xxii FOREWORD 



disappearance of Franklin induced Henry Grinnell and 

 George Peabody to send out the Advance in charge of 

 Elisha Kent Kane to search for Franklin north of 

 Smith Sound. In spite of inexperience, which re- 

 sulted in scurvy, fatal accidents, privations, and the 

 loss of his ship, Kane's achievements (1853-55) were 

 very brilliant. He discovered and entered Kane Basin, 

 which forms the beginning of the passage to the polar 

 ocean, explored both shores of the new sea, and out- 

 lined what has since been called the American route 

 to the Pole. 



Sixteen years later (1871) another American, Charles 

 Francis Hall, who had gained much arctic experience 

 by a successful search for additional traces and relics 

 of Franklin (1862-69), sailed the Polaris through Kane 

 Basin and Kennedy Channel, also through Hall Basin 

 and Robeson Channel, which he discovered, into the 

 polar ocean itself, thus completing the exploration of the 

 outlet which Kane had begun. He took his vessel to 

 the then unprecedented (for a ship) latitude of 82° 11'. 

 But Hall's explorations, begun so auspiciously, were 

 suddenly terminated by his tragic death in November 

 from over-exertion caused by a long sledge journey. 



When the ice began to move the ensuing year, his 

 party sought to return, but the Polaris was caught in 

 the deadly grip of an impassable ice pack. After two 

 months of drifting, part of the crew, with some Es- 

 kimo men and women, alarmed by the groaning and 

 crashing of the ice during a furious autumn storm, 

 camped on an ice floe which shortly afterwards sep- 

 arated from the ship. For five months, December to 

 April, they lived on this cold and desolate raft, which 



