In the year 1553, "the Mystery and Company of English merchants adventurers for the discovery of regions, dominions, islands, and places unknown"—at the head of whom was Sebastian Cabot—fitted out an expedition of three vessels, and gave the chief command to Sir Hugh Willoughby, "by reason of his goodly personage, as also for his singular skill in the services of war." King Edward VI. confirmed the appointment in "a license to discover strange countries."
The fleet consisted of the Buona Speranza, of one hundred and seventy tons, commanded by Sir Hugh, with thirty-eight men, the Edward Buonaventura, of one hundred and sixty tons, commanded by Richard Chancellor, pilot-major of the expedition, with fifty-four men, and the Buona Confidentia, of ninety tons, with twenty-four men. The ships were victualled for fifteen months. On board of them were eighteen merchants interested in the discovery of a northeast passage to India,—a route, therefore, attempted by the English previous to that by the northwest, as the voyage of Sebastian Cabot can hardly be considered a serious effort. A council of twelve, in whom was vested the general direction of the voyage, was composed of the admiral, pilot-major, and other officers.
The squadron sailed from Deptford on the 10th of May, 1553, and fell in with the Norwegian coast on the 14th of July. On the 30th, while near Wardhus, the most easterly station of the Danes in Finmark, Chancellor's vessel was driven off in a storm, and was not seen again by the two others. The latter appear to have been tossed about in the North Sea for two months, in the course of which they landed at some spot on the western coast of Nova Zembla, being the first Europeans to visit that uninhabited waste. On the 18th of September they entered a harbor in Lapland formed by the mouth of the river Arzina. Here they remained a week, seeing seals, deer, bears, foxes, "with divers strange beasts, such as ellans and others, which were to us unknown and also wonderful." It was now the 1st of October, and the Arctic winter was far advanced. They resolved to winter there, first sending out parties in search of inhabitants. Three men went three days' journey to the south-southwest, but returned without having seen a human being. Others who went to the west and the southeast returned equally unsuccessful. This is the last positive intelligence we have of the fate of these hardy and unfortunate explorers. A will, however, alleged to have been made by one Gabriel Willoughby, and signed by Sir Hugh, bearing the date of January, 1554, shows, if authentic, that at least two of the party were alive at that period. Purchas, one of the oldest authorities upon navigation and travels extant, says that the Buona Speranza was discovered in the following spring by a party of Russians, who found all the crew frozen to death. In 1557, a Drontheim skipper told an Englishman, at Kegor, that he had bought the sails of the Buona Confidentia; but it is not known where she was lost, or what was the fate of the crew. The will of which we have spoken, and a fragmentary diary attributed to Sir Hugh, were found by the Russians, and were restored to the kinsmen of the adventurers in England.
The Edward Buonaventura, commanded by Chancellor, and which was separated from her consorts off Wardhus, reached Archangel, on the White Sea, in Russia, in safety, and laid the foundation of a commercial intercourse between Russia and England. On his return, his ship was lost on the coast of Scotland, and he himself, with several of his crew, drowned. Thus, of the three ships despatched, not one ever reached home; and of the officers, merchants, and men, none survived to revisit their country, except a few of the common seamen of the Edward Buonaventura. The advantages acquired at such a cost of human life were limited to the barren discovery of the ice-clad coast of Nova Zembla. Nothing had been effected towards the accomplishment of a Northeast Passage.
Martin Frobisher, a seaman of experience and enterprise, was the first Englishman to cherish the project of attempting to penetrate to Asia by the channel supposed to exist to the north of America. He communicated his design to his friends, and spent fifteen years in fruitless efforts to enlist capital and energy in the cause. Sailors, financiers, merchants, statesmen,—all regarded the scheme as visionary and hopeless. At last Lord Dudley, the favorite of Elizabeth, interested himself in Frobisher's success, and from that moment he experienced little difficulty in accomplishing his object. He formed a company, amassed the requisite sums of money, and purchased three small vessels,—two barks of twenty-five tons each, the Gabriel and the Michael, and a pinnace of ten tons. This valiant little fleet weighed anchor at Deptford on the 8th of June, 1576, and, passing the court assembled at Greenwich, discharged their ordnance, and made as imposing an appearance as their limited outfit would allow. Queen Elizabeth waved her hand at the commander from a window, and, bidding him farewell, wished him success and a happy return. On the 25th he passed the southern point of Shetland,—known as Swinborn Head. He anchored here to repair a leak and to take in fresh water. On the 10th of July, he descried the coast of Greenland, "rising like pinnacles of steeples, and all covered with snow." The crew made efforts to go ashore, but could find no anchorage for the vessels, or landing-place for the boats. On the 28th, Frobisher saw dimly, through the fog, what he supposed to be the coast of Labrador, enveloped in ice. On the 31st he saw land for the third time, and on the 11th of August entered a strait to which he gave his name.
He ascended this strait a distance of one hundred and fifty miles. It was not till the eighth day that he saw any inhabitants. He then found that the country was sparsely settled by a race resembling Tartars. He went ashore and established friendly relations with a colony of nineteen persons, to each one of whom he gave a "threaden point,"—in other words, a needle and thread. A few days afterwards, five of the crew were taken by the natives and their boat destroyed. The inlet in which this happened was called Five Men's Sound. The next morning the vessels ran in-shore, shot off a fauconet and sounded a trumpet, but heard nothing of the lost sailors. However, Frobisher caught one of the natives in return, having decoyed him by the tinkling of a bell. When he found himself in captivity, we are told that "from very choler and disdain he bit his tongue in twain within his mouth: notwithstanding, he died not thereof, but lived until he came to England, and then he died of cold which he had taken at sea." On the 26th of August, Frobisher weighed anchor and started to return to England, the snow lying a foot deep upon the decks. He arrived at Yarmouth on the 1st of October.
One of Frobisher's sailors had brought with him a bit of shining black stone, which, upon examination, was found to yield an infinitesimal quantity of gold. The Northwest Passage became now a matter of secondary interest, the mines of Frobisher's Strait promising a more speedy and abundant return. The society he had formed determined to send him out anew, in vessels better equipped and provisioned for a longer period. He left Blackwall on the 26th of May, 1577, in her Majesty's ship Aide, of one hundred and eighty tons, followed by the Gabriel and Michael, his ostensible object being to discover "America to be an island environed with the sea, wherethrough our merchants may have course and recourse with their merchandise, from these our northernmost parts of Europe to those oriental coasts of Asia, to their no little commodity and profit that do or shall frequent the same." The fleet passed the Orkneys on the 8th of June.
For a month they sailed to the westward, the season of the year being that when, in those latitudes, a bright twilight takes the place of the light of day during the few hours that the sun is below the horizon; so that the crew had "the fruition of their books and other pleasures,—a thing of no small moment to such as wander in unknown seas and long navigations, especially when both the winds and raging surges do pass their common and wonted course." Throughout the voyage they met huge fir-trees, which they supposed to have been uprooted by the winds, driven into the sea by floods, and borne away by the currents.
On the 4th of July they made the coast of Greenland. The chronicler of this voyage, who had doubtless lately visited tropical latitudes, remarks that here, "in place of odoriferous and fragrant smells of sweet gums and pleasant notes of musical birds, which other countries in more temperate zones do yield, we tasted in July the most boisterous boreal blasts." In the middle of the month they entered Frobisher's Strait. On either side the land lay locked in the embrace of winter beneath a midsummer sun. Frobisher would not believe that the cold was sufficiently severe to congeal the sea-water, the tide rising and falling a distance of twenty feet. Ten miles from the coast he had seen fresh-water icebergs, and concluded that they had been formed upon the land and by some accidental cause detached. He reconnoitred the coast in a pinnace, and penetrated some distance into the interior, returning with accounts of supposed riches which he had discovered in the bowels of barren and frozen mountains. A cargo of two hundred tons of the precious earth was taken on board of one of the vessels. On the 20th of August, says the narrative, "it was high time to leave: the men were well wearied, their shoes and clothes well worn; their basket-bottoms were torn out and their tools broken. Some, with overstraining themselves, had their bellies broken, and others their legs made lame. About this time, too, the water began to congeal and freeze about our ships' sides o' nights." The fleet, which had troubled itself very little with the Northwest Passage, at once set sail to the southeast, and arrived in England towards the end of September.
The specimens of ore were assayed and found satisfactory, and Frobisher's report's upon the route to China were received with favor. The queen gave the name of Meta Incognita, or Unknown Boundary, to the region explored. The Government determined to build a fort in Frobisher's Strait and send a garrison and a corps of laborers there. In the mean time, Frobisher was despatched a third time with the same three vessels, and with a convoy of twelve freight-ships which were to return laden with Labrador ore. They set sail on the 31st of May, 1578, and made Greenland on the 20th of June. In July they entered the strait, where they were in imminent danger from storms and ice. The bark Denis, being pretty well bruised and battered, became "so leaky that she would no longer tarry above the water, and sank; which sight so abashed the whole fleet that we thought verily we should have tasted the same sauce." Boats were, however, manned, and the drowning crew were saved. The storm increased, and the ice pressed more and more upon them, so that they took down their topmasts. They cut their cables to hang overboard for fenders, "somewhat to ease the ships' sides from the great and dreary strokes of the ice. Thus we continued all that dismal and lamentable night, plunged in this perplexity, looking for instant death; but our God, who never leaveth them destitute which faithfully call upon him, although he often punisheth for amendment sake, in the morning caused the wind to cease and the fog to clear. Thus, after punishment, consolation; and we, joyful wights, being at liberty, hoisted our sails and lay beating off and on."