The lands of silence

by Sir Clements R. Markham

Baffin’s Discoveries.

Baffin concluded that all the openings were bays. He was right as regards Wolstenholme and Whale Sounds. But those named after Sir Thomas Smith, Sir Francis Jones, and Sir James Lancaster are channels leading to the Polar Ocean, not sounds.

In returning south the Discovery had to run through much ice, and Baffin was never able to reach the land on the west side, which he was anxious to do, so as to obtain green food for the sick, for scurvy had attacked them. Richard Wayman, the cook, died on the 26th July, and Master Herbert[89], with two or three others, was very ill. So Baffin stood over to the Greenland side, and reaching Cockayne Sound on the 28th an abundant supply of scurvy grass, sorrel, and orpine was gathered, while the natives brought salmon peel to barter. The scurvy grass was boiled in beer, and made into salads with sorrel. In a week all were restored to health, and on the 6th August, 1616, they were homeward bound. The Irish coast was sighted on the 25th, and on the 30th the Discovery anchored in Dover roads.

Purchas has printed the brief narrative of Baffin, and his very interesting letter to Sir John Wolstenholme in which he says that though there is no passage by Baffin’s Bay, voyages might be profitable from the whalebone and oil, the seal-skins, and the walrus and narwhal ivory. In this he was right, and his discovery led to the annual acquisition of wealth for many years.

We only have in Purchas the Briefe and True Relation and the letter to Sir John Wolstenholme; but in the Relation Baffin says, “all these sounds and islands the map doth truly describe.” We are then treated to the following exasperating note by Purchas, “This map of the author, with the tables of his journal” (the tabulated log) “and sailing were somewhat troublesome and too costly to insert.” The mischief done by the loss to posterity of these precious documents endured for two centuries. It led to such confusion in the ideas of map-makers that at last the very existence of Baffin’s Bay was doubted. On the map of Luke Foxe (1635) it is shown correctly[90]. But Hondius published a version quite different from the reality, and others followed him. In Moll’s Atlas (1720) both the correct delineation of Luke Foxe and the very erroneous one of Hondius and his imitators are given. Van Keulen and D’Anville caused still greater confusion. In the Maltebrun atlas (1812) there is a slight improvement. Daines Barrington gives what he calls “a circumpolar map according to the latest discoveries.” He treats Baffin’s Bay as a semicircular dotted line with “Baffin’s Bay according to the relation of W. Baffin in 1616 but not now believed” written across it. Finally in Sir John Barrow’s Chronological History of the Voyages to the Arctic Regions (1818) Baffin’s Bay is entirely expunged, Davis Strait being made to open northwards on a blank space. Thus, owing to the omission of the map and log by Purchas, the great discovery of Baffin became at length entirely ignored and discredited.

Baffin, on his return from his great discovery in 1616, had made five voyages to the Arctic regions. The fjords and islets of west Greenland, the glaciers and ice floes of Spitsbergen, the tidal phenomena of Hudson Strait, and the secrets of the far northern bay which he unveiled, were all familiar to him. He had practically investigated, and deeply pondered over the absorbing questions of polar discovery. As an astronomical observer and navigator his unwearied diligence was as remarkable as his talent. If he was an untaught man who had risen from a humble origin, he had so far educated himself as to be able to write letters which are not only well expressed, but graced with classical allusions.

Baffin, who was probably past middle age when he returned from his great discovery, then entered the service of the East India Company, being rated as Master’s Mate, under Captain Shilling, on board the Anne Royal, one of the fleet which was got ready in the winter of 1616. His most important service during the voyage 1617–1619 was the survey of parts of the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. There is the following entry in the Court’s minutes on the 1st October, 1619, “William Baffin, a master’s mate in the Anne, to have a gratuity for his pains and good art in drawing out certain plots of the coast of Persia and the Red Sea which are judged to have been very well and artificially performed.”

In the following year Captain Shilling was selected to command the Company’s fleet. He was on board the London, and, at his special recommendation, Baffin was appointed Master. The Company’s fleet encountered the Portuguese off Jáshak, near the entrance of the Persian Gulf in December 1620, and the fight continued without intermission for nine hours. The Portuguese ships then anchored to repair damages. The English, after raking them, put into Jáshak Roads on the coast of Mekran. A second and more decisive encounter took place on the 28th December, when the Portuguese were defeated, but the victory was dearly bought by the death of Captain Shilling, who was interred at Jáshak on the 9th January 1621.

Captain Baffin remained in command of the London, and the fleet returned to Surat. The English then made a treaty with Abbas the Great, Shah of Persia, to drive the Portuguese out of Ormuz, a Persian port which they had occupied since 1515. The English fleet, consisting of five ships, arrived at an open roadstead on the Persian coast near Ormuz, where news was received that the Portuguese had erected a fort on the island of Kishm to protect some wells. It was necessary to take it before investing Ormuz. The Kishm fort was already beleagured by a Persian army, and the English fleet arrived there on the 20th January, 1622.

After two days, Captain Baffin went on shore with his mathematical instruments, to take the height and distance of the castle wall so as to find the range “for the better levelling of his guns.” But while he was so engaged he was hit by a shot from the fort, and killed on the spot[91].