Charles Francis Hall - First Arctic Expedition

First Arctic Expedition

Around 1857, Hall became interested in the Arctic and spent the next few years studying the reports of previous explorers and trying to raise money for an expedition, primarily intended to learn the fate of Sir John Franklin's lost expedition.

In 1860, Hall began his first expedition (1860–63), gaining passage out of New Bedford on the whaler George Henry under Captain Sidney O. Budington, whose uncle James Budington had salvaged Edward Belcher's exploration ship HMS Resolute, also on the "George Henry". He got as far as Baffin Island, where the George Henry was forced to winter over. The Inuit told Hall of surviving relics from Martin Frobisher's mining venture at Frobisher Bay on Baffin Island. Hall soon travelled there to see them first-hand, drawing upon the inestimable assistance of his newly-found Inuit guides Ebierbing ("Joe") and Tookoolito ("Hannah").

Hall also learned what he interpreted as evidence that some members of Franklin's lost expedition might still be alive. On his return to New York, Hall arranged for Harper Brothers to publish his account of the expedition Arctic Researches and Life Amongst the Esquimaux. It was edited by a British mariner and writer William Parker Snow, who was also obsessed with the fate of Franklin. The two men eventually fell out (largely because Parker Snow was very slow editing the manuscript), and amongst other things Parker Snow later claimed Hall had used his ideas for the search for Franklin without giving him due credit.