Abstract During 1864–1869, Charles Hall led an expedition seeking answers to what happened to the 1845 Northwest Passage Expedition of Sir John Franklin. Hall recovered relics from the expedition and their history from the Inuit. This analysis correlates Hall’s records with the relics now housed at the Smithsonian Institution and those that Hall gave to others. Forty-six of the 83 relics catalogued in Hall’s “ Part of List Sir John Franklin Relics ” notebook were identified. Many of these were correlated with a 1869 contemporary illustration appearing in Harper’s Weekly magazine. We learn that the collection likely represented what was of value to the Inuit as Hall traded for the majority of the relics. Among these, Hall gave away nearly all relics connected to individuals participating in the Franklin Expedition, except for some cutlery belonging to Sir John Franklin. Hall’s efforts provided the first evidence of materials scavenged from the expedition ships themselves. It remains unclear why Hall donated as many relics as he did to the Smithsonian for similar materials were used for fundraising in the past. This suggests he did not plan to return to the Arctic to seek the Franklin Expedition or he had additional relics not yet located.
Russell S. Taichman (Thu,) studied this question.