The Franklin expedition (HMS Erebus and HMS Terror)

The expedition's last known plan is in the Victory Point record: a printed Admiralty form filled in on 24 May 1847, recovered by the McClintock search of 1857-1859, with a marginal note added in April 1848 when the ships were deserted⁠[4]⁠[3]. Mortality before the desertion was extraordinary: 24 deaths among 129 men aboard ships that had wintered without disaster, against the low rates of other Arctic expeditions that stayed longer, and at least 24 more men died within about 100 km of the ships after they left⁠[2].

The dead are scattered along the route of the retreat, from the Victory Point area down the west coast of King William Island to Erebus Bay and around to Simpson Strait and the mainland⁠[5]. At Erebus Bay bones of at least eleven individuals bear cut marks consistent with defleshing, and some show the polish of boiling, the signs of cannibalism in the last stage of starvation⁠[7]⁠[8]. The identified men are Warrant Officer John Gregory, Captain James Fitzjames, Subordinate Officers' Steward John Bridgens, Able Seaman William Orren and Boy David Young of Erebus, and Captain of the Foretop Harry Peglar of Terror⁠[10]⁠[11]⁠[12]⁠[13]. Fitzjames's DNA came from a mandible with cut marks, so the expedition's second-in-command was among those whose bodies were eaten⁠[11]. Five of the six died within two kilometres of each other, all from Erebus⁠[3].

The ships outlasted their crews. On Erebus, south of King William Island, divers are excavating the lower deck, where a seaman's chest, officers' tableware, cabin furniture and instruments survive; the coal bunkers below are empty⁠[14].

The nineteenth-century searches, Admiralty and private, found the first winter camp and graves on Beechey Island, Inuit reports and relics collected by John Rae in 1854, and the Victory Point record, bodies and a boat found by McClintock's party in 1859⁠[6]⁠[4]⁠[15]. Skeletons and scattered bones continued to turn up through the twentieth century; Stenton's inventory lists the recorded finds and their later fate⁠[5].

Modern work has three strands. Physical anthropology: the Beechey Island sailors were exhumed in the 1980s and their tissues analysed for lead, and remains on King William Island have been excavated and studied for cut marks, pathology and lead⁠[16]⁠[7]⁠[1]. Underwater archaeology: Parks Canada searched from 2008, found Erebus in 2014 and Terror in 2016, and with Inuit partners has returned to the wrecks in most seasons since⁠[17]⁠[9]. In 2024 the team made 50 dives on Erebus and used an ROV on the orlop deck and engine room⁠[14]. Genetics: the Stenton team has built an archaeological DNA dataset from 50 tooth and bone samples at ten sites and a reference set from descendants of 33 crew members, and compares them⁠[3]⁠[18].

Inuit knowledge runs through all three. Oral history guided the wreck searches, and new fieldwork is used to test accounts that seemed to conflict with the archaeology, as at Kungearkbeearu on Simpson Strait⁠[9]⁠[19].

The ships' papers would answer most of it. Officers' logs, letters or a later record left on board, if preserved in the sediment-filled cabins of Erebus or Terror, would date the deaths, the decision to leave and any return. The excavation of the officers' cabins on Erebus is under way, and Terror, deeper and better sealed, has barely been entered⁠[14]. More DNA reference samples from descendants would extend the identifications and test whether the two crews travelled apart. A larger, comparable sample of lead, zinc and collagen measurements from identified men of known date of death would separate the lead, nutrition and disease readings, as the Antigua comparison began to do⁠[1]. Dating of the sediment and biological growth on the wrecks could show when each ship sank.