Finding John Rae

by Hamilton, Alice Jane;

  Men had warmed these objects with their living hands. They had extracted a good deal of information from the watches, compasses and telescopes. They were now dead and forever silenced, unable to tell the stories of their discoveries, hardships and inglorious demise. No matter how hard I tried, I could not dispel the terrible thought that some of Franklin’s men had consumed the flesh of fallen sailors using these fine silver utensils. I hoped I understood — if only from the limited perspective of a survivor — the suffering and madness they endured. I had experienced near starvation during an Arctic expedition in 1847, but we managed to drag ourselves to headquarters before it was too late. I shook my head, trying to banish unsettling images.

  I forced my thoughts towards a cheerier scene concerning the departure of the ships for the Arctic. My sister Marion and her husband John Hamilton told an entertaining story about Sir John Franklin and a chosen few of the ships’ officers who enjoyed a farewell supper at their home in the Orcadian port town of Stromness. The date of the gathering was the 24th of May, 1845, the eve of the great expedition’s final departure for the Arctic. Sir John spent the night there, while the Erebus and Terror drew fresh water for the voyage from Login’s Well. Marion told amusing stories of much merriment in the Hamilton home that evening. The aging rear admiral, who by that year had grown quite florid in the face, bald of pate and broadened about the girth, stood up after the meal and danced a lively jig to Orcadian sea shanties, played with great exuberance by the Logie Brothers on their fiddles. He was suffering from a head cold at the time, but the good food and music soon distracted him from his discomfort.

  Marion said the finest port was served to Sir John following his impromptu dance, after which he — normally a tea drinker — duly fell asleep in an armchair by the fire. She covered him with a woollen Hudson’s Bay Company blanket, blew out the candles and left him to dream of the great adventures to come. According to her report, he was bursting with energy in the morning and, after a hearty breakfast of fresh eggs and lamb sausage, he bade a jovial farewell to his hosts.

  Little wonder the commander of the most costly and elaborate of all British naval expeditions was in high spirits that night! The Erebus and Terror were setting off on a sensational voyage of discovery, with all the advantages of the newest marine technology in their favour: steam engines, screw propellers for manoeuvring the ships through narrow spaces, angled wooden planks especially designed to withstand extreme weather conditions, heavy iron bow reinforcements, heated living quarters below decks, and so on. John Franklin was certainly no stranger to the dark side of the Arctic, but if he had any misgivings about the inherently dangerous project he was about to undertake, he certainly showed no public signs of it.

  Although I had seen many paintings and sketches of those two mighty bomb vessels, Marion, John, their children and my mother were fortunate to stand at the water’s edge beside the Stromness kirkyard where our father is buried and watch the magnificent, newly outfitted Erebus and Terror under full sail, being borne away through Hoy Sound with the outgoing tide. Union Jacks were flapping in the wind; 134 officers and men were assembled on deck in full naval uniforms, arms raised and bent in formal salute. The ships’ bellies carried years’ worth of reading materials, an impressive collection of musical instruments for on-board entertainment, pickled and sealed food provisions, and the finest china and linens for the officers. It must have been a grand sight, indeed.

  A wave of sadness interrupted my pleasant daydream, and I found myself wishing that I had been there for the beginning, not bringing home grim news about the end. As the carriage drew nearer to the city, more horse and pedestrian traffic appeared on the road. The bucolic southeast countryside was being replaced by increasing sound and movement, which briefly distracted me from growing discomfort about the meeting ahead and the constant intrusion of melancholy thoughts.

  Admiralty House, Whitehall, London

  [OCTOBER 22, 1854]

  An adjutant escorted me up the winding staircase and showed me into the office of Sir James Graham, first lord of the Admiralty. I had met him briefly two years earlier at a Royal Geographical Society event. We had exchanged a few polite words that evening, but we did not engage in any meaningful conversation, and I doubted we made a lasting impression upon each other.

  The first lord stood stiff and tall behind a large desk, his expression cool. He did not offer his hand to me in greeting. Despite our being only acquaintances, I was taken aback by such a frosty reception. He stretched out his arm, showing me to a chair. I took a seat, placed my hands upon my knees and learned towards him, eager for the conversation to begin. He placed two glasses on his desk, poured whisky from a crystal decanter into both, took a long draught from his glass and sat down across from me. I do not drink spirits, so I took a small courtesy sip and put the glass down.

  “Doctor Rae, I hear your North Atlantic journey from York Factory was quite arduous.”

  “Yes, Sir James. We did indeed experience a challenging crossing.”

  The first lord lifted his brows and inclined his head towards the door. “We will meet with members of the Council after this.” He wasted no time in coming right to the point: “You advised us, in writing, that you have obtained information concerning the fate of Commander Franklin, his men and his ships.”

  “That is correct, Sir. I dispatched my report to your secretary at the end of July.” He sipped the whisky, and slowly licked his lips. He had, of course, read my grim account of cannibalism amongst the last group of survivors. I assumed that the first lord and members of the naval council would personally want to review the testimony and discuss the details with me.

  “You wrote that you have acquired relics which you believe came from the missing expedition.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “And you have these articles with you now?”

  “I do.” I lifted my heavy satchel off the floor, undid the fastenings, withdrew the relics and carefully set them on the desk until most of the surface was covered with assorted metals, pieces of guns and scientific instruments, utensils and other items. The first lord affixed a monocular lens to one eye and closely observed the items one at a time, taking care to avoid touching them.

  “Why would the men have brought cutlery with them when they left the ships?” he wondered aloud.

  “Sir,” I replied, “the utensils are quite light in weight, especially when compared to the other items. Altogether, I think they weigh no more than five pounds. I suspect they were objects of personal importance to the men, because they have been embellished with crests, initials and so on.” I pointed to various items. His eyes followed my gestures, as he examined the remnants of Britain’s greatest naval mystery.

  “As you can see, Sir James, many of these relics are damaged and broken. Here are timepieces, a length of gold braid, brass buttons. Here, we have pieces of guns, a compass, a chronometer and other instruments used in navigation. And here, silver cutlery embellished with the Franklin crest, a star-shaped Order of Merit, and a silver plate bearing Sir John Franklin’s initials. Over there, a silver spoon bearing a crest and the initials F.R.M.C.”

  The first lord pursed his lips. “Francis Rawdon Moira Crozier, Captain of the Terror,” he whispered. It occurred to me in that moment, when he said the name, that he was seeing the relics as more than pieces of metal, brass, and fragments of material. The artifacts were suddenly coming alive for him, just as they had for me. They had been the property of men with names, families, loved ones. I thought of how he would have personally wished the men farewell and Godspeed before their initial departure from the docks at Greenhithe, London, on May 19, 1845.

  His eyes remained on the spoon when he spoke. “Tell me exactly how you came into possession of these, Doctor Rae.”

  “I purchased them directly from the many Esquimaux who came to meet me at Repulse Bay in June and July of this year, Sir.”

  He frowned. Nine years after the last sighting of the Erebus and Terror, th
e first lord of the Admiralty was looking at the possessions of the officers and crew, the first real evidence of the men’s demise. What was going through his mind at that moment?

  The relics spoke for themselves, but I knew it could be a challenging task for me to convince the authorities that the information in my report was accurate because its contents relied entirely upon testimony I had acquired from the Esquimaux. The first lord and his colleagues — indeed, most of the British establishment — believed that all natives, whether they lived in the steaming jungles of Africa or in the frozen Arctic, were primitive and uneducated, that God’s truth held no meaning for them.

  As a Scot who worked for a British company, and as a man who had travelled extensively in the Arctic for more than two decades, I occupied an unusual space somewhere in between the two vastly different cultures. I was in the unique position of being familiar with attitudes and perspectives on both sides of the North Atlantic: the practices and belief systems of the Esquimaux, and matters of importance to the British. I had also heard the rumour that some members of the Admiralty perceived me to be an eccentric and oddball scientist, who consorted with savages while conducting British business in the frozen regions of North America.

  The truth is that I could never have survived there without the support and teachings of the Esquimaux; they taught me everything I needed to know to keep my men and myself alive on our journeys. I trusted them and, even more, I enjoyed being in their company. I found their propensity for engaging in play and tomfoolery amusing, endearing and delightful. Yet, when circumstances called for concentration, stamina and a serious attitude, they never let me down. In fact, I preferred to work with the natives, rather than the British. The reasons were simple: the Esquimaux were accustomed to engaging in hard work because their own survival depended upon it. I suppose that my acceptance and approval of Esquimaux ways was confusing to nineteenth-century Britons, who were suspicious of anyone who was not white and Christian.

  “Doctor Rae, you documented detailed testimony from native people exclusively, declared it correct, affixed your name to it and passed it along to us. You are surely aware that we — including you — would be ill-advised to assume that Esquimaux truths are equal to our own.” Of course, I bristled at his remark but chose my response with care because I knew that if I was disrespectful towards the naval authorities, I would pay the price of ostracism. I wanted them to accept my own faith in the integrity of the Esquimaux, but there was even more to my wish than that. I had worked hard to build my professional reputation on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. I was proud to be considered an expert in Arctic matters; that distinction meant a great deal to me.

  “I appreciate your concerns, Sir James, but if we are meant to solve this great mystery, I encourage you to set aside notions of the Esquimaux as being untrustworthy. Our mutual objective is to examine the facts that have been passed along to us. The evidence of which the natives speak is still where they found it, and probably intact because of climactic conditions. There is no reason to think we will not be able to travel to the area, locate the remains of the sailors and verify the reports of the natives.”

  He glanced at me and sniffed. I wasn’t sure if he was reacting to the suggestion of mounting another costly search for the remains of the expedition, to my reference to a future search party including me, or to both. “Did the natives tell you anything about the commander himself?”

  I knew the first lord was under continuous pressure from Lady Franklin and her many supporters to find an explanation for the mystery of her husband’s disappearance. “I regret to say that no one seems to have intelligence about Sir John Franklin. Not as of yet, anyway, although I am quite sure the information will be attainable at some point in the future.” I was intentionally leaving the door open for discussions about further searching in the areas where the Esquimaux saw the marching men and discovered the gruesome British encampments.

  “Why did you not journey onward in search of remains, Dr. Rae? Surely, you had the time before returning to your headquarters. Everyone is aware of the high rates of speed at which you travel in the Arctic.” His eyes returned to the map.

  “Two of my men’s lives were in danger, Sir. They were failing. If we had continued on, they would have perished. I will never take risks with the lives of men under my charge in order to search for the deceased.” I could see that he was becoming increasingly uncomfortable as our conversation moved closer to the most distressing elements contained in my report. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, stood up and began to pace about the room. After a minute or so, he stopped and turned to me. He cleared his throat and changed the subject.

  “I ask you, why the devil do you believe everything these native people tell you?”

  “Sir, the Esquimaux in that area have never given me cause to doubt the honesty of their words, nor indeed the accuracy of what they say. I went to great lengths to interview and cross-examine each person, alone and in groups, during a period of two months. I detected no fundamental conflicts in their evidence. They had nothing to gain by inventing stories because I had already purchased the relics from them, as an act of good faith.”

  “And your interpreter?”

  “William Ouligback Junior and his father before him are excellent speakers of the English language. I have faith in their translations.” I carefully returned many of the relics to the satchel, retrieved a rolled-up map of the Arctic region from another bag, unfolded the tattered document and laid it upon the desk. Graham squinted into his handheld lens as he watched my finger slide along the surface of the paper.

  “Your report refers to a party of many white men who were seen on or near a large island. Where do you think these people came from?” he inquired, his eyes on the map.

  “Well, no one is absolutely certain, Sir, but it is believed that they came from two large ships which were beset to the west of King William Island, where there is extensive pack ice.” I ran my finger down the map, south from Peel Sound into Victoria Strait, and brought it to rest on an area of the Polar Sea west of the island.

  “How did the white men communicate with the natives?” He sniffed again.

  “They communicated through gestures,” I replied. Graham removed his lens, rubbed his eyes and glared at me.

  “Gestures,” he repeated.

  “They indicated that at least one ship had been sunk by pack ice some time earlier. I do not know exactly when this happened, but apparently it occurred in the autumn, probably during the latter part of 1848.

  “The group of marchers was observed by the Esquimaux more than two years later,” I added. The first lord cleared his throat, and I wondered if he was taken aback by the suggestion that men from the expedition may still have been alive as recently as 1850, when dozens of British search parties were scattered throughout the region, looking for them. There had been no reported sightings of them or the ships.

  “Were these purported eyewitnesses the natives you interviewed at Pelly Bay and at Repulse Bay?”

  “No, Sir. I met with their friends and relatives. The information I collected was reliably passed along from person to person. This is the manner in which all information is disseminated in the Arctic — ”

  He interrupted me, his voice rising. “Why, in God’s name, did these eyewitnesses not come and meet with you themselves?” he hissed.

  Despite its harsh delivery, the question was reasonable enough; only four years had elapsed between the final sightings and the testimony I acquired at Pelly Bay and Repulse Bay. I hastened to explain the eyewitnesses’ absence. “Last year, there was a life-threatening lack of food for the northernmost native communities in the Arctic, due to very poor weather conditions and the resulting changes in animal migration patterns. It is also likely that great numbers of animals perished from starvation. Apparently many Esquimaux starved to death, including women and children. The witnesses of whom you speak were actively engaged in hunting while I was conducting interviews at
Pelly and Repulse Bays. They were gathering as much meat and provisions as they could, to feed their families during the coming winter.” The irony of the fact that we were discussing Esquimaux deaths from starvation against the backdrop of British cannibalism was not lost on me; it was impossible to tell whether the first lord was having the same thought.

  Like many of his upper-class contemporaries, the first lord’s knowledge of the Arctic did not extend very far beyond his own, well-fed British perspective. He did not understand the day-to-day nature of subsistence living, or that the Esquimaux existed under the constant threat of starvation.

  “So, the natives from whom you took testimony concerning Sir John Franklin, his ships and the men under his command, were not even there when these — hungry white men — were encountered? Good Lord, man! This story is becoming ever more preposterous! Have you been living in that godforsaken region for too long?” He sat down and spun his chair around to face the window, his fists clenched.

  To say that I was insulted by his outburst would be an understatement. He had attacked my good sense, judgment and professional capabilities. I understood his frustration with circumstances he could not control; nonetheless, he had no right to belittle me. I had come to the meeting with honest, altruistic intentions but he was apparently determined to discredit me and my trust in the natives’ reports. I refused to let him see how his outburst bothered me. “I understand your skepticism concerning the veracity of my sources and their testimony, Sir James. From outward appearances, it does seem to be second-hand — ”

  “I will remind you that it is second-hand, Doctor Rae!”

  The first lord stood up and stared out the window toward the empty Horse Guards Parade Grounds, his back squarely turned to me. A clock ticking on the mantelpiece was the only sound in the room. The outdoor light was fading, the room was growing dim, and I was beginning to feel claustrophobic from the tension in the stale, musty air.