Cause of death Lead poisoning Role Explorer Name John Hartnell | Occupation Explorer Body discovered 1984 | |
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Resting place Beechey Island74°43′N 091°51′W / 74.717°N 91.850°W / 74.717; -91.850 Died January 4, 1846, Beechey Island, Canada Similar John Torrington, William Braine, Rosalia Lombardo | ||
The face of john hartnell artistic reconstruction
Able Seaman John Hartnell (1820 — 4 January 1846) was an English explorer, and part of Sir John Franklin's last expedition. His preserved body was exhumed in 1984, to try to determine the cause of death.
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1845 Franklin expedition
They set off from Greenhithe, England in two ships, HMS Terror and HMS Erebus, on 19 May 1845. The trip was expected to last about three years, so the ships were packed with provisions which included more than 136,000 pounds of flour, 3,684 gallons of high-proof alcohol and 33,000 pounds of tinned meat, soup and vegetables. However, after late July no one heard from or saw the crew again.
Death and grave
According to his grave marker, on Beechey Island, Hartnell died on 4 January 1846, at the age of 25. In 1852, an expedition sent to find Franklin and his men arrived at Beechey Island. Commanded by Edward A. Inglefield, the crew of the Isabel included a physician, Dr. Peter Sutherland. Inglefield published a journal reporting their findings. In 1984, Dr. Owen Beattie (from the University of Alberta) and his group of scientists arrived at Beechey Island to examine what may have happened to the three men whose lives ended on the tiny speck of land in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago.
What they found was very surprising. Not only was Dr. Beattie stunned to see Hartnell's incredibly well-preserved (and mummified) remains through the melting ice, he was even more surprised to see that Hartnell's body had already been autopsied. Beattie and his team also noticed that John Hartnell's right eye seemed damaged (an issue beyond the sinking-into-the-sockets impact that would have occurred from prior thawing). Setting aside who did what to the mummy – before Owen Beattie's examination – when Beattie and his team removed Hartnell's cap, they saw a great deal of hair. They were able to use Hartnell's hair to conclude that his body contained large amounts of lead at the time of his death.