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9 - Sir John Franklin and the Northwest Passage in Myth and Memory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 March 2023

By
Russell A. Potter
Edited by
Adrian Howkins  and
Peder Roberts
Adrian Howkins
Affiliation:
University of Bristol
Peder Roberts
Affiliation:
University of Stavanger
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Summary

The European quest for a passage by water across North America long pre-dates the nineteenth century, but it was to be then that it took on the urgency of national achievement, and it was to be one man – Sir John Franklin (1786–1847) – whose career came to symbolize the entire era. It may seem an ironic honour, given the disaster that his final expedition of 1845 became, but it must be remembered that the search for his ships was the spur for many more expeditions than had been launched before him. As Joseph Conrad noted in his 1924 essay “Geography and Some Explorers”, ‘This great navigator, who never returned home, served geography even in his death. The persistent efforts, extending over ten years, to ascertain his fate advanced greatly our knowledge of the polar regions.’

Keywords

John FranklinNorthwest PassageimperialismCanadaexplorationheritagehistorymemory
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge History of the Polar Regions , pp. 207 - 228
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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