Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
In the far north, the sea freezes, and when snow and frost cover the land, all turns to white.
Much of this large hand-drawn chart is also white, where areas of paper are blank. Here, we
have selected some details which plot the course of the explorer and naval officer William
Edward Parry in the Arctic. His was one of the first 19th-century British voyages to the far
north of what is now Canada. The blank spaces symbolise the unknown regions which sur-
rounded Parry and his men, as they sought to fix bearings and chart coastlines that appeared
occasionally among the shifting ice-floes when the fog lifted.
After the Napoleonic Wars, the Royal Navy no longer needed so many men on active ser-
vice. John Barrow, Secretary to the Admiralty - commemorated by Barrow Strait on this
chart - sent officers to search for the North-West Passage, which it was hoped would give
European trade a short cut to the Far East. The young Lieutenant Parry served with Cap-
tain John Ross on an Arctic expedition in 1818. Parry then commanded two ships, HMS He-
cla and HMS Griper , to explore beyond the point reached by Ross, and this chart records
discoveries on their voyage from 1819 to 1820. The ships sailed up Baffin Bay, then west-
ward through Lancaster Sound - which Ross had believed to be blocked by mountains - to
Melville Island. They overwintered there, intending to go further the next spring, but were
thwarted by pack ice.
The chart is full of detail of this area, hitherto wholly unexplored by Europeans. Near
Liddon's Gulf - named for the Griper's captain - plentiful game fed on abundant grass,
sorrel and moss saxifrage. At the entrance to Prince Regent Inlet were seen many large black
whales, narwhals and seals. Parry hoped this would be an easier way to the west, but it proved
to be a dead end. A bottle buried on its shores is marked by a cross on the chart.
The harsh climate and other hazards hampered their attempts to put lines on the chart. Long
Island's position and outline were 'very uncertain owing to ... indifferent observations ... in
consequence of thick weather'. A faint pencilled note by Parry explains 'This coast line not
inserted, in hopes of obtaining more accurate angles'. The shoals in North Cove were dan-
gerous, while in Hecla Bay they encountered 14 feet of ice, in an area of snowy plains.
The perils of this kind of voyage were extreme: a ship could be crushed by ice or holed
on an iceberg, or explorers might run out of supplies and die of starvation, as John Franklin's
ill-fated final expedition of 1845 would grimly demonstrate. Although Parry did not find a
complete way through the North-West Passage to the Pacific, this was still perhaps the most
successful voyage in the history of its exploration, and the channel was named after him. This
major discovery is recorded on this chart among the dotted lines and blank spaces.
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