I recently wrote “Could I contemplate a scenario where new information would compel me to get back to work revising my Terror diorama?”1 Well, that situation happened almost immediately! In this post, I focus on what may seem a minor discovery – HMS Terror’s 1845 screw propeller. I argue that it is one of the outstanding finds at either Franklin Expedition wreck site. I will explore the history of this well-preserved artifact and situate it in a revolutionary program of naval ship design. I will conclude by showing how I incorporated the propeller into my diorama of the wreck site.
One hundred and eighty years ago, a visitor to Her Majesty’s Dockyard, Woolwich, near London, would have been treated to a memorable sight: one of Queen Victoria’s warships – under refit to explore the Arctic – was up on the stocks in dry-dock. This was one of a pair of bomb vessels (a type of specialized mortar-armed bombardment ship) which had been converted years before for polar missions. These tough ships had more than proved their mettle during James Clark Ross’s wildly successful expedition to Antarctica. Now the duo – each painted in severe black with a broad white strake stretching along the hull – had been selected for a new “Discovery Service” mission, to be commanded by Sir John Franklin: Complete a Northwest passage across the top of North America. Walking around the dock to the ship’s stern, that visitor would have seen something unusual: a strange cavity low down at the swollen stern post. This was just inboard from an enormous rudder. The hole opened clear through to the other side, like some casemated gun embrasure. Set into this void was a metal monstrosity: A cylindrical shaft with two broad blades twisting away from it. The visitor may have recognized this as a screw propeller – a marvel of the age. When coupled by a long shaft to a steam engine mounted in the bowels of the ship, the rotating screw could propel the vessel – all without a single sail of the lofty three-masted rig drawing a favourable breeze. If that same visitor had returned later, they may have felt the dupe of some trick: the machinery could have completely disappeared, leaving the man-sized hole. As if by some further sleight of hand, the whole cavity could have also appeared closed up, with only a faint rectangular outline now in evidence. What category of navy ship was this anyways? A sometimes-steamer with a propeller that unscrewed right off?! Indeed, here was something completely new: The first auxiliary screw-propelled polar exploration vessel!
The propeller, lowered and possibly installed in its aperture at the stern of the HMS Terror wreck, as photographed by the Underwater Archaeology Team during the late summer of 2019. Credit: used with written permission of Parks Canada, who retain copyright. Scroll down to the next page to see my model of this area.
Early this year I was searching for information about the 2024 Parks Canada program of archaeology on the Sir John Franklin shipwrecks, HM Ships Erebus and Terror in Nunavut, Canada. Instead, I stumbled upon a new post “Anchors and Propellers” by Franklin Expedition scholar and veteran searcher David Woodman on his site: Aglooka.2 This update assembled interesting information about the ships’ complement of anchors, and also their propellers. Reading on, I encountered a previously unpublished image from the Parks Canada Underwater Archaeology Team (above). I was stopped dead in my wake! Here we see Terror’s screw propeller, installed in its aperture! With this photograph, we have the first visual confirmation that a marvelous piece of Victorian maritime technology has survived relatively intact after more than 175 years of immersion at Terror Bay.3
This simple two-bladed screw is one of the most important artifacts existing at either Franklin shipwreck site. The Commemorative Integrity Statement relating to this National Historic Site of Canada specifically identifies the marine screw propulsion as a character-defining aspect of the sites, demonstrating the 1845 technological innovation of the Expedition.4 From the waterline up, both ships looked much like they had during J.C. Ross’s expedition to Antarctica (1839-1843). Erebus and Terror were also not the first ships with an auxiliary steam engine to go north: In 1829 Ross’s uncle, Sir John Ross, had taken Victory north with an experimental – and mostly useless – steam engine.5 However, the idea of fitting a removable screw propeller into a Discovery Service exploration vessel was truly original. The suggestion came from a superstar in polar exploration. As Dr. Matthew Betts relates in his book HMS Terror – The Design, Fitting and Voyages of the Polar Discovery Ship, the seasoned Arctic explorer Sir William E. Parry – who now had an official role in investigating the optimal methods of steam propulsion in the Royal Navy – believed that the new propulsion technology could give vessels operating in the Arctic Archipelago a big advantage: The ability to navigate tight passages free from any dependence on the vagaries of the winds.6 Having auxiliary steam propulsion available to the Expedition captains could help force a constricted passage, position the vessels to better meet the rigors of overwintering in ice (for example by allowing them to get to a safe harbour or a more sheltered section of coast), or get them clear of an immediate hazard, such as an errant iceberg or a perilous lee shore. Parry’s experience commanding similar vessels in the Arctic provided him with an invaluable perspective on how screw propulsion could support this new attempt to transit the Northwest Passage. The Admiralty endorsed Parry’s idea.
Oliver Lang, Master Shipwright at Woolwich, was responsible for working up a technical plan to meet this new requirement. A half-century after he had begun drafting designs, he remained at the forefront of marine technological innovation. During the early 1840s, the military strength of the Royal Navy still rested on the line of battle ships of the sailing navy, those wind-powered “wooden walls” whose broadsides of cannon had allowed Great Britain to dominate the World’s sea lanes. Lang applied new technologies to both mercantile and Royal Navy vessels. He strengthened the basic structure of warships, packed their hulls with new innovations, and enhanced crew comforts onboard, especially to improve lighting and circulation of air. His innovations helped equip the fleet with larger, stronger, and safer warships. He had recently turned to incorporating steam technology into his designs. There had been experiments with steam engines and, since the early 1820s, some small naval units had been propelled by paddle-wheel. The Admiralty was conducting a series of trials of steamers to test a variety of newly-designed screw propellers against paddle-wheel propulsion.7
The famous trial of H.M. Steam sloops Rattler and Alecto, 3 April 1845 (artist unknown). Rattler (left) displays Lang’s newly-installed mizzen mast. PAH0923 Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
Lang’s own treatise Improvements in Naval Architecture (1853) is an important source for understanding his remarkable career. In his own words he “Arranged and fitted the first SCREW propeller to ship and unship in a TRUNK, so as to be taken up on deck in the ships “Erebus” and “Terror” on the late Arctic Expedition for Sir John Franklin.”8 The years 1844-46 were a busy period for Lang, which saw him embark on an ambitious campaign of propeller experimentation, design, and installation. He had first improved upon Rattler’s recently-installed propeller by re-rigging this steamer with a new mizzen mast, which could be used to lift the propeller in its frame straight upwards through a slot which communicated with the steamer’s weather deck. This allowed the crew to ship and unship the propeller, without specialized dockyard facilities.
While building the large steam frigate HMS Terrible (1845 – fitted with paddle wheels), he moved on to designing and fitting his first complete naval propeller assembly. HMS Phoenix (1832) was modified from a paddle-wheeler to a screw steamer. Most of the essential elements of a Lang screw-fitted stern were now in place: propeller aperture, screw propeller, false stern or rudderpost behind the sternpost, a passage for lifting the screw upwards to the weather deck, and the means for lifting it out. The modifications to the Phoenix were underway when he got the “rush order” for the work on the two Northwest Passage exploration vessels.9
The main difference in modifying Erebus and Terror with auxiliary propulsion (with much less powerful steam engines converted from railway locomotives) was that the screws would only be fitted during occasional steaming, and chocks would fill each ship’s propeller aperture most of the time. This filler needed to streamlined into the lines of the hull to not weaken a vulnerable area, and to continue to guide the flow of water aft to the rudder. Lang’s other designs had the propeller fitting into its own iron frame, with the entire assembly lifted through a narrow passage to the deck, or lowered back in place. Erebus and Terror, by contrast, had rails that guided the propeller, which was lifted on its own.
A model of the stern of the Arctic ships as modified by Lang in 1845, showing the propeller aperture, and the bracing of both the stern post and new rudder post to permit the propeller to be hauled up into the trunk and on deck. A view from above shows the almost square passage for lifting or lowering the screw and installing the chock, and the smaller opening for the head of the rudder. Like at the wreck-site, the enormous rudder that would normally project aft is absent. SLR2253 Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.
Phoenix was ready in February 1845, and Lang moved to the design of HMS Niger, which would go on to be used in a more balanced round of evaluations of screw-versus-paddle propulsion (with Niger and Basilisk a closer match than Rattler and Alecto had been). During April, the Franklin ships were modified with their unique combination of adapted railway steam locomotive – installed deep down in the after hold – and auxiliary propeller. Woolwich dockyards had its own highly specialized engineering facility – the “Steam Factory” – with the equipment and docking slips to install the new steam systems. Lieutenant Henry T.D. Le Vesconte of HMS Erebus provided a contemporary description of the work.Writing to his father on 2 April 1845 – after he discussed the excellent prospects for promotion that would come his way by serving with the Franklin Expedition – he noted: “The ships are at present in dock where we are rigging each and stowing them while the shipwrights are altering their sterns by bracing on abaft the stern posts an large mass of timber of the same thickness in which to work the screw propellers the engines will be put in next week[…].”10 After the engines and propellers were tested, and the ships finished provisioning, the Expedition departed from Greenhithe, 19 May 1845. (Continue to explore Terror’s screw propeller on the next page)
A basic principle of model shipwreck archaeology is that – in contrast to their full-size brethren – model shipwrecks do not necessarily deteriorate. In this post we explore updates to our miniature interpretation of HMS Terror’s wreck. The Terror mini-site has witnessed substantial improvement since 2022!
Terror’s rebuilt stern, with new rudderpost, gudgeons to hang the absent rudder, a broader stern tuck up to the sternlights (windows) and lower water-closet deckhouses aft of the double wheel.
An earlier post “Wrecking the Terror: Recreating an Epic Tale of Old Loss and New Discovery” summarized what we know about the actual wreck of HMS Terror located in Terror Bay, Nunavut, and my 2022 project to build a small diorama of the wreck site. Terror, an astonishingly well-preserved time capsule of the last Franklin Expedition, continues to captivate Franklin scholars and enthusiasts, archaeologists, naval historians, ship lovers, and the expanding fandom community who continue to enjoy the fictionalized drama of AMC’s “The Terror”(season 1).
HMS Terror site sketch, 2017 copyright Parks Canada 2021 [modified by rotating]. Source.
Turning now to the reduced-scale World, Terror was my first wreck diorama, and was followed by Breadalbane High Arctic shipwreck and HMS Ontario.
A “glass-bottomed boat” view of the updated wreck site, 80 scale feet under the acrylic case top. The shadow of the bowsprit points due north.
Two years after I thought the diorama was complete, I decided it was time to open the case up and revise some features. A sketch I had worked up independent of this project also helped motivate me to rebuild the Terror.
So what changes has the miniature site undergone? The entire lower hull was reshaped to better highlight the turn of Terror’s bilge, the overall body lines, and the broader aft quarters. The wreck was also placed at a more pronounced list to starboard. I added more detail to the debris of fallen masts and yards now located on the upper deck, which better interprets the complexity of the three-masted barque-rig and the chaotic event of the sinking. This “top-hamper” – and what appears to be the ridge poles of winter awnings – would have showered the deck and areas immediately adjacent to the hull with the types of debris we see in the site plan released by Parks Canada, and imagery released by their Underwater Archaeology Team.
The weather deck looking forwards from the taffrail.
Under all the accumulated silt and growth, there is likely to be a bewildering variety of artifacts, which my interpretation can only begin to hint at. The ship’s boat off the port quarter of the wreck was given a modest update: A more accurate fallen davit resting across the stern.
The bows including the port bower anchor, the hawse holes, the catshead with whisker boom, and other oddities of the polar-modified bomb vessels. under the reinforced channels, the massive ice shield of iron plates shows corrosion and marine life.
The water-closet structures at the stern were completely rebuilt with lower roofs and sliding doors opening to the sides. They still have detailed “privy” interiors. A small cavity at the aft end of the starboard closet shows where the flag locker was located.
The new stern water closets, the double wheel and the captain’s skylight just forward of that. In the foreground, a pipe leads down to the captain’s small stove.
The interior of the wreck diorama remains practically inaccessible, and no substantial work was done belowdecks during our “great repair.” I do hope that, in a future season of modelling work, a more fulsome recording of the detailed interior spaces of the model could be attempted. For now, we had a quick examination of Capt. Crozier’s miniature great cabin through the stern windows; his captain’s desk remains in place, but the drawers are still modelled tightly shut. No miniature records have yet been recovered.
Light shines down through the captain’s skylight onto the surface of Crozier’s desk.
Those with keen eyes will note that the team of scuba-diving archaeologists have not been reinstalled in their customary positions. The site is currently under ice and snow, and they will not return to their program of scale archaeology until the next dive season commences in August, 2025. Could I contemplate a scenario where new information would compel me to get back to work revising the Terror diorama? You bet your sextant I could!
The diorama with its winter cover of ice and snow.
Raise the Terror…NO! Raise the HMS Terror’s Boat! Why? Read on!
A year ago we “floated” the idea of raising an important artifact of the lost 1845 Sir John Franklin Expedition, from one of the two incredible shipwrecks at the Wrecks of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror National Historic Site: A ship’s boat from HMS Terror. In the intervening months, we have bulked-up on our boat-raising research, and have circled back to this topic. We’re doubling down: the World NEEDS the Terror boat back on dry land.
A simulated underwater archaeologist contemplates raising the 1/125 scale model boat wreck on our diorama of the wreck site of HMS Terror. Credit: www.warsearcher.com
During September 2024, Parks Canada underwater archaeologists were again on site in Nunavut, in the high Canadian Arctic. They were conducting an archaeological program at the extraordinary shipwrecks of HM Ships Erebus and Terror. Early indications suggest that they had a long dive season! We are very much anticipating the release of information about newly-recovered artifacts and other discoveries.
There is an artifact that we hope someday will be recovered: one substantially intact 23-foot/7m ship’s cutter. The boat was pulled down as Terror sank in a bay along the southwestern coast of King William Island later named, by coincidence, Terror Bay. Lost about 175 years ago, it has, like the rest of the Terror site, remained astonishingly intact, 80’/14,4m beneath the freezing waters of the Bay.
HMS Terror site plan, ca. 2017, available online as of late 2021. The boat is marked “Cutter” at lower right. Credit: Parks Canada source.
In the earlier post, we explored the idea that this important artifact could be raised from its location on the seabed off the port quarter of the Terror hull (the same caveats still apply).1 The boat wreck could then be conserved and stabilized for eventual public exhibition. Visitors would be able to engage with a remote National Historic Site of Canada by interacting with a substantial Franklin Expedition artifact. We also proposed that it could be replaced with a wooden replica, carefully deposited in position back at Terror Bay. This replica boat would replace the original at the wreck site: It would aesthetically preserve the integrity and character of the site; it could also help monitor changes to the seabed environment that may be less apparent on the original wreck structures; and it could provide powerful commemorative options for an in situ memorial, that would remain, marking this important site for generations to come. Why not have a memorial boat serve as a submerged cenotaph, with plaques in three languages – English, French,Inuktitut– to commemorate the lost 129 men of both the Erebus and the Terror?
This sunken cutter is the only boat from either ship that has survived the destruction of the Expedition in any semblance of its original condition. It would be a signature object around which to build commemorative and interpretive programs. After treatment, it could be placed on display at the Nattilik Heritage Centre in Gjoa Haven, or another suitable museum.
The Nattilik Heritage Centre, Gjoa Haven, taken during a visit from Adventure Canada cruise members in 2019. The Centre houses many interesting artifacts, and the exterior nods to both Inuit and explorer traditions. Credit: Kerry Raymond, CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
There was an era in underwater archaeology when raising a wooden artifact that had been immersed for any length of time was a recipe for destroying it. Sunken wood becomes saturated with water molecules, and swells. This alters the original properties of the wooden structures. After it is exposed to air and dries out, the artifacts become fragile to the point of crumbling. During the 1960s, starting with the famous archaeological work on the Vasa warship wreck in Stockholm Harbour, conservators learned to treat wood and metal artifacts with Polyethylene Glycol (PEG). This compound can replace the water content in the wood, to help it retain its basic dimensions and structure, and allow it to be stabilized for long-term preservation.
The Vasa’s treated hull at right, with a ship’s boat at lower left, and a large-scale model at upper left, all on display at the Vasamuseet, Stockholm. Vasa was found to be carrying three boats, including this 38’/11.7m elbing boat, recovered from the 105’/32m seabed. Credit: Pierre Goiffon via Wikimedia Commons.
The success of a project of this importance would depend on securing an elite team of archaeologists and conservators. The good news is we did not have to look far afield! The archaeologists currently working on the wrecks – Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team (UAT) – have some of the most relevant expertise in the World at successfully completing exactly this type of project. They have surveyed, disassembled, conserved, and reassembled sunken boats from National Historic Sites of Canada – and they’ve done an incredible job. During the late 1960s Parks Canada was an early adopter of PEG treatment to help conserve raised boat wrecks.2 Since then, they have tackled larger and more complex projects.
This and the other volumes in the edited multi-volume Parks Canada series show the ambitious archaeological project at Red Bay Labrador. The project is the major precedent for the current work on HMS Erebus and Terror (Cover illustration by Carol Piper). For full citation see endnotes.
At the Red Bay National Historic Site, Labrador, the remains of a 90-foot long, 250-300 ton Basque whaling ship, usually identified as the San Juan, were methodically excavated from 1977-1992. A thrilling discovery was made in 1983 under the timbers at the stern of the 16th Century shipwreck: The remains of a well-preserved chalupa-type whaling boat. The whaling boat is believed to have been dragged under at the moment of the shipwreck, in a similar manner to Terror’s cutter. The project was extensively described in a multi-volume publication by Parks Canada.3 It was a remarkable find – a missing link in the development of whaling boats and a Basque precursor of North American-built settler and indigenous whaling boats. After meticulous planning and preparations, the decision was taken to raise the remains of the four-hundred year old vessel to reassemble it. An article by Charles Moore, a leading Parks Canada archaeologist, and a piece on the Parks’ website – “Archaeology of a Sixteenth-Century Basque Whaling Boat” – describe this work.4
The Parks Canada conservation laboratories in the south of Ottawa, ca. 2023. Credit: http://www.warsearcher.com
The recovered timbers were shipped to Ottawa, stabilized and treated with PEG, and then painstakingly reformed and reassembled in Parks’ conservation facilities. In July 1998, after a nerve-wracking drive back to Labrador, the 26-foot boat was placed on display in a new interpretation centre back in the community of Red Bay. Today, the artifact continues to offer visitors an accessible connection to the history of Basque whaling in North America, and the National Historic Site under the adjacent waters of Red Bay. A chapter of Parks Canada’s multi-tome series on the Archeological program and discoveries of Red Bay, written by archaeologists Ryan Harris and Brad Loewen, documents the UAT’s meticulous efforts to survey, excavate, raise, and reconstruct this boat.
Reconstructed Chalupa 16th Century Basque whaling boat raised from seabed by Parks Canada and conserved at the Red Bay National Historic Site Credit: Magicpiano, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
It was especially challenging to extricate this boat from the whaling ship remains: the chalupa had been crushed by the bulk of the San Juan’s stern and flattened later by collapsing ship timbers. It was also sandwiched between articulated wreck elements. Terror’s cutter, by contrast, appears to be substantially intact and disassociated from the main site. Indeed, from the above site plan, and Parks Canada photos and film, it appears to be sitting pretty, filled with protective sediment and lightly embedded in the muck. What worked for the Red Bay site during the 1990s can now work for Terror Bay in our years. Raising the boat could be the type of tantalizing project that would sustain popular enthusiasm for the meticulous archaeological investigation of both sites over the coming decades.
The preserved artifacts mentioned in the text and notes of this post have all become prestige objects to build museums, visitor centres, and collections around. This is what we would wish for the Wrecks of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror National Historic Sites of Canada. It does feel like it is time we start talking about raising the Terror’s boat.
A simulated underwater archaeologist has been convinced about raising the model boatwreck on our diorama of the wreck site of HMS Terror. Credit: www.warsearcher.com
Rise again, rise again, that her name not be lost To the knowledge of men. We’ll make the Terror ship’s boat rise again! [paraphrase of Stan Rogers’ The Mary Ellen Carter]
We asked a year ago and are asking again: Have we convinced you? Let us know in a comment!
Ten years ago, the sea gifted us back a legendary ship, lost for almost seventeen decades: HMS Erebus. As visitors to our site know, there is a lot of Terror talk on this blog! HMS Terror, was the “other ship” on Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated 1845 expedition to discover a Northwest Passage. We had been neglecting Erebus, and are now trying to make amends! Interpreting a variety of archival sources, we decided to attempt a simplified set of plans of this incredible ship to mark the important anniversary of Erebus being back in our World:
Our reconstruction of HMS Erebus in her 1845 (final) configuration: stern/bow and side elevation. Credit:www.warsearcher.com adapted from National Maritime Museum plan ZAZ5673 and other technical info and used with written permission of NMM staff. Dotted lines represent features documented on Terror wreck, which could just as well have been located on Erebus, while anchor positions are from 1845 artistic representations of both vessels at sea, click the “design dossier” link at bottom for more information on this reconstruction.
On 7 September 2014, Parks Canada, a key member of the Victoria Strait Expedition – a consortium of government and private partners – definitively located one of Sir John Franklin’s lost ships. A promising sonar target had been identified in Wilmot and Crampton Bay, Nunavut, on 2 September, after archaeological finds on a nearby island had redirected the search. The Parks Canada Underwater Archaeology Team (UAT) deployed a Remotely Operated Vehicle aroung the well-preserved remains of a shipwreck, located in only 11 meters / 36 feet of water. By the afternoon of the 7th, it was clear to the team that the vessel was one of Franklin’s elusive ships. The UAT informed Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Office. Further investigation by the UAT dive team allowed them to definitively identify the ship on 1 October as HMS Erebus.1 The discovery tied into a rich tradition of Inuit oral history, which had suggested, down through the 166-years of searching, that one of the lost ships had come to grief on the western coast of the Adelaide Peninsula.
The moment had finally come for Erebus, that personification of darkness, of gloom, of the unseen World, to come back into the light; it was time for Sir John Franklin’s lost flagship to be restored to the public consciousness. The discovery was an immediate sensation, and ten years on, the yearly program of archaeology – of surveying, imaging, artifact recovery and conservation – continues to be followed with great enthusiasm.
Ryan Harris (left), Parks Canada project lead, alongside Prime Minister Stephen Harper (center) and Minister of the Environment Leona Aglukkaq, announcing the discovery of HMS Erebus 9 Sep. 2014 [cropped]. Credit: Jason Ransom Library and Archives Canada R16093-50252-9-E.
On the day the find was announced, 9 September 2014, as media reports appeared on my device, I was staring at a damaged ship’s wheel and a bell recovered from another famous shipwreck – and one of Canada’s worst maritime disasters – RMS Empress of Ireland. These were on display in the exhibit Empress of Ireland: Canada’s Titanic at the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau. I bought a commemorative bell, walked across the Alexandra Bridge to stand under the statue of explorer Samuel de Champlain – wielding his famous astrolabe over Nepean Point (now Kìwekì Point) – which looks out over the Canadian capital – and rang the bell to celebrate the discovery! It doesn’t have to make sense, it just felt right.
RMS Empress of Ireland wheel, recovered from the wreck off from Pointe-au-Père QC. Taken 9 Sep. 2014 at the Canadian Museum of History (centenary of the sinking) exhibit.
HMS Erebus was a Hecla class bomb vessel completed in 1826, long after the conflict the “bombs” were designed for had terminated. This small warship was about 370 tons burthen, about 105′ / 32m on the gundeck (later considered the lower deck), with a beam (width) of about 28′ / 8.5m. The class was originally armed with two massive mortars – 10” and 13” varieties – housed in rotating carriages in firing beds overtop of reinforced cribbing, that also stored their massive shells. The mortars were located along the centerline of the deck between the fore and main masts. A few cannon installed along the gundeck rounded out the armament, and enabled the ships to defend themselves and perform auxiliary service as a convoy escorts – a useful secondary role during the Napoleonic Wars, when enemy warships and privateers were a constant worry to keeping merchant sea lanes open. The first Heclas were completed at the very twilight of the Wars, and took no active role. Hecla and Fury did participate in the August 1816 Bombardment of Algiers, firing hundreds of shells into the fortified city. In 1819, to lead William Edward Parry’s first exploration mission north, Hecla was converted to the radically different role of polar discovery vessel. For Parry’s next two exploration missions (1821-1825), Fury accompanied Hecla. This revived a tradition of the crews of two reinforced bombs working together on polar missions.2
His Majesty’s Discovery ships, Fury and Hecla by Arthur Parsey (Artist & Engraver) Charles Joseph Hullmandel (Printer) in 1823. Both show early “Parry scheme” modifications for Arctic service, with broadside armament and mortars removed, reinforced channels, and bow iceguards. credit: National Maritime Museum PAH9224.
Erebus, completed the next year at the Royal Navy’s Pembroke, Wales, dockyard, remained in ordinary (out of commission), awaiting a day when the Royal Navy would have need of this compact, incredibly specialized warship. Her first missions saw her employed in the Mediterranean making ports-of-call visits and showing the flag, the typical peacetime routines of the “wooden walls” – the ships of Britain’s massive naval fleet.3 In 1839, Erebus’s moment came to be modified, but it was for an entirely new theatre of polar operations: The exploration of Antarctica. Erebus was selected to be the lead ship in James Clark Ross’s expedition south. The older and smaller Terror(commanded by Francis Crozier) accompanied her. The waist was decked over in a continuous weather deck, as the mortars were unshipped and the massive beds were removed. The ship’s basic skeleton – keel, frames and knees – was reinforced, hull planking was doubled, and this new weather deck was overlayed with diagonal planking. An enormous ice channel or chock now extended from bows to the stern, girdling the hull more completely than earlier exploration ships. The elaborate seven-light (windowed) stern with overhanging quarter galleries was reduced to five lights across the transom, in a simplified design. The entire underbody of the ship was clad in a shining layer of copper plating, but certain areas, such as the bows and waterline, were reinforced with special thickened copper. The vessel that emerged from refit looked less like a pint-sized frigate from the Wars, and more like a bulked-up whaling ship.4
The crews of both vessels succeeded brilliantly on their four-year surveying odyssey, charting vast coastal expanses and ice shelves of the most southern continent, and making important scientific discoveries in biology, zoology, and magnetism. Operating in totally uncharted waters was perilous work, with Erebus and Terror both being damaged in an almost fantastical collision while dodging icebergs. Despite the hazardous environment, casualties on the voyage were incredibly light.
“The Erebus passing through the chain of bergs, 13 Mar. 1842” by John Edward Davis (who was Second Master in HMS Terror) depicts the moments after the collision of the two ships when the damaged Erebus sought refuge in the lee of an Iceberg to make emergency repairs. As Terror maneuvers in the distance, Erebus has lost some of her rig, her bowsprit, and her starboard cathead. Crew are frantically trying to save the bower anchor. PAF0593 Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London
After repairs and a brief lay-up, the “Discovery Duo” was selected for the next major polar effort: Sir John Franklin’s 1845 bid to chart the last section of the Northwest Passage along the top of the North American landmass. Another major rebuild followed. A reinforced iceguard of massive iron plates was fitted to the stem and forefoot under the bows. A radical alteration to the stern timbers allowed each ship to operate a screw propeller, powered by a converted railway steam locomotive (please see our subsequent post about HMS Terror’s screw propeller to explore this interesting technological update). When not in use, the screw could be uncoupled from the drive shaft, and raised into a protective cavity that hung inside the stern. These small engines, with a very limited supply of coal for fuel, were intended to help the ships navigate in the challenging Arctic environment without being fully dependent on the wind’s vagaries.
The Franklin expedition ships, HMS Erebus and Terror, setting out with fanfare in late May 1845 from Greenhithe. This was originally published for the 24 May 1845 edition of the Illustrated London News. (Via wikimedia commons) The location of the prominent scuppers along the ice chock of Erebus (in white) seems to indicate Erebus is at right.
Franklin, installed on Erebus, would lead the expedition. James Fitzjames commanded the flagship, while Crozier, Second-in-Command of the effort, remained in his familiar Terror. As most visitors to this site likely are aware, this was to be a one-way trip for ships and crew, that ended in disaster, shipwrecks, boatwrecks, and a trail of abandoned items, burials and bones. Of the lost 129 expedition members, 67 had served on Erebus.The hulk somehow wound up wrecked in Wilmot and Crampton Bay, south of King William Island. Just like the wrecking of HMS Terror nearby, the exact details of the Erebus sinking have yet to be established.
Archaeological reconstruction of the wreck, discovered ten years ago. The site plan was completed in 2017 and shared online in 2021. Credit: Parks Canada, under Crown Copyright
What were the main differences between Terror (Vesuvius class) and Erebus (Hecla class)? These were not sisterships, though they appeared so similar most observers may have thought they were. Both ships were tubby, and very similar to merchant designs, with their bluff bows and broad hulls. The differences were summarized by Dr. Matthew Betts, an expert in HMS Terror’s design and history, in his blog post “What’s the Difference – Franklin’s ships compared“. Henry Peake’s original 1813 design for the Hecla class emerged iteratively out of his earlier design for the Vesuvius class. The enlargement of 50 tons displacement and deepening of the hull are less visible than the overall impression the original plans provide: Terror’s lines harkened back to a time of more elaborate decoration and sweeping sheer (sheer being the lengthwise curvature up by the bows and stern, down at the waist); Erebus was more upright, with stem and stern posts that dropped from the ship’s built-up rails almost straight down, and a flatter sheer. The very bottom of the ship, out from the massive keel, was broader in Erebus, while Terror had a noticeably more “V” shaped lower hull.5
HMS Erebus and Terror in the Ross Sea. Erebus is at left. John Edward Davis, R.N. (1815-1877), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
During the 1845 refit, Terror’s bowsprit was seated much further aft, so that this heavy mast angled out forwards at the level of the rails. Erebus’s bowsprit remained in its traditional location, piercing the bow lower down, between the anchor hawse holes, and just above the visible ledge of the ice channel. As detailed in the “Design Dossier” link below, what is revealed from a close interpretation of plans and depictions of these vessels through their lengthy service is that Erebus, and the Heclas, had upper counters beneath their stern windows, whereas Terror and her two Vesuvius class sisters did not. Erebus also had six large scuppers a side that discharged via pipes halfway down the ice channel. These drained the weatherdeck. Terror had four large scuppers that discharged higher up, level with the deck and above the channel. Thus, by the time of their departure from Greenhithe on 19 May 1845, the ships featured distinctive elements to sort one out from the other at the bows, amidships, and aft.
May Fluhmann (1906-1985), a notable Franklin researcher, commissioned this model of Erebus during the mid-1950s. We know based on her archival records at Library and Archives Canada that she worked diligently to secure the ship’s plans. We now also know it to not be a strong likeness, of the indicated 1845 appearance. Credit: Library and Archives Canada May Fluhmann fonds.
To conclude, when it comes to the design of these two incredibly unique vessels, we are still very much on a voyage of discovery! It has been a decade since the heady days of the Victoria Straits Expedition’s location of Franklin’s lost flagship, HMS Erebus. Much has been discovered, and much remains to be found at both Erebus and Terror sites. Along with artifacts that allow us to explore the human tragedy – the loss of two shiploads of exceptional individuals – our knowledge about the exact design and advanced technology of both ships will continue to expand over the next decades. Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team is at the Franklin ships at this exact moment! What will they find this year?
“Westward from the Davis Strait, tis’ there twas’ said to lie; the sea route to the Orient, for which so many died. Seeking gold and glory, leaving weathered broken bones, and a long-forgotten lonely cairn of stones”(S. Rogers Northwest Passage – 1981)
CLICK HERE to read the “Design Dossier” for HMS Erebus, and Acknowledgments
The Design Dossier: To create my reconstruction and simplified plans, I had to interpret a variety of sometimes contradictory sources. This project followed on from the reconstruction of HMS North Star, Franklin search ship, and HMS Ontario historic shipwreck. This may only interest a few readers, so I will summarize this research. It adds up to a unique perspective on HMS Erebus. My starting point was the excellent archival collection of plans held at the National Maritime Museum (NMM), Greenwich. My simplified reconstruction omits some frame lines along the midships section for clarity, and because I drew the plans at a small but consistent scale of 1:125. A particularly fine set of technical drawings that show the body plans or hull lines exist at the NMM for Erebus sisters Meteor(1823) and Fury. These made it possible for me to reconstruct both the overall hull lines, and also the bow and stern elevations and body plans for Erebus. Without close adherence to these plans it would be virtually impossible to reconstruct these ships, absent more information from the wreck archaeology. Another guide in this reconstruction was the artistic works that Lt. Graham Gore [Scott Polar Research Institute item 35195957] and Capt. Owen Stanley [National Library of Australia collection item 2484731] created in 1845, as the squadron moved north. I am privileging their first-hand observations over certain other technical evidence. Gore, as First Lieutenant, would have had direct involvement with readying the vessels for sea in 1845, whereas Stanley had sailed in Terror during the Frozen Straits Expedition, and temporarily accompanied the squadron northwards while commanding HMS Blazer, a steamship towing Erebus. Gore sent his artistic depictions back for Lady Jane Franklin while the expedition members posted their final letters from Disko Bay, Greenland (Qeqertarsuup tunua).
Erebus had a large -almost hemispherical- iron iceguard fitted to the bows. Parks Canada’s archaeology has documented iron plating extending from the stem all the way back to be level with the foremast. Their commissioned wrecksite diorama (built by professional model builder Fred Werthman) also demonstrates this expanse of plating. This appears to be larger than any polar-modified ship from before the Expedition and any of the search vessels that followed in the wake of the lost ships. Correspondence with Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team and Dr. Matthew Betts have substantiated this feature.
A distinctive difference in the sterns of the ships is that Erebus always had an upper counter, whereas Terror never had one. An upper counter (see below HMS Victory model) is a space traditionally found under the lowest level of lights (windows) on the stern of a vessel, which also often has the nameplate or lettering identifying the ship. Developing to its classical appearance in the early 18th century, the design of the upper counter was mostly aesthetic, and made a visual transition to the more concave space of the lower counter (where the ship’s rudder usually enters the stern, and stern chase ports, if they exist, are located):This small feature can be readily seen under the stern windows of Parry’s ships in the illustration of Hecla and Fury at top. Terror and her two Vesuvius class sisters (RMG ZAZ5615), by contrast, were more constricted aft and had less deck height in the great cabin, so no upper counter existed under the lights, even when the ship had full, frigate-like stern and quarter galleries. Terror lacked the upper counter in 1813, in 1836, and again in 1845, according to the NMM collections of plans, and a variety of depictions. The upper counter is documented for Erebus on Meteor and Fury‘s 1823 plans and her own 1839 plans for the Ross mission rebuild.
This era saw a lot of experimentation in naval architecture around the stern, to establish the most optimal means of fitting a screw propeller into an existing wooden warship. Oliver Lang (the shipwright for the 1845 modifications to both ships) was at the very heart of this innovative furor, and was involved in the design of the stern of revolutionary new types of steam sloops, frigates, and line-of-battle ships, all modified or designed from the ground up to fit the new models of screw propellers. I believe, when he came to modify these two veteran exploration ships with new propulsion, he omitted the traditional lower counter design from under the transom/stern galleries of both ships, rounding the tuck up, or carrying the hull planking up to meet the transom timbers. His 1845 technical drawing for the stern of both ships (RMG ZAZ5683) is an approximation, even when overlaid to produce the June 1845 “green ink” updates on the 1836 Terror plan (RMG ZAZ5672). The plan had to work for both ships, which had some significant differences in dimensions and stern post orientation. This plan’s inaccuracy can easily be observed when it was traced over to the 1836 Terror plan: The 1845 updates create lines at the level of the ship’s upper rail that have no sheer and terminate hanging in space! Those lines are a simple tracing of the left side sectional stern plan from the 1845 technical drawing, not the right side exterior elevation. This means they are a sectional view imposed inaccurately over Terror’s 1836 lines, with nothing added about what this all looked like from the outside! My interpretation is one of three possible options for the 1845 stern: Round the tuck up to the level of the upper counter in Erebus and the transom/stern galleries in Terror; round the tuck up to the level of the galleries and also remove Erebus’s upper counter; deviate from Lang’s 1845 technical drawing and retain the lower counter in both ships, with Erebus likely also retaining her existing upper counter. As I hope I have indicated with linked examples above, the green tracing on the 1836/45 Terror plans are not accurate – but especially not for the larger Erebus! Only the wreck archaeology will determine the true dimensions and precise geometry of either ship’s 1845 stern configuration. I believe that Lang, familiar with what had happened to Terror’s old-style traditional stern during her 1836 Frozen Straits Expedition ordeal – the near fatal damage to the stern timbers – would have followed his general program of propeller installations, and planked the strongest stern he could have into the two ships- to give the vessels the best chance of not being destroyed by Arctic ice. In my plan, I drew in a “quarter badge” element which tails downwards and which would have flanked the original lower counter in Erebus. This is a stylistic decision and also allows me to easily pencil in a lower counter dividing line towards the stern post if I end up being wrong!
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: We would like to acknowledge the assistance of staff at the National Maritime Museum / Royal Museums Greenwich, as well as HMS Terror expert Dr. Matthew Betts, and Jonathan Moore at the Parks Canada Underwater Archaeology Team, both of whom generously corresponded with me about elements of Erebus’s design over the course of my often-ambling 2022-24 correspondence. Their assistance does not imply that they endorse the above interpretations.
Notes:
This summary of events is drawn from several chapters of John Geiger and Alanna Mitchell Franklin’s Lost Ship: The Historic Discovery of HMS Erebus (Toronto: HarperCollins Pub. 2015). Ryan Harris, Parks Canada’s project lead on Erebus, provided an incredible guided tour of the wreck in October 2014: https://youtu.be/ZxH18XKqt-k?si=OCrC1XHYZa6AfpvC↩︎
Earlier expeditions of the 19th Century had used converted whaling ships, but Captain Christopher Middleton’s 1741-42 Northwest Passage Expedition featured the converted bomb vessel HMS Furnace, while Constantine Phipps 1773 Expedition “towards the North Pole” (which a young Horatio Nelson journeyed on) used a pair of bombs, HMS Racehorse and Carcass. Fury did not survive her Arctic ordeal, and, it is hoped, one day this near-sister of Erebus, with earlier Arctic modifications, will be discovered near Fury Beach, Somerset Island, Nunavut. ↩︎
Michael Palin’s book, Erebus: The Story of a Ship (Random House: 2019), is an essential source for information about all periods of the vessel’s service. The equivalent work for Terror is Dr. Matthew Betts’ HMS TERROR: The Design, Fitting and Voyages of a Polar Discovery Ship (Seaforth pub.: 2023) ↩︎
Hecla was in fact sold for conversion to a whaling vessel in 1831, and a very good whaler was she! ↩︎
In technical parlance, Terror had slightly more steep-rising floors. A useful description of the changes to sterns, bows, and sheer in the first half of the nineteenth century can be found in Dr. Frank Howard’s Sailing Ships of War 1400-1860 (Greenwich: Conway Maritime Press, 1971) P271. Howard also mentions an interesting and cautionary issue about interpreting contemporary 19th C. naval plans: The ability to draft accurate technical depictions to represent new design elements on paper lagged behind the innovations themselves. ↩︎
This site has posted on topics related to the wreck of HMS Terror(1813-1849ish), Sir John Franklin’s second ship on the doomed 1845 Expedition to chart a Northwest Passage at the top of North America. That long-lost wreck, which began life more than three decades earlier as a bomb-vessel, was discovered September 2016 in a bay at King William Island, Nunavut. There have been several other commissioned Royal Navy ships named Terror, and at least one of these is also wrecked on the seabed today. This later British warship has not been explored, or even located, in the very different waters of the Mediterranean Sea north of the Libyan coast.1 This namesake should not be forgotten: She upheld the reputation of her famous predecessor as an incredibly tough warship. A fierce combatant in two global conflicts, she was scuttled eighty-three years ago today.
Terror, an Erebus class monitor, was built by the firm Harland & Wolff (known as the builders of several White Star liners, including RMS Titanic), at Belfast and completed in mid-1916. A monitor performed the traditional function a bomb vessel did during the age of sail –shore bombardment–albeit with a level of destructiveness that would have been barely imaginable when the 1813 Terror first tasted water. Of all twentieth-century monitors, the Erebus sisters were the only ones to continue the historic lineage of bomb vessel names. They also paid tribute to the memory of the specific Franklin ships. The lead ship, HMS Erebus, remained in commission until 1946.
A brief comparison of the 1813 and 1916-built Terrors: where the 1813 wooden sailing vessel was armed with two heavy mortars—a 13” and a 10” variety – and some light cannon, the 1916 armoured monitor was fitted with two 15” rifled battleship guns that fired a variety of explosive and armour-piercing ammunition. Secondary armament included anti-aircraft guns. Length: 1813- 100’ on deck, 1916-405’. Breadth: 1813-30’; 1916- 88’. Displacement 1813-330 tons; 1916-8,450 tons, (larger by the Second World War). 1813-wood, later reinforced for Arctic service with a heavy wood ice chock encircling the hull. 1916-High tensile steel armour up to 13” thick on the turret, with a large anti-torpedo bulge encircling the hull. Lastly, the installed power: HMS Terror (1813) was fitted with a single steam locomotive boiler in 1845, generating 25 horsepower for one retractable two-bladed screw – 4 knots maximum speed while under steam. 1916-four large oil-fired boilers generating 6,000 horsepower for the twin screws – 12 knots maximum speed.
The monitors were a novel way of fitting the 15″ guns of a more conventional design of British battleships, such as the Queen Elizabeth (1912) class – with four turrets and eight 15″ guns – to a smaller, lighter, shallower hull. Brassey’s Naval Annual, 1923 edition, artist not identified, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Early in the First World War, a new design evolved for monitors. With Belgium in enemy hands, there was a role for heavy coastal bombardment of land targets. Battleships, with their deep draughts, could not work close enough inshore to strike deep into occupied territory with their 12′ or larger guns. A boxy, very wide, shallow hull was required to accommodate a rotating turret with what – to most observers – would look like absurdly oversized guns.
HMS General Wolfe, an earlier Lord Clive class monitor. In addition to the regular forward turret armed with twin 12″ guns, she was one of only two monitors to receive a single 18″ gun, the largest fitted to a warship until the Second World War Japanese Yamato battleships. This massive gun was fitted aft, in a fixed structure pointing off to starboard. Wolfe achieved the longest accurate bombardment in Royal Navy history: A target at Snaeskerke, Belgium, 32.2 km distant. Credit: William Lionel Wyllie, Royal Museums Greenwich PAE2675
As monitors went, the Erebus class pair of ships were enormous. They were a significant improvement on the preceding Marshal Ney class, and the design remedied shortcoming of all previous British monitors with heavy guns.2 Their length of 405′ was similar to the battleships of the 1890s that were still serving in the fleet. Their breadth (width) was proportionally even greater – on par with newest dreadnought battleships. This ensured the ships were stable firing platforms for their formidable armament: a rotating turret armed with twin 15” BL MkI guns with 42 caliber barrel lengths. These were the premier Royal Navy capital ship armament, and equipped generations of the Grand Fleet’s battlewagons, from 1915 to 1959. Where the 1813 Terror could lob a 13”, 200-pound explosive or incendiary shell about 3.8 kilometers, the 15” gun could fire a 1,940 pound shell out to about 24 km.
Animation of loading process of a 15” BL MK1 gun. This model of gun delivered one of the longest hits in battleship history when HMS Warspite struck the Italian battleship Guilio Cesare 23.8 km away in July 1940. Via wikimedia commons CC-BY SA
During their First World War service, the Erebus sisters bombarded targets in German-occupied Belgium, as units of the Dover Patrol, and assisted the Allied land armies in bombardments during the Fifth Battle of Ypres (28 Sep-2 Oct. 1918). On October 19, 1917, while operating off Dunkirk, against several German torpedo boats, Terror was torpedoed three times, and was severely damaged, with much of the bows blown off. After an agonizingly-slow tow from Dover to Portsmouth – with some of it backwards to try and keep the forward bulkheads from giving way – the ship was rebuilt. Back to the Dover Patrol to participate in famous April 1918 Raid on Zeebrugge, the Erebus sisters and Marshal Soult – another monitor – bombarded targets. Following the November 1918 Armistice, many of the monitors were decommissioned, laid up in reserve, converted to other purposes, or scrapped. Terror continued in commission on various peacetime assignments, and was assigned to HMS Excellent, the gunnery school at Whale Island near Portsmouth. She was used as a testbed for different artillery, firing on targets which included worn-out battleships.
With the outbreak of the Second World War, the sisters were again required for the bombardment of enemy fortifications and positions. Terror was under long refit in Singapore. Her anti-aircraft defences were upgraded-they would become vitally important to Terror’s survival. Returning to Europe in 1940 by way of the Mediterranean, the monitor became implicated in defending Malta, under siege from Italian air and naval forces. She endured aerial attacks, helping to defend the beleaguered garrison from Italian bombing. Her massive guns bulked up the Island’s coastal batteries. After a stint in Greece, her next assignment was to proceed to the North African coast in early 1941 to assist in the opening of the Libyan campaign against occupied North Africa.
HMS Terror under aerial attack 2 January 1941 off Bardia, Libya, in the lead up to the Australian assault on Italian fortifications: Operation Compass. Terror’s accurate bombardment caused the partial collapse of a cliff, which took Italian short fortifications and artillery positions with it. Credit: Damien Peter Parer, Australian War Memorial 127943
During mid-February the vessel was at Benghazi. On the 22nd, while leaving the port, Terror was damaged by two nearby mine explosions. The damage was not significant enough to delay the departure. The next day, off the African coast, a lone Hurricane fighter covering the embattled monitor had to turn back to refuel. Terror was soon under air attack from three German Junkers JU-88 bombers. Though there had been no single decisive hit, flooding from the accumulated damage was becoming uncontrollable. Though destroyers were coming to Terror’s aid, the help did not come soon enough to save the vessel. Lt- Cmdr John Kellar made the difficult decision to scuttle the ship.3 The entire crew of 300 were evacuated to nearby escorts and Terror sank at position 32.04N 24.05E. A careful perusal of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission’s site reveals that this Terror remained a lucky vessel: in both World Wars, despite torpedoing, air attacks, and mine damage, almost no one died while serving in Terror.4
We have not heard of any effort to locate and survey this wreck. Nor, happily, is there evidence it has been quietly found and salvaged for the significant metal content. The amount of information about the search for and exploration of HMS Terror (1813) effectively hampers research into this topic! The Terror (1916) wreck would be an outstanding example of an unusual type of warship. She had an important record of service with substantive contributions to First and Second World War campaigns. As we eagerly follow the archaeological study of the earlier ship, it is worth sparing a thought for this other Terror shipwreck.
A monitor at Chatham dockyard during the Second World War that we titled “target B”. The elevated large turret can be seen just to the right of midships, while the circular features show the powerful secondary and AA armament. This is one of the oldest captures in Google Earth catalogue. From identifying features, this is Erebus.
We have been unable to locate any sources suggesting the wreck location has been surveyed, or the wreck has been visited. Please let us know if it has! ↩︎
Though the primary role of a monitor at this time was to fit large guns for shore bombardment, there were several more balanced designs that were armed with 9.2″ or 6″ guns. One monitor of this type, HMS M-33 is preserved at Portsmouth. ↩︎
I would like to share an artistic reconstruction of HMS Terror, one of the 1845 Sir John Franklin Expedition’s lost ships. This astonishing, barely-wrecked ship of wonders now rests in a bay named after her, in 80’/ 24m of water! I based my sketch, as much as possible, on archaeological information, reconstructions and site plans at the Parks Canada page “Underwater archaeology at the Franklin wrecks“:
My wreck site interpretation (right) and the model of Erebus at the Nattilik Heritage Centre, Gjoa Haven, Sep. 2019 (left), that inspired me. Credit: (left side) Kerry Raymond via wikimedia commons (right side) Alex Comber @ http://www.warsearcher.com
The above reconstruction is based on sources I discussed in “An Excellent State of Terror now Exists” and other Terror-related posts. It is a preliminary effort, based on a photograph of the model of Erebus at the Nattilik Heritage Centre, Gjoa Haven.1 After more than two years of research, and the construction of a model diorama interpreting the wreck environment, I felt it was time to put something down on paper. The sketch is an idealized representation of the 210-year old exploration vessel. Silt or marine sediment still hides many artifacts and prominent areas of the deck.
I have chosen to omit other marine growth, such as kelp strands, that mask the basic shapes of wreck structures. The overall effect is of a fantastically preserved wreck site. Terror is one tough little ship, a veteran of battles, storms, and ordeals in both Arctic and Antarctic exploration that would have smashed a weaker vessel to splinters. All those with an interest are eagerly awaiting more information about both Terror and Erebus sites.
We don’t yet know the exact details surrounding Terror’s sinking, but one ten-year old has formed her own ideas. Credit: Lucy at warsearcher.com
The model of Erebus on display at the Nattilik Heritage Centre is actually a closer representation of Terror in all details, and appears to have closely followed the 1836/45 National Maritime Museum plans that depict Terror. See our recent post on Erebus to explore the distinctive visual differences. The archaeological investigation by Parks Canada is far from complete. Very little information exists about the entire starboard side of the wreck, or the artifacts scattered on the seafloor in the immediate vicinity of the hull. ↩︎
“With a shipwreck…you are dealing with a single instant in which everything was pitched onto the seabed; and, because water can be a wonderful preservative, in the right circumstances, the wreck and almost everything within will still be there. A wreck can be a perfect time capsule.” (Mensun Bound The Ship Beneath the Ice p.280).
The Franklin expedition ships, HMS Erebus and Terror, setting out with fanfare in late May 1845 from Greenhithe. This was originally published for the 24 May 1845 edition of the Illustrated London News. (Via wikimedia commons)
In 1845, Her Majesty’s Ships Erebus and Terror sailed into the unknown. Sir John Franklin, commander of the expedition, was instructed to chart the last remaining sections of the Northwest Passage and return via the Pacific. The British Admiralty expected that this modern, lavishly-equipped official effort would survey the remaining portions of a sea route along the top of the North American landmass. Hopes ran high that this expedition would be a crowning achievement to decades of British exploration of the Arctic.
Reconstruction of Franklin’s route from 1845-1848 Locations are: 1. (off map, right) Disko Bay, Greenland, site of departure from towing and supply ships 2. Beechey Island, site of the 1845-46 wintering and artifacts; 3. NW of King William Island 1847 position of the Victory Point “All is Well” message and the 1848 addendum of “we are deserting the ships”; 4. Erebus found 2014;5. Terror found 2016. Base map: Kennonv, after CIA’s World Fact BookFranklin’s route: Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Instead, the 129 men disappeared. It would take a decade and a half for the outcome of the expedition to be reported, and decades more for the majority of the grim tale to be uncovered: No survivors, no repository of useful information collected, both ships utterly vanished, and presumed to have sunk. The witnesses, local Inuit who were recalling events from years before, provided oral testimony to parts of the tragedy. So many questions remained unanswered about how this great expedition met its end.
The wreck of HMS Terror, Captain Francis Crozier’s lost ship, was discovered seventeen decades later, in early September 2016, by the crew of the Arctic Research Foundation’s vessel, RV Martin Bergmann. The ARF had already participated in several Government of Canada searches, and had been involved in the discovery of HMS Erebus, Franklin’s flagship, two years earlier.
RV Martin Bergmann at Cambridge Bay, her longtime homeport. Image Courtesy of Gloria Song, who retains copyright.
While at Gjoa Haven, ARF members received a tip from local resident and Canadian Ranger Sammy Kogvik, and decided to divert from the searching area off the western coast of King William Island to enter Terror Bay. After an initial sonar search did not return any likely sonar targets, the Martin Bergmann turned to resume its journey. The course to exit the Bay took the research ship right over a well-defined sonar image of a wreck on the seabed, in about 80 feet (24m) of water.
Our representation of the Terror wrecksite with the Parks Canada dive barge over top, at 80′ scale depth. Credit:www.warsearcher.com for our updated wreck interpretation from 2024, please see: The Great Terror Wreck Repair[2024]
Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team confirmed that the identity of the wreck was indeed Terror a few weeks later. It was an astonishing find: A barely-wrecked ship, almost frozen in time! The hull stands proud of the seafloor, and the weather deck is in exceptional condition. Sections of the masts and the bowsprit are still standing! Unlike Erebus, Terror’s site appears to have little scattered debris. Everything related to the wreck seems to be adjacent to the hull, or has fallen off it in close proximity.
HMS Terror site sketch, 2017 copyright Parks Canada 2021 [modified by rotating]. Source.North is to the left, and the three-dimensional nature of the diorama introduces some positional discrepancies with the above schematic two-dimensional site plan. Credit:www.warsearcher.com
HMS Terror lies in a quiet resting spot, with few obvious signs of damage, and no immediately observable evidence of what brought her to this watery grave, in a bay later named -in a stunning coincidence-after her. She appears to have been abandoned in winter quarters, closed up with topgallant masts removed. The enormous rudder is unshipped from the stern and mounted on the port ice channels amidships. The ship is gently listing to starboard.1 The state of preservation appears outstanding – Almost everything required to operate a mid-19th Century sailing ship with auxiliary steam propulsion is still there. It is as if departing crew members left Terror in good working order as they abandoned ship.
The diorama depicts underwater archaeologists examining sections of the wreck. Credit: http://www.warsearcher.com
With the historic discovery of both Franklin vessels, a methodical exploration of the wrecks by Parks Canada underwater archaeologists, over many seasons, may yet answer important questions about the tragedy: why are the wrecks located further south than many expected; were they reoccupied; did the plan of the retreat, as described in the Victory Point note, evolve; what halted the ships further progress, and caused their final abandonment; when did this happen; how much longer did they remain afloat; is there anything onboard to help point to terrestrial archaeological sites; do the remaining supplies or preserved records help explain what maladies the crews were suffering from, and how these were impacting command decisions; were local Inuit groups able to salvage much from either of the wrecks; are there remains of either of Franklin’s crews still entombed in their ships?2 For now, Terror is keeping her secrets close below decks.
We built a model in 2022 to help us interpret the history of the wreck. We used every scrap of information, including the wreck plan on Parks Canada’s website, the Arctic Research Foundation 2016 video, the Parks Canada 2017 exploration of the wreck video. Matthew Betts’ blog site, Building the Terror where he built a large, extensively researched model of the ship, was also an important resource. He followed this with HMS Terror: The Design, Fitting and Voyages of a Polar Discovery Ship, which came out just as we finished the model. Until more information is released by Parks, this is an essential source for interpreting Terror. Parks Canada Underwater Archaeology staff generously shared information about the archaeological program and assisted us in gathering further information about the ship. Their expertise, professionalism, and concern for the wrecks they conduct archaeological investigations of is remarkable.
This interpretation of the site won’t be the last or the most accurate wreck diorama. So far as we know, it is the first. Credit: http://www.warsearcher.com
The 2017 Parks tour of the wreck video shows, when the ROV reaches the aft cabin, the degree of list to starboard. ↩︎
We don’t yet know if or when crew reoccupied Terror. If she was reoccupied and brought to her present location, we also don’t know if she sank unexpectedly or was abandoned in orderly fashion as the crew marched westwards along the King William Island coast, to cross to the mainland. ↩︎
Raise the Terror? Raise the Terror’s Boat! Why? Read on!
Since the incredible discovery of HMS Terror in September, 2016, there has been keen interest in the archaeology taking place at the wreck. Terror was Sir John Franklin’s second ship from the ill-fated 1845 search for the Northwest Passage, and was discovered almost exactly two years after the lead ship, HMS Erebus. The 2023 archaeological season has concluded, but announcements of new discoveries by Parks Canada archaeologists remain weeks or months away. We are years from a full archaeological assessment of Terror, though a tantalizing vision has formed of an astonishingly well-preserved site, 80-feet under the waters of Terror Bay, King William Island, Nunavut. An international community of “Franklinites” – those interested in all things Franklin Expedition- continues to speculate: What was discovered this year; what new information helps explore the last days of the Expedition; are there connections to known or as yet undiscovered terrestrial archaeological sites? Is either ship an actual tomb to some of its crew?
The ship’s boat immediately to port at the stern of the Terror wreck, as represented in our 1/125 scale wreck diorama. Credit: http://www.warsearcher.com
Over the years, there have been posts on the very active “Remembering the Franklin Expedition” Facebook group, proposing to “RAISE THE TERROR” from her current location. Other members, just as passionately, dismiss the idea as premature, ruinously expensive, and potentially destructive to an artifact group members care very much about. In this post we’d like to focus on what we think would be a less contentious project. We remind readers that we are not archaeologists or marine salvage experts.
What we are proposing is to recover one artifact: RAISE TERROR’S BOAT! It is located on the seabed off the port quarter of the wreck, under a pair of davits. It can be readily seen on the site plan that was prepared by Parks’ archaeology staff in 2017 and released on their website two years later. Like the ship, this boat-wreck appears to be in very good condition after almost 175 years of frigid immersion.
HMS Terror site plan, ca. 2017, modified to emphasize the location of the ship’s boat. Credit: Parks Canada source.
The boat appears to be a standard 23-foot ship’s cutter, about 7-feet at its broadest part. It is clinker-built (overlapping boards) and has recessed slots for rowing with eight or so oars. It has several thwarts for crew and passengers, and could also be fitted with two small masts to sail it. Some upper sections of the gunwales appear to be damaged or rotted through, and it is unclear to us if it still has some type of fabric cover or is instead almost completely filled with sediment. A fallen section of davit or post rests at the squared-off stern, overhanging the transom. The rudder is not installed.1
HMS Fury, carrying a similar cutter in the same position, as depicted before the second William E. Parry Expedition searching for a NW passage. Fury was very similar to both Franklin ships, and had been wrecked in the Arctic at Somerset Island, two decades before. Detail of His Majesty’s Discovery ships, Fury and Hecla by Arthur Parsey (Artist & Engraver) Charles Joseph Hullmandel (Printer) in 1823 PAH9224.
Raising this small vessel should not compromise other areas of the wreck. The operation would not upset precious artifacts or records inside Terror, as they await systematic archaeological study. Based on the Parks Canada tour of HMS Terror film, the boat is not deeply embedded in the hard, gravel-like seabed. Compared to the complex overall sites of either Terror or Erebus, a thorough survey of the boat and its immediate surroundings should not be a multi-year operation. The full survey would ensure that no artifact, no matter how small, was overlooked.
An underwater archaeologist examines the boat near the HMS Terror wreck diorama. Credit: http://www.warsearcher.com
Once recovered and conserved, the artifact could serve a variety of purposes, helping to interpret the history of the Expedition, and its grim denouement. This cutter is a tangible link to its companion boats–the sledge-bound boats that crew members dragged along the coasts until they could go no further. It could also help explore less tragic polar exploration voyages and other searches for a Northwest Passage.2
A comparative example is the display of the famous James Caird, a 22.5-foot reinforced ship’s boat from Sir Ernest Shackleton’s expedition ship, Endurance. After the Endurance was crushed by ice in the Weddell Sea, in November 1915, the boats allowed the crew to escape to Elephant Island. Shackleton and two companions pushed on in the James Caird to South Georgia, where they were able to organize a rescue party to return to for the whole crew. The boat is now on display at Dulwich College, South London. Credit: Rumping, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Raising the Terror’s boat is only half of the ambitious plan, though! The cutter is a character-defining element of the overall Terror site. If it is raised to the surface for conservation and display, it would create an absence at the wreck site. Why not replace it with a replica that also memorializes the lost crews? A traditional boatworks in Great Britain, the Canadian Maritimes, or New England could be contracted to create a faithful copy of the craft, to be deposited (or sunk) in situ in the same exact position. It would gradually silt up and decay alongside the wreck, becoming more integrated into the environment and benthic marine ecosystem as the years pass. This new boat could also serve as a kind of benchmark or “canary in the coal mine” for identifying more rapid changes to the site, which may be less evident on the original structures. In the (hopefully distant) future, when the Terror decays, the boat could remain as one of the last wooden elements at the Terror wrecksite. Beechey Island has memorials and the replica wooden gravestones currently marking the earthly remains of three Franklin expedition crewmembers. It seems fitting that HMS Terror could have a replica boat to mark her resting spot. There are also precedents for this. Replica objects deposited at famous wrecks mark removals, and can restore an aesthetic appearance to the site.3 A suitable plaque affixed to the replica boat could help memorialize the lost crews–an underwater cenotaph to the lost men of the Franklin Expedition in an incredibly powerful location. RAISE THE TERROR’S BOAT INDEED!
So, have we persuaded you? Let us know by leaving a comment or sharing!
This description is drawn from the Parks Canada Terror dive tour video linked to above, Matthew Betts’ work HMS Terror: the Design, Fitting, and Voyages of the Polar Discovery Ship, archaeological field reports about Terror prepared by Parks Canada’s Underwater Archaeology Team, and comparative examples of other Royal Navy cutters. ↩︎
A 23-foot boat could also help interpret more positive events, such as when HMS Fury‘s abandoned boats were instrumental in saving Sir John Ross’s entire expedition crew, after the abandonment of their own ship Victory. Elsewhere, it is also the same basic size as the HMAV Bounty’s launch. ↩︎
One example is a proposal to sink a sculpture of a 55-foot long Sea King Maritime Patrol Helicopter on the deck of the artificial reef, the former Canadian HMCS Annapolis, to reincorporate a representation of the destroyer’s helicopter detachment to the site. ↩︎
HMS Terror, Sir John Franklin’s second exploration vessel, was discovered in Sept. 2016. Captain Francis Crozier’s sturdy little ship had vanished seventeen decades earlier. HMS Erebus, the flagship of the lost 1845 expedition, was located in 2014, about 70km south. Franklin’s mission was to have taken them into uncharted waters, to finish surveying a Northwest Passage across the top of North America. Where they went, none could follow.
So many questions about Terror and her lost crew remain unanswered. Archaeology on the incredibly well-preserved wreck is still in the early stages. The yearly dive season is all too short – late August to mid-September on a good year. Underwater Archaeologists are up there right now (2023/09).1 See our earlier post for possible Terror-related archaeological priorities. Here are some questions we have about this fascinating shipwreck:
A. When, why, and how did Terror actually sink? How did Terror get from the point of original Apr. 1848 abandonment by Crozier and the crew, Northwest of King William Island, to a resting spot under the waters of Terror Bay?
B. What documents or artifacts are in the great cabin desk? What other objects are along the shelves there? What is in Capt. Crozier’s bedchambers (behind the only blocked door on the lower deck)?
C. Is Terror’s screw propeller deployed in its trunk, or raised up? Since we know the massive rudder is unfitted and mounted on the ship’s port side channels, this info could help understand Terror’s last movements near Terror Bay, King William Island.
D. What did the stern gallery (windows at stern of ship) really look like and was there any transom decoration?
E. What else is on the seabed, besides the 23-foot ship’s cutter (boat) off the port quarter. The original Arctic Research Foundation 2016 wreck discovery film showed a variety of weird and interesting objects on the seabed.
F. How high do the remains of the masts project above the weather deck? We know the foremast is entirely missing (most likely on the seabed under the bowsprit – see link to last post’s multibeam sonar video clip)
G. Since the wreck and debris are highly localized, are there any significant timbers or structures missing, that suggest damage or removal by the crew?
H. What condition are the lowest decks in? How much provisions and fuel remain aboard?
I. Are there any human remains on the ship? (either the wreck is a tomb to members of its crew, or it is a powerful site of remembrance of those departed explorers)
It’s seventeen long decades since these ships of fame Brought my Lord Franklin across the main, To Baffin Bay where the whale fish blow The fate of Franklin no man may know. (Adapted Lady Franklin’s lament trad.)
Early indications suggest the balance of September 2023 archaeology has again prioritized Erebus. ↩︎
“Who knows what lies behind that closed door!” (R. Harris, Parks Canada, 5 Sept. 2019) As this year’s underwater archaeological season commences on the Sir John Franklin 1845 Expedition shipwrecks, HMS Erebus and Terror, we highlight what we believe to be an important description of the incredible condition of the shipwreck of Terror, discovered September, 2016.
Model diorama we constructed during 2022 which was inspired by the sources of information discussed below.
The most detailed public statement regarding the condition and archaeological plan for HMS Terror that we are aware of remains Ryan Harris’s 5 September 2019 comments to visitors onboard Parks Canada’s Research Vessel, David Thompson.1 It is an authoritative and concise description of Terror, from an experienced underwater archaeologist who has significant dive time on both Franklin wrecks. (There is more context about the vessels mentioned in this post from our 2022 update)
Ryan Harris (left), Parks Canada project lead, alongside Prime Minister Stephen Harper (center) and Minister of the Environment Leona Aglukkaq, announcing the discovery of HMS Erebus 9 Sep. 2014 [cropped]. Credit: Jason Ransom Library and Archives Canada R16093-50252-9-E.
Harris was recorded by Adventure Canada crew members or passengers during the first (and thus far only) visit of members of the general public to the Wrecks of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror National Historic Site. This was included in a remarkable video with other clips featuring Marc-André Bernier, veteran underwater archaeologist, and other Underwater Archaeology Team (UAT) members. Site sketches and multi-beam sonar of both wreck sites made jaw-dropping cameo appearances.
A sonar image of the HMS Terror wreck, ca. 2017, which was similar to one of the images in the film. credit: Parks Canada, Crown Copyright source.
The film was uploaded to the company’s YouTube account and was also featured in Bunny Laden’s blog post “A Visit to the Wrecks of the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror National Historic Site of Canada” released on Adventure Canada’s site eleven months later. The lucky participants from the Northwest Passage cruise onboard MS Ocean Endeavour had been able to board the dive support barge, Qiniqtiryuaq, which was anchored near the wreck of Erebus. They also explored David Thompson. Harris spoke candidly about Terror, and also the plans for the 2020 archaeology season. After the heady days of 2019, events (The Covid-19 Pandemic and an increasing concern about Erebus’s fragility) caused the postponement of these best-laid plans. Rumours have circulated that this year’s archaeological season, which appears to have started, may involve asignificant return of the archaeologists to Terror.
1927 Gould Admiralty Map, which listed Franklin-related discoveries and conjecture about the ships up to that time [modified with several updated locations, including the approximate wreck locations and geographic features]. Credit: Library and Archives Canada May Fluhmann fonds MG31-C3 vol.1
Harris’s statement is important, so we transcribed it to the best of our ability, and encourage readers to visit the hyperlinks to see what he was referencing:
This is another multibeam image that we collected just a few days ago in Terror Bay. This is the other ship, HMS Terror, and you can probably readily see that this is in really really good condition, even better than the Erebus. It’s essentially completely intact. So it has all kinds of structures sticking up, including davits, these suspended the various boats, and raised and lowered them over the side. We still see masts standing to a certain height, sheared off about 10 feet in the case of the mainmast, above the deck. And along the centerline are various openings in the upper deck, including the forward companionway down to the focs’l. (BREAK)
And those openings, even though they are sometimes skylights with all the panes of glass still intact, we’re able to insert that Remotely Operated Vehicle you may have seen on the dining room table here, into, on several different occasions, and we’ve explored 90% of the lower deck just a few days ago. If you have seen the Youtube video [link], a lot of that footage – some of the good stuff!
The only cabin or compartment we couldn’t access was Captain Crozier’s bedchamber. So tantalizing – behind the only closed door on the ship that we haven’t seen – so who knows what lies behind that closed door! But you peer down the corridor with the ROV and you can see the list of the ship, because the ROV rights itself naturally…and through the darkness you see the lights penetrating, and then a succession of cabin doors, all sliding doors all open, and we went in one after the other…probably twenty different times -every single cabin except for that one – open. And you could see an incredible array of artifacts all in situ, chamber pots below the beds, washbasins on the shelves, muskets attached to the wall ready for action, ceramics, the plates for the different mess groups, showing different ceramic patterns mess group by mess group…little cradles that are in the sick bay, which are the sick beds…just a wondrous array of artifacts that are going to be documented in the years to come.
So the plan for next year is to basically take that barge, anchor it over the Terror, and do the same thing but with the surface-supply diving equipment, the hats and umbilicals and we’ll go inside and we’ll go cabin by cabin and learn what we can.
Ryan Harris, Parks Canada, Adventure Canada 5 Sep. 2019 interview (loaded on Youtube).
A 2017 plan of HMS Terror wreck site released by Parks Canada and uploaded to their site in late 2021. Credit: Parks Canada, Crown Copyright source.
We hope that that plan comes to fruition in the next few weeks and that this is a productive season for exploring the always astonishing, barely-wrecked ship of wonder, HMS Terror!
Another essential description of the wreck is the epilogue “The Discovery Vessel Herself Discovered” that concludes Matthew Betts’ recent book, HMS Terror; the Design Fitting and Voyages of a Polar Discovery Ship (Pen & Sword 2022). The authors of the foreword, Ryan Harris and Jonathan Moore, UAT Manager, note that Betts provides a summary of Parks Canada’s findings up to publication. ↩︎
What a cast of characters, what a mise en scène! Since arriving off King William Island, Nunavut, in late August, 2022, the Parks Canada Research Vessel David Thompson has remained near the famous Sir John Franklin expedition shipwrecks longer than previous seasons. What amazing discoveries must the Underwater Archaeology Team (UAT) be making at these incredible mid-19th Century exploration ships right now?! Will the dive team working from David Thompson or the specialized dive barge, Qiniqtiryuaq, uncover new information about the last days of this ill-fated effort to locate the Northwest Passage?
Composite Google Earth image, with RV David Thompson superimposed from below GE capture, and sonar images of wrecks of HM ships Erebus and Terror modified from Parks Canada images. Date and location of all ships indicated is only an approximation.1
There has not yet been any official reporting about the 2022 Parks Canada work. It is a safe bet that the balance of research is focusing on the fragile or “dynamic” site: HMS Erebus (discovered by Parks during the Sep. 2014 search in Wilmot and Crampton Bay, after years of searches which followed up on Inuit oral history of a wreck in this area).2 In the long 165-years that Erebus remained unlocated, there must have been decades where the wreck, in the frigid waters of Wilmot and Crampton Bay, would have appeared almost untouched by time’s passage. Unfortunately, her condition has worsened in the last years, as ice or ocean swells take their toll on upper surfaces, such as the weather deck and supporting structures. The wreck is only in about 11 M of water. There is real urgency to conduct a thorough survey.
HMS Terror is located about 60 km North, somewhere in the aptly named Terror Bay (discovered Sep. 2016 by the Arctic Research Foundation’s ship Martin Bergmann, following up on a tip from Gjoa Haven resident and Canadian Ranger Sammy Kogvik). The seabed is about 24 M deep, and the wreck’s depth and location seem to be working to better shelter it. We hope at some point that the team are able to shift the archaeological exploration to Terror. Previous Remote Operated Vehicle surveys of the interior have shown a wealth of artifacts requiring further study.
The ships (and shipwrecks) of the 2022 Franklin Fleet:
RV David Thompson (2017) LOA 95’ / 29m TDISP 228 tons. Originally Canadian Coast Guard Fisheries Patrol vessel CCGS Arrow Post (1992-2016) before transfer to Parks Canada. Now equipped with up to two Rigid Inflatable Boats and a hydraulic crane. RV David Thompson made a brief transit back through the Simpson Strait to Gjoa Haven 7 September, but appears to have returned to the vicinity of Erebus the next day.
RV David Thompson, a day after her return to the Coast Guard station at Prescott, ON. 1 November 2022, after a busy archaeology season at the Franklin wrecks and elsewhere. Credit http://www.warsearcher.comRV David Thompson during the 2019 expedition to the wreck sites. Credi: Kerry Raymond, CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Parks Canada Dive Barge “Qiniqtiryuaq” (2017) approximately 50’X 30’ / 15.3 X 9.3 m displacement unknown. Fitted with three 20’ converted sea containers with a tool shop/archaeological lab, a meeting space, a decompression chamber. During 2018 the barge received a powerful hydraulic crane.
CCGS Pierre Radisson Icebreaker (1977) LOA 323’ / 98.3 m TDISP 8,200 tons Arctic class 3 breaker. Early in its career, this was the base of operations of Dr. Joseph B. MacInnis’s 1981 search effort for the Beechey Island wreck Breadalbane, supply ship to the 1853 Franklin search effort. This year it assisted or escorted RV David Thompson on the journey to Gjoa Haven. It can help to replenish and refuel the Parks Canada vessels, be called upon to ensure the security of the sites, and be involved in towing the dive barge.
CCGS Pierre Radisson (at right) refuels HMCS Moncton during the Sep. 2015 Operation QIMMIQ in Nunavut. Credit: Department of National Defence (Corporal Felicia Ogunniya) SW2015-0226-1306
CCGS Sir Wilfred Laurier (1986) LOA 262’ / 83M TDISP 4,600 tons Arctic Class 2 Light Icebreaker and tender. This ship is a veteran of previous Franklin Expedition search efforts and Parks Canada archaeology efforts. During the 2019 season, Laurier contributed anchors to help tether the barge Qiniqtiryuaq above Erebus. Based on recent marine traffic information (2022/09/20), and the onset of colder weather off King William Island, we believe the Laurier is helping to conclude the dive season. CCGS Pierre Radisson has moved on to Hudson’s Bay. Laurier’s last positions showed it stationary near Ambush Rock after having moved westward from Gjoa Haven through the Simpson Strait and Storis Passage, towards the vicinity of the Erebus site. The ship appears to be accompanied by an 8m, 15 ton light Coast Guard Boat which may be ferrying supplies back from the actual wreck site to the Laurier.
CCGS Sir Wilfred Laurier (left) and HMCS Moncton in search of HMS Terror as part of Operation QIMMIQ on September 2, 2015. Credit: Department of National Defence (Photo: Corporal Felicia Ogunniya) SW2015-0226-980
HMS Erebus (1826-ca.1849) Hecla class bomb vessel extensively modified for polar expeditions. For the 1845 expedition to locate the Northwest Passage, the massively reinforced vessel was fitted with an auxiliary method of propulsion (steam railroad engine) and a retractable screw propeller. Lead ship of expedition, carrying Sir John Franklin, officer commanding and Erebus’s captain, James Fitzjames. LOA ca. 120’ / 36.6 m davits on transom to stem knee, sparred length unknown TDISP 370 tons
The Franklin expedition ships, HMS Erebus and Terror, setting out with fanfare in late May 1845 from Greenhithe. This was originally published for the 24 May 1845 edition of the Illustrated London News. (Via wikimedia commons) The two ships, from separate classes of bomb vessels, were virtually indistinguishable after many updates for polar expeditions.
Credit: Parks Canada, Crown Copyright.
HMS Terror (1813-ca.1849) Vesuvius class bomb vessel extensively modified for polar expeditions. War of 1812 veteran. For the 1845 expedition to locate the Northwest Passage, the massively reinforced vessel was fitted with an auxiliary method of propulsion (steam railroad locomotive) and a retractable screw propeller. Commanded by Captain Francis Crozier, second-in-command of expedition. LOA ca. 120’ / 36.6 m davits on transom to stem knee, sparred length unknown. TDISP 320 tons
A sonar image of the HMS Terror wreck, ca. 2017. credit: Parks Canada, Crown Copyright.
Credit: Parks Canada, Crown Copyright.
The precise location of the Franklin ships has not been released, and the general vicinity of each site is protected and not accessible to the public. ↩︎
We most likely won’t hear for months about this season’s work, or a reported April or May site visit (which would have involved an ice camp over either wreck site) ↩︎
This small feature can be readily seen under the stern windows of Parry’s ships in the illustration of Hecla and Fury at top. Terror and her two Vesuvius class sisters (RMG 
The Searchers 