ABCD - from Ron Baxter's script for Red Duster's show "North West Passage - the Search for Franklin and His Gallant Crew":-

"Then between 1982 and 1986 Prof. Owen Beattie of Alberta University made several trips to the North. At Starvation Cove he dug up bones buried by Lt. Schwatka. From these and others found on King William Isle, he discovered that it was "possible" that they could have been suffering from scurvy. But far more startling was firm evidence, from knife cuts on some thigh bones, that they had resorted to cannabalism!

However there was still no firm evidence of why they ALL died.

He then moved on to Beechey Isle, where the bodies of the three crew members who had died that first winter were buried. After gaining permission from eleven separate agencies [including the Admiralty in London, and any surviving descendents] he exhumed them. They appeared as if they had died only the day before, the permafrost had preserved them so well. There he carried out post mortems on them, 140 years after they had died.


The actual cause of death, for all three was pneumonia. All also showed the early stages of T.B. One, a stoker, had emphysema and pneumoconiosis [which he probably had before he sailed]. But by far the most startling find was that all of them had well over thirty times the normal level of lead in their bodies!

So after 138 years since the last survivors drew their final breath, the final part of the puzzle slipped into place; they had died of lead poisioning from the solder used to seal the seams of the canned provisions. They were killed by the very rations that should have been their salvation.

The "fate of Franklin and his gallant crew" at last was known."

There was indeed such a documentary more than ten years ago which covered the exhumations and autopsies described above. Lead poisoning would gradually have impaired the physical and mental abilities of those affected. Poor judgement led to bad decisions, diminishing strength left them unable to accomplish the Herculean task they set themselves in trekking overland.

Ross