ltwilliammowett:

HMS Erebus and HMS Terror in the Antarctic (detail) by John Wilson Carmichael 1847

In Photos: Artifacts Recovered from the HMS Erebus Exploration

Sorry for the abosloutly annoying ads, but this article has pictures and descriptions of artifacts that were recently recovered from the Erebus. The water pitcher and artificial horizon came from an officer’s cabin, though it doesn’t say whose. It only says it wasn’t Franklin’s, where they supposedly think they might find records. Other articles said they couldn’t get into it but not why. Since they need to be careful to not cause unnecessary damage to the ship I’m guessing it might take a while and some planning to get in there. Still not sure how a ship’s log can survive underwater for so long, but I’m not the underwater archaeologist. I also wonder if what they find if anything will be in Franklin’s hand or Fitzjames’. Not sure what naval protocol is when a captian dies and the commander takes over via a vis cabins, but I think the ship’s log would be Fitzjames responsibility since he’d be responsible for that ship (Crozier being responsible for the expedition and Terror). I guess that’s for a naval historian? Crozier was second for the whole expedition but Fitzjames would be second for the ship itself.

Erebus

Just an FYI - new popular fiction about the Erebus coming next week. It’s likely to be interesting becasue, well, Michael Palin. Yes I like Monty Python, and he is an amateur historian (I’ve heard this is the reason behind Monty Python and the Holy Grail). Terror had a pretty interesting career as well. It was launched to bomb Ft. McHenry in Maryland during the War of 1812, was nearly crushed in the arctic under the command of George Back, captained by Francis Crozier in the Antarctic where it survived a collision with Erebus and finally settled in near pristine conditions in the arctic. At risk of getting annoyingly philosophical about it, I like finding the history of the vessels. They’re just inanimate objects but you can’t help but think of them silently serving their commanders until they reach their final resting place, either crushed and lost at the bottom of the ocean like Endurance or resting like a grand old lady like Fram. I like to think of Erebus and Terror waiting patiently to be listened to.

Anyway, here’s a plate from Terror’s original occupation as a bomb vessel. The ‘GR’ indicates its use under King George III.

Arctic ice crumbling HMS Erebus and blocking divers from researching the wreck | CBC News

Problems with last summer’s season

Back to the Arctic with the first part of a commission for @dramatic-opening-shot , a view from Erebus on icebound Terror

The wreck of HMS Erebus of Franklin’s doomed expedition, found by Parks Canada. HMS Terror was also discovered and in much better condition.

Plan of the HMS Terror with the necessary modifications necessary for the expedition.

Franklin relics - Divers found dishes in the steward’s pantry at the HMS Erebus shipwreck

A relic of Sir John Franklin’s last expedition 1845-48. Knife blade bought from the Inuit by the McClintock Search Expedition on 3 March 1859, near Cape Victoria, on the Boothia Peninsula. The item is made from materials salvaged from discarded equipment belonging to the Franklin expedition. It has a triangular steel blade with two reinforcing plates attached which retain one copper and two steel rivets. Referred to by McClintock as ‘one knife without a handle’. A Royal Naval Museum number has been painted in white on the handle ’(6)’. Date 1848-1859.

“They forged the last links with their lives”: Sir John Franklin’s men dying by their boat during the North-West Passage expedition. The original full title of this painting, under which it was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1895. Artist: Smith, William Thomas.

Relics of the lost Franklin Expedition, as found by McClintock in 1859. Watercolors on paper, artist by Kristina Gehrmann.

Last will and testament 1845

Updated the page with Fitzjames’ last will and testament, now including fragments of his handwritten one. Especially interesting to see things like his correction of a sentence and the signatures of Le Vesconte, Fairholme and William Coningham.

Daguerreotype

On this day, 19 May 1845, Franklin’s Arctic Expedition sailed out from Greenhithe.

A few days before, on 16 May, all of the officers of the HMS Erebus plus Captain Francis Crozier of HMS Terror had their Daguerreotype portrait taken. Fitzjames wrote to Wiliam Coningham:

Erebus Greenhithe Friday

16th May

My dearest William

[…]

She [Lady Franklin] has taken it into her

head to have a portrait of

all our officers, & sent a man

down who takes us all with the

Daguerreotype  - I have got a

second for Elizabeth to whom

I shall send it when set.

I believe it is very like me

The other known Daguerreotype is either in private hands or lost. Only a photographic copy exists.

Colourisations by Ross’ Restorations. Give him a follow on Instagram for more amazing colourisations.

Fitzjames’ Service Record, in his own words

Thanks to William O'Byrne’s project of compiling a record of service of all living naval officers, we have Fitzjames telling the story of his career in his own words.

Service Record

Sigh at him being so proud of being the first to sail a man-o’-war (though the Clio was no man-‘o-war, I think) up the Euphrates & Tigris while this account from passenger Henry Rawlinson tells a less successful story:

As told at a Royal Geographical Society meeting in 1857.

Fitzjames’ Last Letters

InMay We Be Spared to Meet on Earth: Letters of the Lost Franklin Arctic Expedition everybody will be able to read Fitzjames’ original last letters to the Coninghams. This is the publication history of the edited letters, including some quotes and images of the original ones:

https://jamesfitzjames.com/last-letters/

Bonus Crozier tea:

I went onboard the Terror in the evening for it

was quite calm & found Hodgson better for

he had been ill & Crozier looking like a sick

owl - I had tea with him.

One less mystery…

When transcribing Fitzjames’ first surviving letter of September 21st 1825 to his uncle Robert Coningham, William Battersby misread “my dear Aunt” for “my dear Rumb” (p. 37), and developed the theory that Rumb could be a nickname for Fitzjames’ Portuguese nurse. (p. 29 and 31).

Now that I have seen the original letter I can say that the words clearly say “my dear Aunt”, meaning Louisa Coningham.

So that is one less Fitzjames mystery to solve.

Suspected but now confirmed: James Fitzjames did not only have a red beard, he was a redhead as well! This fragment from William Coningham’s December 20th 1835 letter to Fitzjames, written at the family home in Chorleywood, Hertfordshire, confirms it:

They are all fond of you here even Will Wyat asks after the red headed young gentleman as he knew formerly -

First image: daguerreotype of James Fitzjames, May 1845, colourised by Ross Day, National Maritime Museum Greenwich

Second image: excerpt from letter by William Coningham to James Fitzjames, Caird Library Greenwich

Third image: watercolour portrait of James Fitzjames, May 1835 by Lieutenant Robert Cockburn, Euphrates Expedition, Yale Center for British Art, USA

To give you an idea why William Coningham thought it best to edit James Fitzjames’ letters, this is how Fitzjames describes Second Master Henry Foster Collins:

In 1859 William Coningham published his friend/cousin/otherwise related James Fitzjames’ last letters to William and his wife Elizabeth. But not before editing them as Fitzjames makes some unkind remarks about his colleagues. The original letters are on microfilm at the Caird Library, and will appear in the long awaited ‘Franklin Expedition letters book’ entiteled May We Be Spared to Meet on Earth: Letters of the Lost Franklin Arctic Expedition, out July 2022.

Happy 209th birthday, Henry Le Vesconte!

ALT

Born 14 June, 1813! The secret of his birth date was found in the archives of Newfoundland and Labrador, which included a copy of the following addition to his diary kept at the National Maritime Museum Greenwich (transcribed in alt text):

ALT

Noted for his talent in map-making and surveying—as noted in this poston@fabtet’s wonderful James Fitzjames research blog—there are a few quotes pertaining to his activities on the Franklin expedition.

In his published letters to Elizabeth Coningham, Fitzjames referred to spending the day with Le Vesconte on 6 July, 1845, with HMS ErebusandTerror off the Greenland coast:

Every man nearly on shore, running about for a sort of holiday, getting eider ducks’ eggs &c.; curious mosses and plants being collected, as also shells. Le Vesconte and I on the island since six in the morning, surveying. It is very satisfactory to me that he takes to surveying, as I said he would. Sir John is much pleased with him.

— originally published in Nautical Magazine and Naval Chronicle in 1852, full transcript available on another excellent research blog, Arctonauts.

(N.B. while these published letters spell Henry’s name as ‘Levescomte’, that’s the error of the transcriber/compositor, not Fitzjames himself, who consistently spelled his friend’s name correctly in his original letters).

Sir John Franklin referenced Henry Le Vesconte in his last letter to his wife, reproduced in The Life of Sir John Franklin R.N. by H.D. Traill (Google Books):

I accompanied Mr. Le Vesconte to the top of the highest land, that we might procure a view of the groups of islands and rocks in this neighbourhood, and take bearings for placing them on the chart.

You may have seen a copy of Henry Le Vesconte’s drawing of Whale Fish Island, Greenland; this picture of the original sketch was sent to me by Russell Potter.

If you look closely, there is a figure on a rock at left with what looks like a theodolite—a self-portrait of Le Vesconte surveying the terrain?