306 DE HAVEN. -NORTH STAR. 



Hence the present expedition. The Prince Albert sailed 

 from Aberdeen on the 5th of June. 



An expedition also was equipped in America. This 

 was got up mainly by the exertions and at the cost of 

 Henry Grinnell, Esq., a merchant of New York, but 

 was put in order and sent forth by the United States 

 Navy department. It consisted of two vessels, the 

 Advance and the Rescue, of respectively one hundred 

 and twenty-five and ninety-five tons ; and was put under 

 the command of Lieut. De Haven, who had served in 

 the United States Exploring- Expedition, under Cornmo 

 dore Wilkes, in the Antarctic seas. It sailed from New 

 York on the 24th of May, and was accompanied for two 

 days in his yacht by Mr. Grinnell. Its object was to 

 push promptly forward, in any way it could, in the di- 

 rection of Melville Island and Banks's Land ; to winter 

 wherever it might happen to stick fast, in the pack, or 

 out of the pack ; and to move on and make search as 

 long as it might be able, in any direction which should 

 offer most promise of success. 



The North Star transport, which left England in 1849 

 to convey stores to the expedition under Sir James C. 

 Ross, may in some sense be regarded likewise as one of 

 the exploring ships of 1850. She became beset in Mel- 

 ville Bay on the 29th of July, 1849, and gradually drifted 

 till the 26th of September ; and being then abreast of 

 Wolstenholme Sound, and able to bore a way through the 

 loosened ice, she pressed up to the head of that sound, 

 and there wintered in lat. 76 33' N., being the most north- 

 erly position in which any vessel, except Dr. Kane's, has 

 been known to be laid up. She lost four of her crew 

 during the dismal seclusion of the Arctic night, but not 

 from causes attributable to the climate ; and she found a 

 large proportion of the preserved meats she had brought 

 from England to be of bad quality, and was obliged to 



