DNA Identifies Four More Sailors From the Doomed 1845 Franklin Arctic Expedition

Anthropologists from the University of Waterloo have identified four more sailors from Sir John Franklin's ill-fated 1845 Arctic expedition, using DNA recovered from skeletal remains and compared with samples from living descendants. The new matches bring the total number of Franklin expedition sailors identified through DNA to six.

By April 1848, Franklin's two ships, Erebus and Terror, had been trapped in Arctic ice for nearly two years. The 105 surviving crew members abandoned the vessels and tried to walk to safety along the west coast of King William Island, Nunavut, hauling boats on sleds. None survived the journey, and remains have since been found on King William Island and the Adelaide Peninsula.

"Three of the sailors we have identified are from HMS Erebus, and they all died at Erebus Bay. The fourth, the only sailor from HMS Terror to be definitively identified by DNA analysis, was found 130 kilometers away," said Dr. Douglas Stenton, adjunct professor of anthropology at Waterloo. That fourth sailor is Harry Peglar, Captain of the Foretop on HMS Terror, whose identity had been debated since 1859, when a body was found carrying his personal documents but wearing clothing that did not match his rank.

The other three identified were William Orren, an able seaman; David Young, a boy 1st class; and John Bridgens, a subordinate officers' steward -- all from HMS Erebus. Unlike the remains of Captain James Fitzjames, identified by the same team in 2024 and found to show evidence of cannibalism, the remains of these four sailors show no such evidence. Dr. Stephen Fratpietro of Lakehead University extracted DNA from the remains, comparing it with mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA from descendants and finding a genetic distance of zero in each case -- strong evidence of a shared ancestor.

The research also revealed that BBC News journalist Rich Preston is a descendant of John Bridgens. The findings are reported in two papers, one in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports and the other in Polar Record. Researchers are encouraging other descendants of Franklin expedition members to come forward, since more DNA samples could help identify remains still unknown.