We now know who was cannibalised on the doomed Franklin expedition

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We now know who was cannibalised on the doomed Franklin expedition

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The Franklin expedition was dramatised in television show The *******

AMC

Human ******** recovered from the British Royal Navy’s doomed Franklin expedition have been identified as Captain James Fitzjames using DNA and genealogical evidence. The unfortunate officer has also been confirmed as the first known victim of cannibalism among the expedition members.

In 1845, an expedition led by Sir John Franklin set out to find a navigable North-West Passage through the Arctic with 129 men aboard the ships HMS ******* and HMS Erebus. But in 1848, Captain James Fitzjames, commander of the HMS Erebus, left a report in a stone cairn recording how the survivors had decided to abandon the ships. Later, the unidentified skeletal ******** of many sailors were discovered in various locations across the ********* Arctic.

Now researchers have put a name to some of those ********. “Identifying an individual using molecular methods often takes time because descendants need to be involved in the process,” says

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at MacEwan University in Canada, who was not involved in the study.

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at the University of Waterloo in Canada and his colleagues identified Fitzjames by comparing the Y chromosome profiles from a tooth that was found on Canada’s King William Island with cheek swabs taken from one of Fitzjames’s descendants. The descendant donor had a demonstrated genealogical relationship with Fitzjames through the captain’s great-grandfather.

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Cut marks on this mandible, now identified as that of James Fitzjames, indicate it was cannibalised

Anne Keenleyside

The discovery also makes Fitzjames the first identified victim of cannibalism among the Franklin expedition’s members. Earlier analysis by the late bioarchaeologist

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had revealed cut marks on many of the recovered ********, with one lower jawbone – now identified as belonging to Fitzjames – having multiple cut marks.

This indicates some of the last survivors who were trekking overland resorted to eating parts of Fitzjames’s body and those of several other sailors. The finding “reveals the desperation of the Franklin sailors”, says Swanston.

Such research also reinforces the importance of testimony from Indigenous Inuit people, she says. The Inuit reported seeing about 40 men dragging a ship’s boat on a sledge and made the first discoveries of bodies showing signs of cannibalism.

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#cannibalised #doomed #Franklin #expedition

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