JOURNAL OF THE SEARCH
FOR
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.
CHAPTER I.
Cause of delay in equipment—Fittings of the 'Fox'—Volunteers for Arctic service—Assistance from public departments—Reflections upon the undertaking—Instructions and departure—Orkneys and Greenland—Fine Arctic scenery—Danish establishments in Greenland—Frederickshaab, in Davis' Straits.
It is now a matter of history how Government and private expeditions prosecuted, with unprecedented zeal and perseverance, the search for Sir John Franklin's ships, between the years 1847-55; and that the only ray of information gleaned was that afforded by the inscriptions upon three tombstones at Beechey Island, briefly recording the names and dates of the deaths of those individuals of the lost expedition, who thus early fell in the cause of science and of their country.
In this manner were we made aware of the locality where the Franklin expedition passed its first Arctic winter. The traces assuring us of that fact, were discovered in August, 1850, by Captain Ommanney, R.N., of H.M.S. 'Assistance,' and by Captain Penny, of the 'Lady Franklin.'
FORMER EXPEDITIONS.
In October, 1854, Dr. Rae brought home the only additional information respecting them which has ever reached us. From the Esquimaux of Boothia Felix he learned that a party of about forty white men were met on the west coast of King William's Island, and from thence travelled on to the mouth of the Great Fish River, where they all perished of starvation, and that this tragic event occurred apparently in the spring of 1850.