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Inuit oral stories could solve mystery of Franklin expedition Randy Boswell, Canwest News Service Published: Wednesday, June 25 More than 150 years after the disappearance of the Erebus and Terror - the famously ill-fated ships of the lost Franklin Expedition - fresh clues have emerged that could help solve Canadian history's most enduring mystery. A Montreal writer set to publish a book on Inuit oral chronicles from the era of Arctic exploration says she's gathered a "hitherto unreported" account of a British ship wintering in 1850 in the Royal Geographical Society Islands - a significant distance west of the search...

Kogvik took photo with ship's mast 6 years ago, but when he lost his camera, he kept quiet about it. The Nunavut man who led the Arctic Research Foundation to the wreck of HMS Terror says he never talked about the find six years ago, because he wasn't sure people would believe him. It was the account that Gjoa Haven's Sammy Kogvik gave his "boss" — expedition leader Adrian Schimnowski — about the mast he saw sticking out of the water that led to the discovery of Sir John Franklin's ill-fated ship HMS Terror, found earlier this month in the...

A shipwreck uncovered beneath the icy wastes of northern Canada has been identified as long-lost HMS Erebus. The Victorian-era vessel became part of nautical folklore after it vanished in the mid-19th Century. Its captain, Sir John Franklin, had been searching for the fabled Northwest Passage. Experts on Thursday confirmed that the wreck, discovered last month, was indeed the celebrated Royal Navy vessel. "It is in astonishing condition,'' said search team member John Geiger, president of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. "We're over the moon." The ship set sail from England in 1845 under Sir John's command. He was accompanied by...

CAMBRIDGE BAY, Nunavut — The search for the remnants of an ill-fated British expedition that failed to cross the Northwest Passage — and a seminal moment in Canada’s history on Arctic sovereignty — will start anew. In the coming weeks, a group of researchers will scour Canada’s Arctic waters to find Sir John Franklin’s two ships, Erebus and the Terror, led by a ship named for an Arctic researcher who perished in a plane crash last year. The renewal of Parks Canada’s search for the lost Franklin vessels, anticipated last week by Postmedia News, follows three recent federal expeditions that...

- Breadalbane sank in 1853 on search for Franklin expedition - - Wooden three-master is well preserved in icy waters - Canada has released underwater images of the world's most northernly shipwreck – a three-masted merchant ship that went down 161 years ago after becoming trapped in Arctic ice. The Canadian Armed Forces and Parks Canada produced the footage over six days, lowering a remotely operated HD camera through a hole in the sea ice, to capture images of a barnacle-encrusted hull and anchor from the ocean floor. “It's rare to have such a detailed view of a shipwreck from...

Bronze Bell from Long-Lost Arctic Shipwreck Revealed by Megan Gannon, News Editor | November 10, 2014 03:13pm ET Divers recovered a bronze bell from the wreck of the HMS Erebus, a British ship that was missing for nearly 170 years after an ill-fated expedition to the Canadian Arctic. In 1845, British Royal Navy officer and explorer John Franklin led more than 100 men on a quest to find a Northwest Passage connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. But they never completed their mission; in 1846, their ships — the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror — became trapped in ice near...

One of two British explorer ships that vanished in the Arctic nearly 170 years ago during a search for the fabled Northwest Passage has been found, Canada's prime minister announced Tuesday in a discovery that could unlock one of history's biggest mysteries and swell Canadian pride. Last seen in the 1840s while under the command Sir John Franklin, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror have long been among the most sought-after prizes in marine archaeology and the subject of songs, poems and novels. Harper said the discovery would shed light on what happened to Franklin's crew. Franklin and 128 hand-picked officers...

Historically valuable items are continually being lost or destroyed or being found. For example, most R&L readers likely missed a two-paragraph item in the middle of page 10A of last Wednesday's edition. The title of the article was "Canada Finds One of Two Explorers Ships Lost in Arctic." I feel this discovery warrants more coverage. The two vessels were the HMS Erebus and the HMS Terror, both lost during an expedition to determine the feasibility of traversing the "Northwest Passage," a route over the top of North America to link the Atlantic Ocean and Europe to the Pacific Ocean and...

'One of two British explorer ships that vanished in the Arctic more than 160 years ago has been found, Canada's prime minister says. Stephen Harper said it was unclear which ship had been found, but photo evidence confirmed it was one of them. Sir John Franklin led the two ships and 129 men in 1845 to chart the Northwest Passage in the Canadian Arctic. The expedition's disappearance shortly after became one of the great mysteries of the age of Victorian exploration. The Canadian government began searching for Franklin's ships in 2008 as part of a strategy to assert Canada's sovereignty...

Canadian explorers have drawn a blank in the latest hunt for the remains of Captain Sir John Franklin's fatal expedition, 160 years after he took his crew of 129 men deep into the Arctic.In 1845, Capt Franklin, an officer in the British Royal Navy, took two ships and 129 men towards the Northwest Territories in an attempt to map the Northwest Passage, a route that would allow sailors to travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific via the icy Arctic circle. Stocked with provisions that could last for seven years, and outfitted with the latest technology and experienced men, the...

TORONTO – Canadian archeologists have found a ship abandoned more than 150 years ago in the quest for the fabled Northwest Passage and which was lost in the search for the doomed expedition of Sir John Franklin, the head of the team said Wednesday.

OTTAWA - The Canadian government confirmed Friday it will embark on the most extensive search ever for the fabled British shipwrecks Erebus and Terror, with Environment Minister John Baird saying the hunt led by Parks Canada scientists will boost "our case for sovereignty" in Arctic waters. .... The six-week search - the first season in what could be a three-year project headed by Parks Canada’s senior underwater archeologist Robert Grenier and Inuit historian Louie Kamoukak - is set to get under way within days aboard a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker. Both of the expedition leaders attended a news conference Friday...