Only the Ghosts of Ships Survive

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 998, 14 June 1930, Page 18

Only the Ghosts of Ships Survive

Canadian Government Offers

Reward For Solution of Baffling Mystery of Arctic Expedition Led by Sir John Franklin More Than 80 Years Ago in Quest of the Northwest Passage ....

OMEWHEKE In the 'BNfrozen bosom of a little island in the Arctic re/ZW\sW(sv\ gions is locked a mys’V tery upon which the world has been working for more than three-quarters of a century and which Canada is today making a renewed effort to solve. What are the real facts concerning the ill-fated expedition headed by Sir John Franklin? Where lies the gallant leader and does his grave contain the priceless records of the Northwest Passage? For a solution of the mystery the Canadian Government has offered a handsome reward. Eighty-five years ago, on the ISth day of May, Sir John Franklin with his party of 128 officers and men set sail from the Thames on two ships, the Erebus and the Terror. They were bent on answering the foremost navigational problem of the day, a problem upon which explorers had been at work before America was discovered, namely, a Northwest Passage between the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. But death sailed with that party and not one lived to tell the story of its trials and heroic struggles. This much is certain: the expedition came to an end within 100 miles of the accomplishment of its purpose. Although Amundsen in 1905 completed the passage to Bering Strait, the scientific world has generally conceded the honour of the discovery to Sir John Franklin.

.Now Canada is seeking to piece together the story, fragments of which have drifted back from time to time. Tales of ghost ships locked in the merciless ice of two winters and manned by dead sailors; stories of the desperate attempts of the survivors to reach help by starting out on foot across the frozen wastes and dying from exhaustion and exposure; personal relics of the explorers found in the possession of Eskimos. Those who seek the solution to the Franklin mystery have only one little scrap of paper as documentary evidence to follow. The paper was found in a cairn at Point- Victory, on the north-west coast of King Williams Island, by the McClintock relief party, sent out by Lady Franklin in 1857. It is a printed form, the kind usually supplied to ships by the Admiralty with the object of being enclosed in bottles and thrown overboard to ascertain the set and general drift of ocean currents. However, the margin of the form contained written notations signed by two officers of the expedition which gave to the world the clues upon which Is has sines worked.

The notations were made a year apart; the first when the men were buoyed up with the hopes of shortly accomplishing the great work they had set themselves to achieve; the second when, after losing their leader and with their ship locked in the ice and facing a grim battle for survival, they were preparing to set forth on foot for the river than meant salvation. The first notation reads: 2 Jth of May, 1847— H.M. ships Krebus and Terror wintered in the ice in latitude 70 degrees 5 minutes North and longitude p 8 degrees 23 minutes West having 1 _ wintered in 3 846-7 at Beechey Island in latitude 74 degrees 43 minutes ZJi seconds North, longitude 91 degrees minutes 15 seconds West, after havmg ascended Wellington Channel to latitude i 7 degrees and returned by the west side of Cornwallis Island. Sir John Franklin commanding the expedition.. All well. Party consisting of two officers and •>4 X 1847 n leU 1116 ships on Monday. May This notation was signed by Lieutenant Gore. The second notation was signed by Captain Fitzjames and reads: April 25, 1848— H.M. ships Terror and Ei-ebus were deserted on April 22 five leagues north-north.west of this, havbeset since September, IS4 6, J ho officers and crews, consisting of 3 0& souls, under the command of Captain F. R. M. Crosier, landed here in latitude 6.» degrees -»7 minutes 42 seconds North longitude 9S degrees 41 minutes West. A paper was found by Lieutenant Irving under the cairn supposed to have been built by Sir James Ross in IS3I, four

miles to the northward, where it . had been deposited by the late Commander Gore in June, 1847. Sir James Ross's pillar has not, however, been found, and the paper has been transferred to this position, which is that on which Sir James Ross's piliar was erected. Sir John Franklin died on June 11, 1847, and the total loss by death In the expedition has been, up to this date, nine officers and Id men. Start, on tomorrow, 2Cth, for Backs Fish River.”

The efforts of the Canadian Government today to complete the grim history of the Franklin expedition are but the continuation of many other attempts which have been made over a period of more than SO years. Lives have been risked and thousands of dollars spent to no avail, for little has been added to the information contained in the paper found by McClintock.

That there were many important records of that notable exploration and that logbooks were kept on both ships is a certainty, explorers say. It also seems reasonable to suppose that when hope of success was gone and death stared the entire party in the face, precautions would have been taken to preserve these records for explorers who would ultimately follow in their footsteps. In 1847, when the prolonged silence of the Franklin expedition boded ill for its fate, the British Admiralty sent instructions to the various Hudson Bay Company’s posts to warn Indians to look out for the survivors, and large rewards were offered by the Government to the masters and crews of all ships employed in the whaling fisheryin Baffin Bay for information concerning the Erebus and the Terror.

Failing to get any information from these sources, the British Admiraltyequipped and commissioned several vessels for search purposes. At her own expense Lady- Franklin equipped the Prince Albert, a schooner of 90 tons, which sailed under the command of Cajitain Forsyth, R.N., with instructions to explore the coast of Prince Regent Islet. At the time that the Government was offering 20,000 crowns, Lady Franklin offered a further sum of 3,000 crowns “to any exploring party or parties as may in the judgment of the Admiralty have rendered efficient assistance to Sir John Franklin, his ships and crew.” In the autumn of 1850, five years after the expedition left England, there were no few-er than 15 vessels engaged in the search. But not a trace of the two ships or a clue to the fate of the party was found. The first step in retracing the itinerary of the ill-fated expedition came when Captain Austin, who had wintered at Griffiths Island, in Barrows Strait, returned with the information that three graves marked with simple headstones and inscriptions were found on Beechey Island—grim evidence of the first w-inter of the Frank lin expedition having been spent on that island. The locality was thoroughly- searched for further evidence, but without hvail. From this point nil trace of the party was lost and reremained veiled in obscurity until the spring of 1855. From the Eskimos of Boothia, Dr. Rae, sent out by the Hudson Bay Company, learned that a party of about 40 white men were seen on the west coast of King 'Williams Island and was travelling toward aßcks Fish River. The Eskimos

said ’ they had all fall down and die in their tracks.” Some relics were obt a lin'd from tile natives, and brought home by this expedition, and-Dr. Ra e was given 10.000 crowns for apparent ly solving the mystery. Lady Franklin and the advocates of further search impressed upon 'the Government the necessity of following up this information, but the Government deemed it inadvisable to spend further time and funds for what apparently was a lost cause. How. ever. Lady Franklin not only used her own fortune in a renewed'search but a considerable sum raised bv popular subscription, and Captain MeClintock set sail in command of the expedition that was to bring back the only documentary evidence of the Franklin party yet found. Captain McClintoek’s account of his expedition, limited to a few copies, is now in‘the rare-book class. A peep between its covers might be interestiug in the light of the present interest in the mystery. “May 7.—We talked to Eskimos, who remembered that one ship was sunk and one foundered. One old woman told of the white men dropping as they journeyed to Great River. I purchased from them six pieces of silver plate bearing the crest and initials of Franklin and Crozier, as 'well as many small toilet articles belonging to the party. They assured us that three days' journey from here we might find parts of the wreck of the ship. “May IS (just fourteen years since Sir John Franklin set sail from England*. —Shortly after midnight last night, when walking on a ridge near the beach, I came upon a human skeleton with a few fragments of clothing strewed around, of the dress showed him to have been a steward on the Terror. “May 20.—Two more skeletons found in a boat mounted on a heavilv constructed sled. In the boat were books, articles of clothing and about ten pounds of chocolate, but not a line of writing. They were evidently some of the men who left the ship •and were endeavouring to get to the river on sleds.” But nothing else of note was found until the important discovery of the cairn containing the printed form with its valuable marginal writings. From it the world has been able to piece out something of the story of the Franklin expedition. Major T. L. Burwash, who is attached to the North-west Territories and Yukon branch of the Dominion Government, and is himself an explorer of note, has for years been interested in speculations concerning the fate of the Franklin party. He has just returned from a sojourn in the polar regions, where he travelled 6,500 miles by dog, boat and airplane and went over both the real and fancied footsteps of the Franklin expedition. He says there are Eskimos living today who profess to recall the mysterious “Kabloonahs,” or white men, and their great winged ‘kaiak. He believes the men perished from fatigue and scurvy rather than starvation. as some have asserted, for records show that they were heavily supplied with provisions. He thinks it may be possible to locate the missing documents.