Johan Peter Koch

Who was Johan Peter Koch?

Johan Peter Koch was a Danish captain and explorer of the Arctic dependencies of Denmark, born at Vestenskov.

He participated in Amdrup's expedition to east Greenland in 1900 and was one of the general staff of the surveying expeditions to Iceland in 1903-1904. In 1906-1908 he was a member of the Danmark expedition led by Ludvig Mylius-Erichsen, which mapped the last pieces of the northeastern coast of Greenland. On the death of Mylius-Erichsen and two others on a long sled voyage from Danmarkshavn to Peary Land, Koch along with the Greenlander Tobias Gabrielsen searched for the lost party, and found only the Greenlander Jørgen Brønlund on whose body was recovered hand drawn charts which completed the map of Greenland. Koch later led a sled expedition across the inland ice of Greenland in 1912-13, with Alfred Wegener.

Koch received, among other honors, the Vega medal of the Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography. He became a member of the International Polar Commission.