Arctic explorers vanished in 1845. Now, cannibalized body of crew member identified

When Captain James Fitzjames departed the United Kingdom in 1845 on the third Franklin Northwest Passage expedition to the Arctic, he and his crew didn’t know the harrowing fate ahead of them.

Their ships would become entrapped in ice in the years that followed, and hoping to escape the Arctic, Fitzjames led the 104 other sailors to abandon ship and journey into the elements.

No crew members would make it back to Britain — and many turned to drastic measures to try to survive.

Now, Fitzjames’ body has been identified for the first time, according to a study published Sept. 24 in the peer-reviewed Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports.

“It was only in 1854 that the very first concrete news of the ultimate fate of (the crew) was obtained from Inuit testimony,” researchers said.

Inuit people said they had run into a group of around 40 people pulling a boat in Nunavut, now the northernmost territory of Canada, and then found bodies nearby a year later, according to the study.

In the 1850s and 1860s, two search teams discovered the remains of the expedition’s two ships with many more skeletons, and they weren’t rediscovered until the early 1990s, researchers said.

The team now knows one of those bodies belonged to the lost Captain Fitzjames.

Finding DNA match

Uncover more archaeological finds

What are we learning about the past? Here are three of our most recent eye-catching archaeology stories.

→ Sword found in 19th-century German cellar is something much older — and from far away

→ Student with metal detector finds bangle — then discovers ancient hoard in Denmark

→ Hidden corridor beneath Warsaw held ancient artifacts — and secret place for Masons

“The identification was made possible by a DNA sample from a living descendant , which matched the DNA that was discovered at the archaeological site on King William Island where 451 bones from at least 13 Franklin sailors were found,” researchers said in a Sept. 24 news release from the University of Waterloo.

Only one other body has ever been positively identified, an engineer on the HMS Erebus named John Gregory, researchers said. Gregory was identified in 2021.

Using a molar extracted from a jawbone discovered at the site, researchers created a genetic profile for the dead sailor, according to the study.

Someone believed to be Fitzjames’ descendant then submitted a cheek swab with their DNA, and markers on the Y-chromosome of both samples were compared, researchers said.

“The identification of Fitzjames’ remains provides new insights about the expedition’s sad ending,” study author Douglas Stenton, an adjunct professor of anthropology at the University of Waterloo, said.

A sad ending

Fitzjames’ mandible, and bones of other sailors, had cut marks indicative of their soft tissue being cut off their bodies, usually a sign of cannibalism, researchers said.

“This shows that he predeceased at least some of the other sailors who perished, and that neither rank nor status was the governing principle in the final desperate days of the expedition as they strove to save themselves,” Stenton said.

When the Inuit first found bodies in the 1850s, they reported some having evidence of being eaten, according to the study, but it wasn’t believed by the British, “who shared a view that all cannibalism was morally reprehensible, and some therefore rejected it.”

In a note written by Fitzjames before the crew abandoned ship, he said the forced reliance on stored food for so long had caused serious nutritional deficiencies among the crew, according to the study. Researchers believe many of the crew may have died quickly after leaving the ship because of the physical stress put on struggling bodies.

Study author Robert Park, an anthropology professor at the University of Waterloo, said the findings show “the level of desperation that the Franklin sailors must have felt to do something they would have considered abhorrent.”

“Ever since the expedition disappeared into the Arctic 179 years ago there has been widespread interest in its ultimate fate, generating many speculative books and articles and, most recently, a popular television miniseries which turned it into a horror story with cannibalism as one of its themes. Meticulous archaeological research like this shows that the true story is just as interesting, and that there is still more to learn,” Park said.

Those who suspect they are a relative of a Franklin sailor are encouraged to contact Stenton to help researchers continue to give the bodies back their identities.

Sailor remains were placed in a memorial cairn, or mound of stones, with a commemorative plaque on King William Island.

King William Island is in south-central Nunavut.

The research team includes Stenton, Park and Stephen Fratpietro.

1,300-year-old throne room — for a ‘powerful woman’ — unearthed in Peru. See it

Divers find trove of artifacts — including rifles and bullets — on Ottoman shipwreck