“In the spring four winters past (1850), whilst some Eskimo families were killing seals near the north shore of a large island, named in Arrowsmith’s charts King William Land, forty white men were seen travelling in company southward over the ice, and dragging a boat and sledges with them. They were passing along the shore of the above named island. None of the party could speak the Eskimo language so well as to be understood; but by signs the natives were led to believe the ship or ships had been crushed by ice, and that they were then going to where they expected to find deer to shoot. From the appearance of the men (all of whom, with the exception of one officer, were hauling on the drag ropes of the sledges, and were looking thin,) they were then supposed to be getting short of provisions, and they purchased a small seal, or piece of seal, from the native. The officer was described as being a tall, stout, middle-aged man. When their day’s journey terminated they pitched tents to rest in. “At a later day the same season, but previous to the disruption of the ice, the corpses of some thirty persons and some graves were discovered on the continent, and five dead bodies on an island near it, about a long day’s journey to the north-west of the mouth of a large stream, which can be no other than Back’s Great Fish River, as its description and that of the low shore in the neighbourhood of Point Ogle and Montreal Island agree exactly with that of Sir George Back. Some of the bodies were in a tent or tents, others were under the boat, which had been turned over to form a shelter, and some lay scattered about in different directions. Of those seen on the island, it was supposed that one was that of an officer (chief), as he had a telescope strapped over his shoulders, and his double-barrelled gun lay underneath him. From the mutilated state of many of the bodies, and the contents of the kettles, it is evident that our wretched countrymen had been driven to the last dread alternative—cannibalism—as a means of sustaining life. A few of the unfortunate men must have survived until the arrival of the wild fowl (say until the end of May), as shots were heard, and fresh bones and feathers of geese were noticed near the scene of the sad event. “There appears to have been an abundant store of ammunition, as the gunpowder was emptied by the natives in a heap on the ground, and a quantity of shot and ball was found below high-water mark, having probably been left on the ice close to the beach before the spring thaw commenced. There must have been a number of telescopes, guns (some of them double-barrelled), watches, compasses, etc., all of which seem to have been broken up, as I saw pieces of these different articles with the natives, and I purchased as many as possible, together with some silver spoons and forks, an order of merit in the form of a star, and a small plate engraved ‘Sir John Franklin, K.C.B.’”