Edmund Hoar, Sir John’s steward, had lengthened the dining table until it could accommodate all the officers present — Commander Fitzjames, Lieutenants Gore, Le Vesconte, and Fairholme from Erebus, Captain Crozier and Lieutenants Little, Hodgson, and Irving from Terror. Besides those eight officers seated on either side of the table — Sir John sat at its head near the starboard bulkhead and entrance to his private head — also present, standing at the foot of the table, were the two ice masters, Mr. Blanky from Terror and Mr. Reid from Erebus, as well as the two engineers, Mr. Thompson from Crozier’s ship and Mr. Gregory from the flagship. Sir John had also asked one of the surgeons, Stanley from Erebus, to be in attendance. Franklin’s steward had set out grape juice, cheeses, and ship’s biscuits, and there was a short period of chatting and relaxing before Sir John called the conference to order.
“Gentlemen,” said Sir John, “I am sure you all know why we are gathered here. Our expedition’s advance the last two months, thanks to the graciousness of God, has been wonderfully successful. We have left Beechey Island almost three hundred and fifty miles behind us. Lookouts and our sledge scouts still report glimpses of open water far to our south and west. It still may be in our power — God willing — to reach this open water and to navigate the North-West Passage this very autumn.
“But the ice to our west is increasing, I understand, in both thickness and frequency. Mr. Gregory reports that Erebus’s main shaft has been damaged by ice and that although we can make headway under steam, the flagship’s effectiveness has been compromised. Our coal supplies are dwindling. Another winter will soon be upon us. In other words, gentlemen, we must decide today what our course of action and direction shall be. I think it is not unfair to say that the success or failure of our expedition shall be determined by what we decide here.”
There was a long silence.
Sir John gestured to the red-bearded ice master of HMS Erebus. “Perhaps it would be helpful, before we venture opinions and open discussion, to hear from our ice masters, engineers, and surgeon. Mr. Reid, could you inform the others of what you told me yesterday about our current and projected ice conditions?”
Reid, standing on the Erebus side of the five men at the end of the table, cleared his throat. Reid was a solitary sort and speaking in such exalted company made his face flush redder than his beard.
“Sir John, … Gentlemen… it ain’t no secret that we’ve been Godda—… that is… darned lucky in terms of ice conditions since the ships was released from ice in May and since we left Beechey Island harbour around the first of June. While we was in the straits, we been plowing through mostly sludge ice. That ain’t no problem. Nights — them few hours of darkness we have what’s called nights up here — we cut through pancake ice, that’s like what we been seeing the last week as the sea’s always on the verge of freezing, but that ain’t no real problem either.
“We been able to stay away from the young ice along the shores — that’s more serious stuff. Behind that’s the fast ice that’ll tear the hull off even a ship as reinforced as this here and Terror in the lead. But as I say, we stayed away from fast ice… so far.”
Reid was sweating, obviously wishing he hadn’t gone on so long but also knowing that he hadn’t fully addressed Sir John’s question yet. He cleared his throat and continued.
“So with the moving ice, Sir John and your honours, we ain’t had much problem with the brash ice and thicker drift ice, and the bergy bits — them little bergs what broke off from the real bergs — we been able to avoid them because of the wide leads and open water we’ve been able to find. But all that’s coming to an end, sirs. What with the nights getting longer, the pancake ice is always there now and we’re running into more and more of them growlers and hummocky flows. And it’s the hummocky flows that’s got Mr. Blanky and me worried.”
“Why is that, Mr. Reid?” asked Sir John. His expression showed his habitual boredom at discussions of the different ice conditions. To Sir John, ice was ice — something to be broken through, gone around, and overcome.
“It’s the snow, Sir John,” said Reid. “The deep snow atop ’em, sir, and the tidemarks on the side. Such always signifies old pack ice ahead, sir, real screwed pack, and that’s where we get frozen in, you see. And as far as we can see or sledge ahead to the south and west, sirs, it’s all pack ice, except for the possible glint of open water way down south of King William Land.”
“The North-West Passage,” Commander Fitzjames said softly.
“Perhaps,” said Sir John. “Most probably. But to get there we shall have to cross through more than a hundred miles of pack ice — perhaps as much as two hundred miles of it. I am told that the ice master of Terror has a theory about why the conditions worsen to our west. Mr. Blanky?”
Thomas Blanky did not blush. The older ice master’s voice was a staccato explosion of syllables as blunt as musket fire.
“It’s death to enter that pack ice. We’ve come too far already. The fact is, since we came out of Peel Sound, we’ve been looking at an ice stream as bad as anything north of Baffin Bay and it’s getting worse every day.”
“Why is that, Mr. Blanky?” asked Commander Fitzjames. His confident voice showed a slight lisp. “This late in the season, I understand that we should still have open leads until the sea actually freezes, and close to the mainland, say southwest of the peninsula of King William Land, we should have some open water for another month or more.”
Ice Master Blanky shook his head. “No. This isn’t no pancake ice or sludge ice, gentlemen, it’s pack ice we’re looking at. It’s coming down from the northwest. Think of it as a series of giant glaciers — calving bergs and freezing the sea for hundreds of miles as it flows south. We’ve been protected from it, is all.”
“Protected by what?” asked Lieutenant Gore, a strikingly handsome and personable officer.
It was Captain Crozier who answered, nodding at Blanky to step back. “By all the islands to our west as we’ve come south, Graham,” said the Irishman. “Just as we discovered a year ago that Cornwallis Land was an island, we know now that Prince of Wales Land is really Prince of Wales Island. The bulk of it has been blocking the full force of the ice stream until we came out of Peel Sound. Now we can see that it’s full pack ice being forced south between whatever islands are up there to our northwest, possibly all the way to the mainland. Whatever open water is down there along the coast to the south won’t last long. Nor will we if we forge ahead and try to winter out here in the open pack ice.”
“That is one opinion,” said Sir John. “And we thank you for it, Francis. But we must decide now on our course of action. Yes, … James?”
Commander Fitzjames looked, as he almost always did, relaxed and in charge. He had actually put on weight during the expedition so his buttons appeared ready to pop from his uniform. His cheeks were rosy and his blond hair hung in longer curls than he’d worn in England. He smiled at everyone along the table.
“Sir John, I agree with Captain Crozier that to be caught out in the pack ice we’re facing would be unfortunate, but I do not believe that will be our fate should we forge on. I believe that it is imperative that we get as far south as we can — either to reach the open water to realize our goal of finding the North-West Passage, which I think we shall do before winter sets in, or simply to find safer waters near the coast, perhaps a harbour where we can winter in relative comfort as we did at Beechey Island. At the very least, we know from Sir John’s earlier expeditions overland and from previous Naval expeditions that the water tends to stay open much later near the coast because of the warmer waters coming in from the rivers.”