262 KELLETT AND MOORE'S EXPEDITION. 



taken to their boats westward of the Northern Archi- 

 pelago, and forced their way to the American continent. 

 The third was a marine expedition, to be conducted 

 by Sir James Clarke Ross, with the ships Enterprise and 

 Investigator, through Lancaster Sound and Barrow's 

 Strait, to examine all the tracks of the missing ships 

 westward as far as they could penetrate into the archi- 

 pelago ; and this was designed to afford relief in the 

 event of the adventurers having been arrested either in 

 the very throat of the supposed passage, or at some 

 point on this side of it, and of their attempting to 

 retrace their steps. This plan of search seemed com- 

 prehensive and noble, and was carried with all possible 

 promptitude into execution. The Plover left Sheerness 

 on the 1st January, 1848 ; but, being a miserable sailer, 

 did not reach Oahu, in the Sandwich Islands, till the 22d 

 August. She was then too late to attempt, that season, 

 any efficient operations within the Arctic Circle, and 

 she passed on to winter quarters at Noovel, on the coast 

 of Kamtschatka. The Herald, meanwhile, had received 

 instructions from home, and gone northward as far as 

 Cape Krusenstern, in Kotzebue Sound, the appointed 

 rendezvous. But, not being prepared to winter there, 

 nor prepared for explorations among ice, she returned, 

 in autumn, to the Sandwich Islands. 



On the 30th June, 1849, the Plover left Noovel, and 

 on the 14th July anchored off Chamisso Island, at the 

 bottom of Kotzebue Sound. Next day she was joined 

 by the Herald and by the Nancy Dawson, the latter a 

 yacht belonging to Robert Shedden, Esq., who, in the 

 course of a voyage of pleasure round the globe, got 

 intelligence in China of the intended expedition through 

 Behring's Strait in search of Sir John Franklin, and 

 nobly resolved to devote his vessel and himself to its 

 aid. On the 18th the three vessels left Chamisso ; on 



