A Narrative of the Discovery of the Fate of Sir John Franklin and his Companions
The Voyage of the Fox in the Arctic Seas

McClintock's 1859 account of his expedition through the North-West Passage to discover the fate of Arctic explorer Sir John Franklin.

Francis Leopold McClintock (Author)

9781108050036, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 14 June 2012

476 pages, 17 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 2.7 cm, 0.6 kg

Sir Francis Leopold McClintock (1819–1907) established his reputation as an Arctic explorer on voyages with Ross and Belcher, undertaking long and dangerous sledge journeys charting the territory. McClintock's account of his 1857–9 expedition on the yacht Fox through the North-West Passage to discover the fate of Arctic explorer Sir John Franklin and his ships, the Erebus and Terror, was first published in 1859. The journey was commissioned by Franklin's widow who, unhappy with the Admiralty's reluctance to seek confirmation of the account of her husband's expedition brought back in 1854 by explorer John Rae, commissioned McClintock to seek corroborating evidence. After a punishing voyage, including 250 days beset by ice in Baffin Bay drifting some 1,400 miles, the search continued by sledge. It was William Hobson, McClintock's second-in-command who found the written evidence documenting Franklin's death in 1847. The grim remains of others who had perished were also discovered.

Dedication
Preface
1. Cause of delay in equipment
2. Fiskernaes and Esquimaux
3. Melville Bay
4. Snow crystals
5. Burial in the pack
6. A bear-fight
7. A holiday in Greenland
8. Fox nearly wrecked
9. Off Cape Warrender
10. Leave Pond's Bay
11. Proceed westward in a boat
12. Death of our engineer
13. Dr Walker's sledge journey
14. Meet Esquimaux
15. The cairn found empty
16. Errors in Franklin's records
17. Signs of release
Conclusion
Appendix.

Subject Areas: Historical geography [HBTP]