Although much talent has been brought to bear upon the deciphering of the letters found in a pocket-book near Cape Herschel (page [248] ante), yet, from their being so very much defaced by time, only a few detached sentences have been made out, and these do not in the slightest degree refer to the proceedings of the lost expedition.
It will be seen that I have noticed (page [260]) the discrepancy between the number of souls accounted for by the Point Victory Record, and the generally received opinion that 138 individuals sailed in the 'Erebus' and 'Terror.'
I am now enabled to state, on the authority of the Admiralty, that only one hundred and thirty-four individuals left the United Kingdom, and of these five men subsequently returned: one by H.M.S. 'Rattler,' and four by the transport 'Barretto Junior;' so that only one hundred and twenty-nine—the exact number mentioned in the record—actually entered the ice. The five invalids were—
| From H.M.S. 'Terror,' | John Brown, Able seaman. |
| " | Robert Carr, Armorer. |
| " | James Elliot, Sailmaker. |
| " | William Aitken, Marine. |
| From H.M.S. 'Erebus,' | Thomas Birt, Armorer. |
The relics we have brought home have been deposited by the Admiralty in the United Service Institution, and now form a national memento—the most simple and most touching—of those heroic men who perished in the path of duty, but not until they had achieved the grand object of their voyage,—the Discovery of the North-West Passage.
London, 24th Nov., 1859.