Such was the esteem and affection Parry had acquired among the companions of his two former voyages, that when he took the command of a third expedition, with the intention of seeking a passage through Prince Regent’s Inlet, they all volunteered to accompany him. From the middle of July till nearly the middle of September (1824), the “Hecla” and the “Fury” had to contend with the enormous ice-masses of Baffin’s Bay, which would infallibly have crushed vessels less stoutly ribbed; and thus it was not before September 10 that they entered Lancaster Sound, which they found clear of ice, except here and there a solitary berg. But new ice now began to form, which, increasing daily in thickness, beset the ship, and carried them once more back again into Baffin’s Bay. By perseverance, however, and the aid of a strong easterly breeze, Parry regained the lost ground, and on September 27 reached the entrance of Port Bowen, on the eastern shore of Prince Regent’s Inlet, where he passed the winter. By July 19 the vessels were again free, and Parry now sailed across the inlet to examine the coast of North Somerset; but the floating ice so injured the “Fury” that it was found necessary to abandon her. Her crew and valuables were therefore received on board the “Hecla;” the provisions, stores, and boats were landed, and safely housed on Fury Point, off North Somerset, for the relief of any wandering Esquimaux, or future Arctic explorers who might chance to visit the spot, and the crippled ship was given up to the mercy of the relentless ice, while her companion made the best of her way to England.
In spite of the dreadful sufferings of Franklin, Richardson, and Back during their first land journey, we find these heroes once more setting forth in 1825, determined to resume the survey of the Arctic coasts of the American continent. A far more adequate preparation was made for the necessities of their journey than before; and before they settled down for the winter at “Fort Franklin,” on the shores of Great Bear Lake, a journey of investigation down the Mackenzie River to the sea had been brought to a successful end. As soon as the ice broke in the following summer, they set out in four boats, and separated at the point where the river divides into two main branches, Franklin and Back proposing to survey the coast-line to the westward, while Richardson set out in an easterly direction to the mouth of the Coppermine River. Franklin arrived at the mouth of the Mackenzie on July 7, where a large tribe of Esquimaux pillaged his boats, and it was only by great prudence and forbearance that the whole party were not massacred. A full month was now spent in the tedious survey of 374 miles of coast, as far as Return Reef, more than 1000 miles distant from their winter-quarters on Great Bear Lake. The return journey to Fort Franklin was safely accomplished, and they arrived at their house on September 21, where they had the pleasure of finding Dr. Richardson and Lieutenant Kendall, who, on their part, had reached the Coppermine, thus connecting Sir John Franklin’s former discoveries to the eastward in Coronation Gulf with those made by him on this occasion to the westward of the Mackenzie. The cold during the second winter at Fort Franklin was intense, the thermometer standing at one time at 58° below zero; but the comfort they now enjoyed formed a most pleasing contrast to the squalid misery of Fort Enterprise.
When Franklin left England to proceed on this expedition, his first wife was then lying at the point of death, and indeed expired the day after his departure. But with heroic fortitude she urged him to set out on the very day appointed, entreating him, as he valued her peace and his own glory, not to delay a moment on her account. His feelings may be imagined when he raised on Garry Island a silk flag which she had made and given him as a parting gift, with the instruction that he was only to hoist it on reaching the Polar Sea.
While Parry and Franklin were thus severally employed in searching for a western passage, a sea expedition under the command of Captain Beechey had been sent to Bering’s Straits to co-operate with them, so as to furnish provisions to the former and a conveyance home to the latter—a task more easily planned than executed; and thus we can not wonder that when the “Blossom” reached the appointed place of rendezvous at Chamisso Island, in Kotzebue Sound (July 25, 1826), she found neither Parry (who had long since returned to England) nor Franklin. Yet the barge of the “Blossom”—which was dispatched to the eastward under charge of Mr. Elson—narrowly missed meeting the latter; for when she was stopped by the ice at Point Barrow, she was only about 150 miles from Return Reef, the limit of his discoveries to the westward of the Mackenzie.
In the year 1827 the indefatigable Parry undertook one of the most extraordinary voyages ever performed by man; being no less than an attempt to reach the North Pole by boat and sledge travelling over the ice. His hopes of success were founded on Crosby’s authority, who reports having seen ice-fields so free from either fissure or hummock, that had they not been covered with snow, a coach might have been driven many leagues over them in a direct line; but when Parry reached the ice-fields to the north of Spitzbergen, he found them of a very different nature, composed of loose, rugged masses, intermixed with pools of water, which rendered travelling over them extremely arduous and slow. The strong flat-bottomed boats, specially prepared for an amphibious journey, with a runner attached to each side of the keel, so as to adapt them for sledging, had thus frequently to be laden and unladen, in order to be raised over the hummocks, and repeated journeys backward and forward over the same ground were the necessary consequence. Frequently the crew had to go on hands and knees to secure a footing. Heavy showers of rain often rendered the surface of the ice a mass of slush, and in some places the ice took the form of sharp-pointed crystals, which cut the boots like penknives. But in spite of all these obstacles, they toiled cheerfully on, until at length, after thirty-five days of incessant drudgery, the discovery was made that, while they were apparently advancing towards the pole, the ice-field on which they were travelling was drifting to the south, and thus rendering all their exertions fruitless. Yet, though disappointed in his hope of planting his country’s standard on the northern axis of the globe, Parry had the glory of reaching the highest authenticated latitude ever yet attained (82° 40´ 30´´). On their return to the “Hecla,” which awaited them under Captain Forester in Treurenberg Bay, on the northern coast of Spitzbergen, the boats encountered a dreadful storm on the open sea, which obliged them to bear up for Walden Island—one of the most northerly rocks of the archipelago—where, fortunately, a reserve supply of provisions had been deposited. “Every thing belonging to us,” says Sir Edward Parry, “was now completely drenched by the spray and snow; we had been fifty-six hours without rest, and forty-eight at work in the boats, so that by the time they were unloaded we had barely strength to haul them up on the rocks. However, by dint of great exertion, we managed to get the boats above the surf, after which, a hot supper, a blazing fire of drift-wood, and a few hours’ quiet rest restored us.” He who laments over the degeneracy of the human race, and supposes it to have been more vigorous or endowed with greater powers of endurance in ancient times, may perhaps come to a different opinion when reading of Parry and his companions.
Thus ended the last of this great navigator’s Arctic voyages. Born in the year 1790, of a family of seamen, Parry at an early age devoted himself, heart and soul, to the profession in which his father had grown old. In his twenty-eighth year he discovered Melville Island, and his subsequent expedition confirmed the excellent reputation he had acquired by his first brilliant success. From the years 1829 to 1834 we find him in New South Wales, as Resident Commissioner of the Australian Agricultural Company. In the year 1837 he was appointed to organize the mail-packet service, then transferred to the Admiralty, and after filling the post of Captain Superintendent of the Royal Naval Hospital at Haslar, was finally appointed Governor of Greenwich Hospital. He died in the summer of 1855 at Ems.
Ten years had elapsed since Captain John Ross’s first unsuccessful voyage, when the veteran seaman, anxious to obliterate the reproach of former failure by some worthy achievement, was enabled, through the munificence of Sir Felix Booth, to accomplish his wishes. A small Liverpool steamer, bearing the rather presumptuous name of the “Victory,” was purchased for the voyage, a rather unfortunate selection, for surely nothing can be more unpractical than paddle-boxes among ice-blocks; but to make amends for this error, the commander of the expedition was fortunate in being accompanied by his nephew, Commander James Ross, who, with every quality of the seaman, united the zeal of an able naturalist. He it was who, by his well-executed sledge journeys, made the chief discoveries of the expedition; but the voyage of the “Victory” is far less remarkable for successes achieved than for its unexampled protraction during a period of five years.
The first season ended well. On August 10, 1829, the “Victory” entered Prince Regent’s Inlet, and reached on the 13th the spot where Parry, on his third voyage, had been obliged to abandon the “Fury.” The ship itself had been swept away; but all her sails, stores, and provisions on land were found untouched. The hermetically sealed tin canisters in which the flour, meat, bread, wine, spirits, sugar, etc., were packed had preserved them from the attacks of the white bears, and they were found as good after four years as they had been on the day when the “Fury” started on her voyage. It was to this discovery that the crew of the “Victory” owed their subsequent preservation, for how else could they have passed four winters in the Arctic wastes?
On August 15 Cape Garry was attained, the most southern point of the inlet which Parry had reached on his third voyage. Fogs and drift-ice greatly retarded the progress of the expedition, but Ross moved on, though slowly, so that about the middle of September the map of the northern regions was enriched by some 500 miles of newly-discovered coast. But now, at the beginning of winter, the “Victory” was obliged to take refuge in Felix Harbor, where the useless steam-engine was thrown overboard as a nuisance, and the usual preparations made for spending the cold season as pleasantly as possible.
The following spring (from May 17 to June 13) was employed by James Ross on a sledge journey, which led to the discovery of King William’s Sound and King William’s Land, and during which that courageous mariner penetrated so far to the west that he had only ten days’ provisions—scantily measured out—for a return voyage of 200 miles through an empty wilderness.