a newsman in The Pas, Manitoba reported on a small Inuit village right off of Lake Angikuni. The village always welcomed fur trappers that passed through now and then. But during the year 1930, a man that was well-known in the village, Joe Labelle, found that everyone in the village was gone. He saw that the villagers left immediately because he found unfinished shirts that still had needles in them, and food hanging over fire pits. And even more disturbing was that he found seven sled dogs that were dead from starvation, and that a grave had been dug up. The fur trapper knew that an animal could not have done any of this because the stones that surrounded the grave in a circle had not been disturbed in any way. The fur trapper reported this to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who conducted a search for the missing people. No one was ever found. This is the story as it appears in Frank Edwards' 1966 book, Stranger than Science; other versions appear in Whitley Strieber's science fiction novel, Majestic (fiction) and Dean Koontz's horror yarn "Phantoms"; The Worlds Greatest UFO Mysteries (presented as fact) has an even more embellished version, as do other websites and books, complete with mysterious lights in the sky, empty graveyards, and over one thousand people missing.

The earliest version that was found is in the November 29, 1930 Halifax Herald, written by a journalist of questionable repute, Emmett E Kelleher. The article contained a "photo" later found to be from 1909 that had nothing at all to do with the story. The story appears to have been forgotten until referenced by Edwards' 1966 book.

The event is still considered "unsolved", though some believe the story to be a hoax because of inconsistencies.(Latta, 1991, pg.255)

Analysis

The RCMP has since dismissed the case as an urban legend, claiming that the story originated in the book Stranger Than Science by Frank Edwards. The RCMP also states that "It is also believed that such a large village would never have been possible in such a remote area." (Despite the fact that the aforementioned book the RCMP is using for reference only cites 30 people and one grave.) The RCMP states that it has no records of any unusual activity in the area.

Despite the modern RCMP explanation, an older one can be found from 1931, issued by the RCMP itself after an investigation that the modern RCMP does not acknowledge. The 1931 RCMP considered the whole story untrue, although later investigations indicate there may have been some structures that were permanently or seasonally abandoned by the occupants, a normal act which could be confusing to those inexperienced to the area and conditions; it was not sudden and nothing of any real value was left behind. The November 1976 issue of Fate Magazine also studied the story to much the same conclusions.

References

• Latta, Jeffrey Blair. The Franklin Conspiracy Cover-Up, Betrayal, and the Astonishing Secret Behind the Lost Arctic Expedition. Toronto: Hounslow Press, 2001. Excerpt from Google Books ISBN 0888822340
• Woodman, David C. Unravelling the Franklin Mystery Inuit Testimony. McGill-Queen's native and northern series, 5. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1991. Excerpt from Google Books ISBN 0773509364

External links

• Angikuni Lake at the Atlas of Canada