HMS Investigator

HMS Investigator was a merchant ship purchased by the Royal Navy in 1848 to participate in the search for the lost Franklin Expedition. Originally built as a merchant vessel in 1848, it was hastily refitted for Arctic service. Under the command of Captain Edward Bird, it formed part of Sir James Clark Ross's 1848–1849 search mission. The ship is most famous for its subsequent voyage under Commander Robert McClure, during which it achieved a historic navigation of the Northwest Passage, albeit while becoming permanently trapped in the ice.

History and construction

The vessel was constructed in 1848 at the Scotts yard in Greenock, originally intended for the Irish trade. With the Admiralty urgently needing ships for the Franklin search expeditions, it was purchased that same year and renamed HMS *Investigator*. Its design as a sturdy merchantman was considered suitable for ice navigation, and it was fitted with additional internal strengthening, a reinforced bow, and a screw propeller for the arduous conditions of the Arctic Ocean. The ship's company was drawn from volunteers across the Royal Navy, and it was provisioned for a potential three-year absence from Britain.

Arctic exploration

In 1850, under Commander Robert McClure, HMS *Investigator* was dispatched via the Pacific Ocean as part of a renewed search effort, entering the Arctic from the west through the Bering Strait. McClure's orders from the Admiralty were to search the western reaches of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago for traces of Sir John Franklin and his crews aboard HMS Erebus and HMS Terror. The ship navigated eastward along the northern coast of North America, discovering and transiting Prince of Wales Strait before being blocked by pack ice in Barrow Strait. Forced to retreat and sail around Banks Island, it eventually became trapped in the ice of Mercy Bay in September 1851.

The ship remained beset, and the crew endured two severe winters there, during which McClure and his officers, including Lieutenant Samuel Gurney Cresswell, conducted extensive sledge journeys. These proved that a navigable, if ice-choked, route through the archipelago connected the Atlantic and Pacific, effectively completing a traverse of the Northwest Passage. In the spring of 1853, the crew was rescued by a sledge party from HMS Resolute, which was part of Sir Edward Belcher's squadron, after McClure had prepared to abandon the ship.

Antarctic exploration

HMS *Investigator* did not participate in any Antarctic expeditions. Its entire notable service was confined to the Arctic region. The ship's name is sometimes conflated with other vessels used in southern polar exploration, such as the French *Astrolabe* or the later *Discovery*, but it played no role in the exploration of Antarctica or the Southern Ocean.

Fate and wreck

After the crew's rescue in 1853, HMS *Investigator* was abandoned in the ice at Mercy Bay on the northern coast of Banks Island. It was briefly reboarded by crew from HMS North Star in 1854 to retrieve supplies but was left to its fate. The wreck site was lost for over a century and a half. In July 2010, a team of Parks Canada marine archaeologists, operating from the Canadian Coast Guard ship CCGS Sir Wilfrid Laurier, located the remarkably well-preserved hull in the shallow waters of the bay. The site is now protected under the Canada National Parks Act as part of Aulavik National Park.

Legacy and recognition

The voyage of HMS *Investigator* under Robert McClure is credited with the first successful navigation of the Northwest Passage, a centuries-old maritime quest. For this achievement, McClure and his crew received a Parliamentary reward of £10,000, and McClure was knighted. The ship's wreck is a designated National Historic Site of Canada and an important archaeological site, offering insights into 19th-century naval technology and exploration. The story of the ship forms a key chapter in the history of Arctic exploration and the Franklin search expeditions, remembered in institutions like the National Maritime Museum and through the journals of its officers, such as those held by the Scott Polar Research Institute.

Category:Royal Navy ships Category:Arctic exploration vessels Category:Shipwrecks in the Canadian Arctic Category:Ships of the Franklin search expeditions Category:1848 ships