Frozen in Time: The Fate of the Franklin Expedition

In May 1845 the Erebus and the Terror set sail from the Thames to find a northern route to the Northwest Passage with a complement of 129 men and officers, enough tinned food for three to five years, thousands of books, a dog, and a monkey. Many sailors and scholars sought their fate ever since. Here Beattie (anthropology, U. of Alberta) and Geiger (history, U. of Alberta) describe the voyage of what has become known as the Franklin Expedition, the efforts to find it, and the probable cause of i…