The North-West Passage and the Plans for the Search of Sir John Franklin (1858)

CHAPTER XVI.

July 20th, 1855. A Select Committee having been appointed by the House of Commons, on the motion of Mr. Mackinnon (June 19th), to inquire into the circumstances of the expedition to the Arctic seas, commanded by Capt. M'Clure, with a view to ascertain whether any and what reward may be due for the services rendered on that occasion, and further, to examine into the claims of Capts. Collinson and Kellett, to ascertain whether any and what reward may be due to them for services rendered on the occasion of that expedition, now gave in their Report. It says, "The attempt to discover a water communication through the Arctic regions between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, is one which has engaged the attention of maritime nations, especially that of Great Britain, for a period now extending over three centuries. It has fallen to the lot of Capt. M'Clure, his officers and crew, to set at rest this question. They are undoubtedly the first who have passed by water from sea to sea, and have returned to this country a living evidence of the existence of a North-West Passage." The Report, then alluding to the "Rewards offered by Parliament for the discovery of the North-West Passage," remarks : "Successive sovereigns have encouraged the enterprise, and men of science have, . . through succeeding generations, urged the attempt." It then details the course of the Investigator to Mercy Bay, the arrival there of Lieutenant Pim from the Resolute, the abandonment of the Investigator, the subsequent arrival of Capt. M'Clure, his officers and crew, on board the Resolute, Capt. Henry Kellett, at Melville Island, and finally their arrival in England on board the Phoenix, Capt. Inglefield, proving, "beyond doubt, that to Capt. M'Clure incontestably belongs the distinguished honour of having been the first to perform the actual passage over water ... between the two great oceans that encircle the globe. . . By this achievement he has demonstrated the existence, and traced the course of that connection between these two oceans which, under the name of the North-West Passage, has so long been the object of perilous search and deep interest to the nations of the civilized world." In making the following remarks we have no desire to take from Capt. M'Clure the honour of having been the first who has passed by water from sea to sea, and returned a living evidence of the existence of the Passage; still we much question whether he was the first to discover and prove the existence of the Passage. "We must doubt it, when we see how clearly the movements of Franklin and his associates are developed in the floating fragments of Rae and Collinson; and yet more so, in the undoubted relics recently obtained by Rae. These martyrs to science have unhappily not returned to claim the honour, but that they were the first to discover and to make the North-West Passage, few, we think, will doubt, especially when they see such authorities as Sir E. I. Murchison, the late Admiral Beaufort, the present active Hydrographer, Capt. John Washington, Capt. Collinson, Etc. advocating this " claim for those who can urge nothing for themselves" In this opinion, then, we are not solitary. Sir John Richardson, than whom no sounder Arctic authority exists, in the Times, June 23rd, 1855, says: "The remnant of the crews of Franklin's ships made the Passage in the spring of 1850, precisely in the same sense as it was performed in October of the same year, over the ice, by the party sent out from Prince of Wales' Strait by Capt. M'Clure." That "the boats dragged by the forty determined men whose bones are blanching near the mouth of the Great Fish River proceeded from the ships or wrecks lying in a water-way continuous with the sea that washes the Continent . . is proved by the fragments of the ships' fittings that had drifted to the Finlayson Islands, picked up by Capt. Collinson; and also by a spar, to which the same origin can now be ascribed, found by Dr. Rae, in the previous year, in the same channel"

Sir John then gives extracts from a letter he received from Sir John Franklin in January, 1845, "to show that he purposely sought an entrance into the line of water that washes the shores of the mainland (America)," and adds, "Whether Franklin, after leaving Beechey Island, carried his ships to the eastward or westward of Cape Walker, will perhaps be ascertained by Mr. Anderson, now descending the Great Fish River, . . but no dispassionate reasoner can doubt that the priority of discovery rests with the Erebus and Terror, the Investigator being at least six months later." Lady Franklin also claims the precedence of discovery and performance of the North-West Passage for her gallant husband and his associates. In a letter sent to Mr. Mackinnon (July 6th, 1855), chairman of this committee, she says: "When it is remembered that these brave and unfortunate men, after years of intense privations and suffering, were found dead of starvation upon a spot which they could not have reached without having first solved that geographical problem which was the object and aim of all these painful efforts, and when it is remembered that they are beyond the reach of their country's rewards, you will not, I think, refuse them the just acknowledgment that is due to their memories. . . Capt. M'Clure . . is not the less the discoverer of a North-West Passage, because my husband had previously, though unknown to Capt. M'Clure, discovered another and a more navigable passage." The fact of finding the drifting fragments of ship's fittings with the Government mark at Parker and Cambridge Bays, and on the larger Finlayson Island, and also the important fact of there being a boat with the distressed party who are said to have perished at the mouth of the Back River, all these go to prove the existence of continuous water, extending towards the American coast ; it may exist on both sides, but we have shown the improbability of such a condition east of Cape Walker by Peel Sound, and in this we differ from the authorities we have quoted; they all think the ships, or a party, or parties, came down that sound, we cannot. The only other passage is Bellot's Strait, and it is narrow, doubtful and unlikely. We have no alternative, then, but to suppose they came by some channel issuing from the west, and communicating between Melville Sound and the north of King William's Land, and this we have proved exists. It would be presumption in us to assert the ships got down this strait into this unknown space, and were there wrecked. They might have done so ; but if they had, we think there would have been stronger evidence of the fact in the greater abundance of floating reliquiae. "We do not think, therefore, the ships did get down it, and consequently were not wrecked to the north of King William's Land, but we feel quite assured the boat and party did. In either case, the North-West Passage was made by Franklin. Again, as to the time: it was in April, 1850, that this party is said to have been seen to the north of King William's Land ; in May they were at Back River ; they must, then, consequently have made the passage at that time. Now Capt. M'Clure did not discover the passage until October 26th, 1850, and did not perform or make it until April 28th, 1852, at which time he reached Melville Island. As he could not be said to have performed or made it until he had reached that island, the merit therefore of achieving the great object of his voyage, the solution of the question of a North-West Passage, most undoubtedly belongs to Sir John 'Franklin and his gallant officers and crews.

As regards rewards, we think Capt. M'Clure justly earned, and is entitled to, all the honours and rewards he obtained; but with respect to Captains Kellett and Collinson, we do not think their services have been sufficiently recognized. We have already alluded to the important assistance rendered by the former officer to Capt. M'Clure, at a crisis when, from an insufficiency of food, sickness and despondency had reduced them to a situation described as deplorable. Some few of the most hardy of his crew might have escaped with their lives, but there was little chance the remainder could ever have reached a place of succour. Captain Kellett dragged them through all their difficulties, and restored them, under Providence, to health, happiness, and home; besides which, this efficient officer had served for many years with great credit in the Arctic regions. With regard to Capt. Collinson, he had the command of the expedition to which the Investigator, Capt. M'Clure, was attached. He had been also three years in the ice; and he, too, had discovered the Passage; indeed, had made it within twenty days after that officer, and therefore we think should specially have been rewarded. Capt. Collinson, in addition, seeing his second was ahead of him, selected other and important ground, hitherto unexplored, for his search; took his ship through intricate passages, and further east than any one before him, where ship's keel had never passed before ; and brought her and his crew home in health and safety. Looking, then, to the merits of these two distinguished officers, we do feel that they have not been sufficiently acknowledged. The service upon which they had been engaged was an arduous, a chivalrous, and a noble one. Whether we view it in the sacred cause of humanity, or in the solution of the Great Question bequeathed to us by our ancestors, it demanded the possession and exercise of the highest attainments, much careful thought, anxiety, and great personal sacrifice, and therefore should have had special honour and reward. Surely, Captains Kellett and Collinson have fallen on evil days! But enough. Franklin may have perished, but it may be almost literally said, whatever merit may be due to others, "that it was his spirit that pointed out the way … by which the long-sought-for problem has at length been solved, … and that another ray has been added to the maritime glory of the British Empire." Had we been of the Committee, seeing the mighty influence it has exercised on the national mind, and the advantageous results that have accrued out of this purely British question, we should have recommended three for the honour of knighthood instead of one, and 30,000 instead of the parsimonious 10,000. We are pleased to see that Sir R. I. Murchison strongly advocates the presentation of a medal to each and all, of whatever rank and country, who have served on the Arctic Searching Expeditions. In this he shows his feeling to be identical with the wishes of Captain Kellett.