Hms erebus and hms terror series#

Subsequent expeditions up until the late 1980s, including autopsies of crew members, revealed that their canned rations may have been tainted by both lead and botulism. Both ships had become icebound and were abandoned by their crews, all of whom died of exposure and starvation while trying to trek overland to Fort Resolution, a Hudson's Bay Company outpost 970 km (600 mi) to the southwest.

Hms erebus and hms terror series#

The disappearance of the Franklin expedition set off a massive search effort in the Arctic and the broad circumstances of the expedition's fate were revealed during a series of expeditions between 18. The expedition sailed from Greenhithe, Kent, on, and the ships were last seen entering Baffin Bay in August 1845. She was converted into a polar exploration ship two decades later, and participated in George Back's Arctic expedition of 1836–1837, the successful Ross expedition to the Antarctic of 1839 to 1843, and Sir John Franklin's ill-fated attempt to force the Northwest Passage in 1845, during which she was lost with all hands along with HMS Erebus. She participated in several battles of the War of 1812, including the Battle of Baltimore with the bombardment of Fort McHenry. These were bomb ships designed to carry heavy mortar and cannon to bombard shore targets. The main armaments were large bore mortars which weighed 3 tons each and required that the ships be considerably reinforced for the punishing work that this entailed as the mortars had a powerful recoil. At the center of this story are two ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror. Here are five things you may not have known about the HMS Terror.

HMS Terror was a specialised warship and a newly developed bomb vessel constructed for the Royal Navy in 1813. Erebus and terror were designed as 'bomb ships ' for the naval bombardment of shore targets. Five interesting facts about the HMS Terror The second of Sir John Franklins doomed ships has been located in the Canadian Arctic.