21 
ISIcetcliecl by U. M'Vormic/c. R.JS. 
Rogier Head, South. 
Monday, August 30th. — I was up this morning and outside the tent as early 
as four o'clock to look around, and, having well weighed both our present 
position and future prospects, to determine on the best course to be adopted ; 
when, taking into consideration the advanced period of the season and unpromising- 
appearance of the weather, that nothing further could be accomplished in the 
search northward and eastward of this bay, I very reluctantly decided on return- 
ing to the ship, and we commenced stowing the boat and making preparations 
for our return. 
At 9'30 A.M., we erected a cairn on the summit of the Black Mount, which I 
called Mount Providence, in commemoration of our providential deliverance from 
as perilous a position as a boat could possibly have escaped from, — placing 
beneath the cairn a tin cylinder, enclosing a record of our proceedings, of which 
the following is a copy : — 
Memorandum. — A boat expedition from Her Majesty's ship " North Star," 
at Erebus and Terror Bay, Beechey Island, in search of Sir John Franklin, 
arrived here on Monday August 23d, at midnight, during a gale of wind and 
heavy sea which carried away the rudder of the boat and nearly swamped her. 
On Thursday last, sledged on the snow over the low lands round the head of 
the bay, without finding any opening to the eastward or traces of the missing 
expedition ; returning to the boat on Saturday afternoon. Weather during the 
preceding week has been most unfavourable, blowing, snowing, and foggy, with 
the thermometer constantly below the freezing point. The lakes frozen over, 
and every appearance of winter rapidly setting in. 
Launched the boat this morning on the making of the tide, to return down 
Wellington Strait and examine the bays along its eastern shores. A memoran- 
dum of our sledge journey has been deposited under a cairn erected on the 
summit of the northern point of the bay. 
R. M'CORMICK, 
Monday, August 30th, 1852. Officer Commanding Party. 
To the inlet running up on the west side of Mount Providence, from S.S.W. 
to N.N.E., I gave the name of Dragleybeck, in commemoration of the birthplace 
of Sir John Barrow, Bart., and in compliment to his son, John Barrow, 
Esq., of the Admiralty, F.R.S., who, following up his father's career, has earned 
for himself a distinguished position in the history of Arctic discovery bv his 
noble and unceasing efforts in furthering the search for the brave but ill-futcd 
Franklin and the rest of our long-lost countrymen. 
The chain of lakelets on the moorland I named, after two near relatives, the 
Louisa and Marianne Lakes. 
C 3 
