The Great White North / The story of polar exploration from the earliest times to the discovery of the pole

by Helen S. Wright

“M’Clure had thirty men and three officers fully prepared to leave for the depot at Point Spencer. What a disappointment it would have been to go there and find the miserable Mary yacht, with four or five casks of provisions, instead of a fine large depot!

“Another party of seven men were to have gone by the Mackenzie, with a request to the Admiralty to send out a ship to meet them at Point Leopold, in 1854. The thirty men are on their way over to me now. I shall, if possible, send them on to Beechey Island, and about ten men of my own crew, to be taken home the first opportunity.”

Captain Kellett was at first inclined to favour M’Clure’s efforts to save the Investigator, but, on the 2d of May, Lieutenant Cresswell reported to Captain Kellett that two more deaths had occurred. It was then deemed advisable that Dr. Domville should go back with Captain M’Clure and inspect the crew. Those unfitted to pass another winter in the Arctic were to be ordered home, and the healthy should be given their option of going or remaining. Only four of the crew were willing to remain, although all of the officers volunteered to stand by the vessel.

Preparations were therefore made to abandon the ship. A depot of provisions and stores was landed for the use of Collinson, Franklin, or any other person that might find them, and on June 3, 1853, the colours were hoisted to the masthead, and officers and crew bade farewell to the Investigator. Upon arriving at Dealy Island, they were accommodated on board the Resolute and Intrepid.

DEATH OF BELLOT

In connection with the glorious report of the discovery of the Northwest Passage and the safety of M’Clure, Captain Inglefield brought home news of a sad and tragic character; the death of that gallant Frenchman, Lieutenant Bellot. He had returned to the north in the Phœnix drawn by the fatal lure of the Arctic which to his adventurous soul was irresistible. In August, 1853, he had volunteered to lead a party to Sir Edward Belcher’s squadron near Cape Beecher in Wellington Channel. They started on a Friday, the 12th, from Beechey Island,—Harvey, Johnson, Madden, and Hook, with Lieutenant Bellot in the lead,—carrying despatches from Captain Pullen of the North Star.

The rottenness of the ice at this season makes travel particularly dangerous, and Bellot was cautioned to keep close to the eastern shore of Wellington Channel. They were provided with a light India-rubber boat, which was easily dragged upon the sledge. The evening of the 12th, they encamped about three miles from Cape Innes. The following day they made considerable progress, and that night encamped upon the broken ice, over which they had been plodding all day, near Cape Bowden. On Sunday they noticed a crack about four feet wide running across the channel. No special concern was felt at this discovery, and Lieutenant Bellot cheered and encouraged the men to make for a cape in the distance which he called Grinnell Cape. Upon reaching this cape, a broad belt of water was found between the ice and the shore. An unfortunate wind raised a rough sea, but Lieutenant Bellot made an attempt to reach the shore alone in the boat, intending to convey a line by which the remainder of the party and provisions might be brought across. The violence of the gale drove him back, and Harvey and Madden were ordered into the boat, and successfully made the crossing. After this the boat was passed and repassed by means of lines, and three loads from the sledge were landed in safety. The party on shore were hauling off for a fourth when Madden, who had hold of the shore-line and stood up to his middle in water, called out that the ice was on the move, and driving offshore.

Bellot saw that if Madden held on to the line much longer he would be dragged into deep water, so he called to him to let go, which he did. Lieutenant Bellot and his two men then hauled the boat on to the sledge and ran it up to the windward side of the ice, intending to launch it at once and make for the shore. Before this could be accomplished, the ice had rapidly increased its motion and drifted so far from the shore as to make it impossible for them to reach it. Madden and Harvey, with indescribable feelings of alarm, hastened to an eminence, and for two long hours watched their comrades drifting out to sea in the teeth of a bitter breeze—amid the turbulent icebergs. As the mists and driving snow finally closed upon their view, the two men were seen standing by the sledge, Lieutenant Bellot on the top of a hummock.

Madden and Harvey descended to the shore and at once began their return journey to the ship. With very little provisions, they walked round Criffen Bay and hence to Cape Bowden, where they remained to rest. While there, great was their joy to recognize Johnson and Hook hastening toward them. The party now made for the ship, which they reached with considerable difficulty and privation. The fate of poor Lieutenant Bellot is described by William Johnson, who was with him on the ice at the time of his death.