Year: 1875

Admiral Richards, in letter published in
yesterdays HERALD commenting upon the
expedition of Captain Allen Young in the
Pandora, points out the fact that Lady
Franklin to the end of her life entertained
an unalterable conviction that some records
Of her husbands expedition still lay buried
on King Williams Island, off the shores of
which his ships were abandoned in 1S48.
The points Of interest to Arctic navigators
are the discovery Of these records and the
opening of a southwest passage. Those who
study the subject believe that Sir John
Franklin left his journals on King Williams
Island, and that if the island could be
searched by reaching it in the latter part
of August or the first of September
these records might be discovered. The
search Of Sir Leopold McClintock was made
in May, when the ground was for many feet
deeply covered with snow. The reasons for
this theory on the part of Arctic navigators
are logical. Sir John Franklin died in June
1S47, when the Erebus and the Terror, his
two ships, were blocked up in the ice fifteen
miles from Cape Felix. AS everybody at
that time was in good health on board these
ships, it seems probable that instead Of
burying him in hole cut in the ice, they
would have carried the body to land and
there inferred it. The Erebus and Terror
we're abandoned the following spring, in
April, 164S. One hundred and FIVE of the
late officers and crew landed at Point Vic
tory, few miles south of Cape Felix, with
the intention Of trying to reach the great
Fish River. That is all that is absolutely
known of the fate of Sir John Franklins OK
pedition. These facts recorded on q scrap
Of paper in ten lines of writing, are the only
results obtained by forty ships, sent out on
many different expeditions. This one scrap
of paper is the single record of the fate of
the great explorer. Some critics have alluded
to the curious fact that the English after
having searched over the whole Arctic Zone,
after having spent millions of pounds in the
search and after having finally demonstrated
the fact that Sir John Franklin's party was
lost on King Williams Island, should sud-
denly abandon the search at the point of
success The fact that q summer search had





authorities because McClintock discouraged
it. He had made his glory out of the Arctic
regions and reasoned that if anybody were
to 90 and do moro he would thereby be
eclipsed. And it is quite possible, according
to some Of the writer's, that this feeling Of
tenderness toward McClintock may have
actuated Captain Allen Young, Of the Pan
DORA 1t seems to us that the papers Of the
Erebus and Terror are somewhere on King
Williams Island. If they were properly put
up in barrels there is no reason why they
should not be in as good condition now as
when the ships were abandoned, nearly
thirty years ago. Some writers think that
the Esquimaux may have found them and
burned them for fuel but when Captain
McClintock was on King Williams Island
it is very certain that no Esquimanx
had ever been 50 far north as Point
Victory, where he landed. At least
McClintock says as much in his
narrative of the expedition His reasons for
SO believing were that he found too many
relics of the last expedition in tho shape of
wood, iron and clothing-things Of the great
est value to the Esquimaux-which they
never would have left behind them. Alto
gether, the problem Of finding the logbooks,
records and journals Of Sir John Franklins
expedition is as interesting now as it was
nearly thirty years ago. We agree with Ad-
miral Richards in his letter to the London
Times, that the solution Of this question is
now the most interesting duty awaiting
Arctic explorers.