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Additional documents and survey on the Franklin sites of Beechey Island, Nunavut, Canada: addendum

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2011

Todd Hansen
Todd Hansen*
Affiliation:
P.O. Box 30, Berkeley, CA 94701, USA (thansen731@earthlink.net)
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Extract

In addition to the visits to Beechey Island referenced in my recent article (Hansen 2010), M'Dougall also describes his visit to Beechey Island (in Resolute with De Bray) from Tuesday 10 August 1852 (mistakenly given as 11 August) to Sunday, 15 August (M'Dougall 1857: 78–87). He gives his version of the inscriptions of the three Franklin expedition headboards. While he follows the mistaken placement order as in Osborn and The Illustrated London News of 4 October 1851 (Osborn 1865: 90; The Illustrated London News 1851b), comparison of the inscriptions with both Kane (Kane 1854: 163) and the photo of the Torrington headboard in Powell (Powell 2006: 330, Fig. 10) now lead me to conclude that M'Dougall's rather than Kane's version of the Franklin headboards inscriptions are probably the most accurate of the contemporary accounts.

Type
Notes
Information
Polar Record , Volume 48 , Issue 2 , April 2012 , pp. 195 - 196
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

In addition to the visits to Beechey Island referenced in my recent article (Hansen Reference Hansen2010), M'Dougall also describes his visit to Beechey Island (in Resolute with De Bray) from Tuesday 10 August 1852 (mistakenly given as 11 August) to Sunday, 15 August (M'Dougall Reference M'Dougall1857: 78–87). He gives his version of the inscriptions of the three Franklin expedition headboards. While he follows the mistaken placement order as in Osborn and The Illustrated London News of 4 October 1851 (Osborn Reference Osborn1865: 90; The Illustrated London News 1851b), comparison of the inscriptions with both Kane (Kane Reference Kane1854: 163) and the photo of the Torrington headboard in Powell (Powell Reference Powell2006: 330, Fig. 10) now lead me to conclude that M'Dougall's rather than Kane's version of the Franklin headboards inscriptions are probably the most accurate of the contemporary accounts.

The account of Sutherland Reference Sutherland1852 (Hansen Reference Hansen2010: 194–195) also has a foldout map at the front of volume 2 that includes a detail of Beechey Island (Sutherland Reference Sutherland1852: vol. 2 front map). It is similar to that in The Illustrated London News of 20 September 1851 and De Bray (The Illustrated London News 1851a; De Bray Reference De Bray and Barr1992: 42) in having a hatched oval symbol of the garden at Pullen's tent site (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Detail. Vicinity of the Beechey Island graves, tent, and supposed garden sites (Pullen Reference Pullen1855: opposite 794, in Powell Reference Powell2006:194).

As it was a common practice to bury messages north of cairns, the unidentified disturbed area (Hansen Reference Hansen2010: 198) at the ridge termination just northeast of the Franklin can cairn was probably created by Franklin searchers hoping, unsuccessfully, to find a buried message.

A new reference adds insight into the tent site discussed as site 4 (Hansen Reference Hansen2010: 197). Commander Pullen's proceedings from 14 August 1852 to February 1853 are given in the Arctic Blue Book series (Pullen Reference Pullen1854: 103–136). On 24 January 1853 Pullen started another careful search for records, especially under the pile of tins at the Franklin can cairn. On page 128, he states:

On the 28th we had dug over all those places that had been before examined, without finding any record to the direction of the missing ships have taken. A few broken tent pegs, bones, pieces of glass, shavings, &c., was all we got. By-the-by, in that place so imaginatively designated the garden, and what I should say was the site of a tent, was discovered most of the broken tent pegs, also scraps of brown paper and a solitary piece of tallow candle (mould). The cairn on the top of the island we have not yet found, although frequent have been the searches for it; however, we have plenty of time before us yet (Pullen Reference Pullen1854: 128).

Pullen also notes that he has begun a survey of the bay (Pullen Reference Pullen1854: 133). Thus it appears that Pullen studied the garden/tent site based initially on similar information as that available to Kane and De Bray. Presumably therefore the disturbed ground on the crest noted as site 3 (Hansen Reference Hansen2010: 197; Fig. 1) was located later, as well as the summit cairn. It is not unreasonable to believe that Pullen consulted with Osborn regarding the garden location, as the latter was back in the Arctic during the period Pullen was making his map.

References

De Bray, E.F. 1992. A Frenchman in search of Franklin: De Bray's Arctic journal 1852–1854 (translator and editor Barr, W.). Toronto: University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, T. 2010. Additional documents and survey on the Franklin sites of Beechey Island, Nunavut, Canada. Polar Record 46 (238): 193–199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kane, E.K. 1854. The U.S. Grinnell expedition in search of Sir John Franklin: a personal narrative. New York: Harper and Brothers.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
M'Dougall, G.F. 1857. The eventful voyage of H.M. discovery ship ‘Resolute’ to the Arctic regions in search of Sir John Franklin and the missing crews of the H.M. discovery ships ‘Erebus’ and ‘Terror’ 1852, 1853, 1854. London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, and Roberts.Google Scholar
Osborn, S. 1865. Stray leaves from an Arctic journal or eighteen months in the polar regions In search of Sir John Franklin's expedition in 1850–51. Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons.Google Scholar
Powell, B.D. 2006. The memorials on Beechey Island, Nunavut, Canada: an historical and pictorial survey. Polar Record 42 (223): 325–333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pullen, W.P.S. 1854. In: Great Britain, Parliament. Papers relative to the recent Arctic expeditions in search of Sir John Franklin and the crews of H.M.S. ‘Erebus’ and ‘Terror’. London: HMSO. (House of Commons, Sessional Papers, Accounts and Papers, 1854: 42 (1725)).Google Scholar
Pullen, W.P.S. 1855. In: Great Britain, Parliament. Further papers relative to the recent Arctic expeditions in search of Sir John Franklin and the crews of H.M.S. ‘Erebus’ and ‘Terror’. London: HMSO. (House of Commons, Sessional Papers, Accounts and Papers, 1854–1855: 35 (1898)).Google Scholar
Sutherland, P.C. 1852. Journal of a voyage in Baffin's Bay and Barrow Straits, in the years 1850–1851, performed by H.M. ships ‘Lady Franklin’ and ‘Sophia’ under the command of Mr. William Penny, in search of the missing crews of H.M. ships ‘Erebus’ and ‘Terror’: with a narrative of sledge excursions on the ice of Wellington Channel; and observations on the natural history and physical features of the countries and frozen seas visited. London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans (2 vols.).Google Scholar
The Illustrated London News. 1851a. The Arctic searching expeditions. The Illustrated London News 20 September 1851, 19: 347–348.Google Scholar
The Illustrated London News. 1851b. Traces of the Franklin expeditiona and return of Captain Austin's expedition. The Illustrated London News 4 October 1851, 19: 409–410.Google Scholar
Figure 0

Fig. 1. Detail. Vicinity of the Beechey Island graves, tent, and supposed garden sites (Pullen 1855: opposite 794, in Powell 2006:194).