Whenever it was possible M’Clure sent parties ashore to erect cairns and to open up communications with any natives that they might find. From these he gleaned one valuable piece of information, namely, that they had never before seen a “big oomiak” like the Investigator. The Erebus and Terror, therefore, could not have reached these shores.
After passing Return Reef navigation became more perilous than ever, owing to the innumerable shoals composed of driftwood and the deposits of the neighbouring rivers. On one occasion the Investigator went aground and lay for some time in imminent danger of being crushed to matchwood by the drifting floes. With all possible speed, a liberal supply of provisions was transferred to the boats, one of which unfortunately capsized and sixteen casks of salt meat went to the bottom. The loss was very severely felt later on.
Sailing with great care and circumspection, M’Clure succeeded in reaching Cape Parry. Here a south-easterly wind sprang up which cleared the sea of ice and gave him an open way to the north, of which he was not slow to take advantage. In a few hours the welcome cry of “land on the port bow” rang out, and Banks’ Land came in sight. At first there was some doubt as to what this new land might be. Some thought that it was a continuation of Wollaston Land, others held that it was a part of Banks’ Land. In his uncertainty M’Clure gave it the name of Baring Island, but when, later on, it was found to be the southern extension of the land sighted by Parry from Melville Island in 1819-20, its original name was, of course, retained.
McClure’s delight was completed when he found a perfectly open channel extending along the shores of the new land in a north-easterly direction. Up this channel he sailed, hardly daring to hope what was actually the truth, that this was the North-West Passage. His doubts were not, however, to be set at rest immediately, for thirty miles from the point at which the channel joins Barrow Strait his career was summarily checked by a barrier of ice which there was no penetrating, and all that he could do was to make up his mind to spend the winter where he was.
The early days of October brought with them the exceedingly unpleasant discovery that 500 lbs. of preserved meat were putrid and only fit to be thrown away. A little later, an examination of his stores showed him that another 424 lbs. were unfit for food, bringing the loss up to nearly a thousand pounds, in addition to the sixteen casks of salt meat which had fallen into the sea earlier in the voyage. The matter was especially serious as he had assured the Admiralty that he was fully provisioned for three years.
However, there was nothing for him to do but to make his crew forget the misfortune as quickly as possible, so he set about sending out expeditions along the shores of Prince of Wales’ Strait, as he had named the channel which he had just discovered, and through Banks’ Land. It was during one of these that he actually discovered the North-West Passage and so earned the ten thousand pounds offered by the Government. This event took place on October 26th, when M’Clure, having ascended a high hill found that, as he had hoped, Prince Albert Land trended away to the eastward, while Banks’ Land terminated in a low promontory about twelve miles from the point on which he stood. Away beyond the northern entrance to Prince of Wales’ Strait he gazed across the frozen waters of Melville Sound, in which Barrow Strait terminates.
The dark days of winter passed away without misadventure, and, with the return of spring, M’Clure decided to send out sledge parties in search of Franklin. Few of those whose lot is cast in warmer climates can realise the dangers and discomforts of a long sledge journey in the Arctic regions. Sherard Osborn knew them well, and he gives so eloquent a description of them that we may quote it for the benefit of the uninitiated.
“If they should feel cold,” he writes, “they must be patient, for until their return to the ship they will have no fire to warm them. Should their parched tongues cleave to their mouths, they must swallow snow to allay their thirst, for water there is none. Should their health fail, pity is all that their comrades can give them, for the sledge must move on its daily march. If hungry, they must console themselves by looking forward to being better fed when the travelling is over, for the rations are, necessarily, in sledge journeys, weighed off to an ounce. In short, from the time they leave the ship till their return to it, the service is ever one of suffering and privation, which call for the utmost endurance and most zealous energy.”
Three parties were sent out, which surveyed the coasts of Banks’ Land and Prince Albert Land, but their labours were fated to be unrewarded, for not a trace of the missing expedition could they discover.
As soon as the thaw released him, M’Clure naturally made an effort to complete the North-West Passage. Ice and contrary winds, however, rendered it impossible for him to make his way through Prince of Wales’ Strait, so he put about and determined to try to find a passage round the western coast of Banks’ Land, and so into Melville Sound. At first all went well, but when he reached lat. 73° 55′, the highest point that he had yet attained, he was once more brought to a standstill. The channel of open water became narrower, the coast became more dangerous, and towering hills of ice hemmed them in on every side, threatening the ship with instant destruction.