Frozen in Time

by Owen Beattie

  After pulling the shroud away, his shirt and right arm and hand were also exposed. “Look at that hand, it’s very well-preserved,” Beattie said. “Nice shirt, there’s not a mark on it, it looks brand new.” No sign of his left arm could be found, and the possibility that it may have been amputated was discussed. As thawing progressed, they discovered that his left arm was frozen underneath his body. Beattie at first thought Braine had been too big to be placed in the coffin with his arms in their natural position. But they later saw that it would have been just as easy to have placed his arms over the sides of his chest and still have room for the coffin lid. His body and head, too, were not positioned carefully, and one of his undershirts had been put on backwards, leading them to conclude he was placed hastily in the coffin.

  Thawing the body was again a matter of pouring warm water over the frozen sections. In the cold of the grave the warm water would send up clouds of steam filled with the pungent smells of wet wool and cotton. Hours of this smell took its toll on some of the crew and the emotional strain of the work drained them all. Braine, being buried so deeply, was in colder ground, and the ice would not yield without a battle. They had tremendous difficulty in thawing the portions of the clothing and shroud frozen to the bottom of the coffin, which trapped Braine within it. Warm water poured directly onto the material seemed to have little effect, and the team struggled for eighteen more hours before they were able to free him from the ice. Even then, they had to cut the clothing up the small portion of exposed back and lift him, not only out of the coffin, but out of his clothes as well. Beattie and Amy then eased him up to the side of the grave, handing him to Savelle and Kowal, who positioned him on a plastic sheet.

  Immediately noticeable was the extremely emaciated appearance of this man—literally a skin-covered skeleton. Braine would have weighed less than 88 pounds (40 kg). He must have been extremely ill during his final days. Every rib could be counted and it was possible to identify features on his hip bones. His face also reflected his condition, the skin drawn taut over the cheeks and eye sockets. His limbs had a spidery appearance; so thin were his arms that his hands appeared very large. For Beattie, lifting this frail and lifeless man up and out of his grave, coming as it did after such tremendous effort to free him, was the most difficult aspect of his work on Beechey Island. The strained faces of the others illustrated that he was not alone in these feelings.

  Exhausted though the team was, Braine was immediately wrapped in a sheet and carried across to the X-ray tent. Notman and Anderson, who had been sleeping after their difficult work on Hartnell, were roused so they could begin their work. The X-raying of Braine was carried out much as it had been with Hartnell, though the situation was quite different as Braine had not had a previous autopsy. Both worked continuously for nearly twelve hours until the X-raying was completed.

  Before the others could rest they still had to remove Braine’s clothing from the coffin for Schweger to analyze. With the body removed, thawing accelerated and the job was completed in an hour. During the initial thawing of the foot-end of the grave, Carlson thought he detected a different kind of fabric peeking out just below the shroud-wrapped feet. Not until the body had been removed and further thawing of the shroud had taken place was his observation confirmed. Rolled up and placed under Braine’s feet were a pair of stockings. These were quite large and appeared to be of a heavy material, and one had a hole in it. The thawing and removal of the shroud and kerchief were left for the following day. Beattie, Kowal, Savelle, Amy and Damkjar wandered back to the cook tent, had a wash outside and went in for food and drink. They were then able to have a brief rest before returning to conduct the autopsy.

  When they gathered again, all suffered terrible headaches and dizziness. Some felt they would be physically ill. They came to the conclusion that they were suffering the effects of carbon monoxide poisoning from the two stoves that burned continuously during the removal of Braine from his coffin. Although the tent flap had been tied open and a breeze had blown through during the work, the fumes had gathered in the grave pit, creating the problem.

  When Amy and Beattie entered the X-ray/autopsy tent to begin their work, Notman pointed out a series of lesions on Braine’s body: on the left and right shoulders, in the groin area and along the left chest wall. These lesions involved the skin and in some cases the tissue and muscle below. Close inspection revealed teeth marks. Notman and Amy agreed that rats must have attacked the body while it had rested aboard the Erebus, prior to burial.

  Rats were a common problem on nineteenth-century ships and caused difficulties even among Arctic expeditions. Elisha Kent Kane, the United States Navy officer, had experienced severe problems with the vermin while commanding the Advance in the Franklin search from 1853 to 1855:

  They are everywhere… under the stove, in the steward’s lockers, in our cushions, about our beds. If I was asked what, after darkness and cold and scurvy, are the three besetting curses of our Arctic sojourn, I should say RATS, RATS, RATS.

  … it became impossible to stow anything below decks. Furs, woollens, shoes, specimens of natural history, everything we disliked to lose, however little valuable to them, was gnawed into and destroyed.

  Even efforts to fumigate the ship with the “vilest imaginable compounds of vapours—brimstone, burnt leather, and arsenic” failed to get rid of the rats.

  Notman had compared the X-rays of Hartnell with those just taken of Braine and described one interesting difference to Beattie: “With Hartnell’s skull we could not penetrate to see bony details with X-rays because of the solid block of ice inside. That’s what is creating this uniform whiteness,” he said, pointing at the X-ray. “In contrast, Braine’s skull could be penetrated quite easily. I really don’t have any explanation for that because they were buried under similar circumstances.”

  Further examination of the X-rays revealed some degenerative arthritic changes in the hands, possibly related to occupational stresses. The feet also showed arthritic changes, in particular, the big toes had a condition called hallux rigidus. These observations would be consistent with a man of Braine’s age and occupation. In addition to arthritic changes, small bony projections, probably benign bone tumours (osteochondromas), were seen in the bones of the knees (on the tibias).

  The autopsy took seven hours and was extremely comprehensive. Like Hartnell’s, it was performed on the ground with the body resting on a sheet of white plastic. Written and recorded accounts were made during the whole period, and a thorough photographic record taken. Beattie assisted Amy during the autopsy, labelling storage containers and collecting tissue samples.

  Unlike either Torrington or Hartnell, Braine was partially decomposed, demonstrating that some time had elapsed after William Braine’s death before the burial actually took place. An explanation for this apparent delay is difficult to find, though two possibilities were discussed. During the spring of 1846, parties were sent away from the ships to survey parts of nearby Devon Island. Franklin campsites had been discovered by searchers north of Beechey Island on the west coast of Devon Island and at Cape Riley. It is possible Braine had been with one of these parties when he died; after suffering a rapid decline in health in the manner of later sledge crews, some members of which became so ill that they had to be hauled back as passengers on the sledges they were meant to be pulling. There was even physical evidence to support this: The presence of ulcerations over the anterior surface of both shoulders indicated the likelihood of abrasion from sledge hauling. With two graves already located at Beechey Island, his body would have been returned for burial at the tiny cemetery. Wrapped and secured to a sledge he would have frozen within a few hours, though decomposition would have already set in. When the sledge party arrived at the ships, he may have been taken on board for examination by the doctors, followed by preparation for burial. During the time spent on ship, the rate of decay would have accelerated. Another possibility was related
to poor weather. Braine may have died when the weather conditions did not allow his immediate burial. This seems a less reasonable explanation, as the body could easily have been placed in a cool or even freezing part of the ship, where the amount of observed decomposition would have been far less likely to occur. Whatever the reason, the decomposition was at least a possible explanation for Braine’s body being placed quickly and without care in the coffin.

  During this final autopsy, Beattie wondered what Torrington, Hartnell and Braine would have thought about his research. The three men were explorers in their own time, either through conscription or by choice, involved in dangerous exploits that embodied the Victorian ideals of adventure, imperialism and self- sacrifice. Now, at least in body, they had emerged from the ice to briefly visit the 1980s. They could not have foretold such an odyssey.

  With the autopsy and X-rays complete, a plane arrived on 20 June to pick up Amy, Notman, Anderson, Schweger and Spenceley. Those remaining on site wrapped Braine’s body tightly in cotton and lowered it to Beattie and Savelle, who were standing in the grave. Gently, they laid the body in the coffin and positioned it carefully. Minutes before, Beattie had spread the shroud along the bottom of the coffin and, once the body had been placed on it, the left side of the shroud was brought over the body, followed by the right side, which was tucked underneath. The kerchief, undershirt, sweater, shirt and stockings, each wrapped in protective mylar, were then placed in the coffin and the lid lowered into position. The north side of the tent was pulled back, and the sun, low in the northern sky at 11 PM, illuminated the headboard and inside walls of the tent. Standing beside the grave, bathed in brilliant yellow sunlight, the team silently gave a moment of reflection and respect to William Braine. Beattie then jumped into the grave, and a bucket of gravel was passed down to him. He slowly emptied the bucket over the plaque, spreading the gravel in a protective layer on its surface.

  The filling of the grave began immediately. The huge pile of gravel, resting beside the grave, attested to the depth of the burial. Two people shovelled gravel into buckets while the others took turns carrying the buckets to the grave and pouring them in. Soon the gravel pile began to shrink, and within three hours the grave had been filled to a point where the large rocks could be repositioned on the surface—but mental and physical exhaustion had taken hold, and this task would be completed the following day.

  Several days were spent completing the restoration of the site, and, after dismantling their camp, the remaining researchers left in two groups: Beattie, Nungaq and Kowal on 24 June, with Carlson, Savelle and Damkjar following on 27 June.

  Other than the Franklin search expeditions of the 1850s, no one else had spent so much time at the site where the crews of the Erebus and Terror had experienced their first Arctic winter, and the early searchers had departed with many questions still unanswered. But Beattie left Beechey Island convinced that Petty Officer Torrington, Able Seaman Hartnell and Private Braine would provide some answers, for it seemed they had lived again for a few brief hours during the Arctic summers of 1984 and 1986.

  16. Understanding a Disaster

  The frozen tissue, hair and bone samples from both John Hartnell and William Braine were carried back to Edmonton in a small insulated cooler, and, within two days of leaving Beechey Island, were stored in a deep freeze at the University of Alberta Hospital. So much depended on this tiny box of samples. This was the evidence that would either confirm or defeat Beattie’s theory about the impact of lead on the Franklin expedition.

  If trace element analysis of the samples revealed lead levels dramatically lower than had been obtained from Torrington and the Booth Point skeleton, then the source of lead exposure for those previously tested would have to be re-examined. The question would then be: Why only Torrington and not the others? But if elevated levels of lead were identified during the testing of the remains of Hartnell and Braine, then a much more substantial argument could be made for the underlying impact that lead would have had on the expedition. Five years of research now hinged on the extraction and analysis of the information locked in the tissue samples.

  Such analysis, however, takes careful planning, and, in the following months, while Kowal prepared to test the human samples, Beattie spent his time studying the ten tin cans collected at Beechey Island.

  Again, there was no question that lead contamination from the solder would have been considerable, but, on closer examination, the tins also revealed something unexpected, something Beattie and Damkjar had overlooked while plotting and describing the artefacts on the island. The side seams of some of the tins were incomplete. In fact, it appeared as if the tinsmith who made them had failed to properly seal the end part of the seams. The significance of this missed step in the manufacturing process cannot be overemphasized, as it would have resulted in spoilage of the food contained in the tins. It is, therefore, important to understand the design of the tins supplied to Franklin’s expedition, both for the location of solder and the reason for the flaws.

  In 1845, tinned preserved food was still a relatively recent innovation, one that would have an immediate and major impact on maritime exploration. The tin container itself, patented in England in 1811, was immediately embraced by the British for use in its Royal Navy in most parts of the world. It was an invention that presumably would allow expeditions to winter successfully in the Arctic and make an assault on the Northwest Passage seem destined for success.

  The first containers were constructed from a tinned wrought-iron sheet bent round a cylindrical form, with the edges allowed to lap over one another. The tinsmith then placed his soldering iron on each formed seam (internal and external), where he floated a bead of solder along most of its length. The seams were left unsoldered at the top and bottom ends.

  The top and bottom end pieces were then bent to form a flange. When the ends were placed on the cylinder body, the flange slid over either the outside or the inside of the cylinder, depending on the tin type. (The flange was the reason why the tinsmith did not solder the body lap-seams all the way to the top and bottom: the end pieces could be slipped onto the cylinder body without being blocked by seam solder.) However, when the ends were soldered on, the small gaps between the lap-seam and the flange were not always sealed with a drop of solder. The incomplete seam very likely resulted in the spoilage of some of the expedition’s food supply, which supported the conclusions of some of the leading Franklin searchers.

  The top end piece of each tin also had a filler hole that varied in size, depending on the size and type of canister. The top end piece was attached first, then heavily soldered on the inside. The bottom end piece was then attached, and it too was soldered internally through the filler hole in the top end piece. Solder was then applied round the outside of the end seams.

  Food was pushed through the filler hole and the tin then almost completely immersed in boiling water (sometimes containing calcium chloride to increase the cooking temperature.) When cooking was complete and while the food was still at temperature, the filler hole was covered by a cap, secured with solder. The tins, now completely sealed, formed a partial vacuum upon cooling. The next step was to paint the outside of the tins to protect them against damage and corrosion. (The solder itself was made up of more than 90 per cent lead, with the balance being tin. This high lead level produced a solder that had poor “wetting” characteristics—in other words, it did not flow readily when in a liquid state. This meant it did not migrate easily into the spaces formed between two pieces of metal, as would solder with a higher tin content.)

  The contract for the tinned preserved food was given to Stephan Goldner on 1 April 1845. On 5 May, the day Franklin received his sailing instructions, the superintendent of the Victualling Yard at Deptford reported that only one-tenth of the contract had been supplied. This was followed three days later by a promise from Goldner that by 12 May, all the meat would be delivered and the soups by 15 May, tho
ugh he did ask for and receive permission to pack the soups in tins larger than in the original specification. There is a good chance that in the rush to complete the order, quality control suffered and some food that would later spoil was included among the 8,000 tins supplied to the expedition. If a significant proportion of the food went bad, it would have added a considerable burden to the expedition.

  As Beattie continued his research into the problem tins, Roger Amy submitted the tissues collected under sterile conditions for bacteriological assessment. The preliminary results of this research identified tuberculosis in the lung tissue of William Braine, though there had been no success in culturing the organism. However, bacteria collected from the bowel of William Braine (an uncommon form of the genus Clostridium, associated with the human bowel) was cultured. Remarkably, bacteria dating to 1846, and once part of William Braine, is still alive today.

  Then, in early 1987, Walt Kowal and experts at the Alberta Workers’ Health and Compensation laboratory in Edmonton began to test hair samples collected from Torrington in 1984 and Hartnell and Braine in 1986. Again, the method of testing involved the combustion at high temperatures of solutions made from samples of the hair. (The resulting emissions are characteristic of a particular element, such as lead, and can be identified and quantified.) The first tests were run on hair collected from the crown and nape areas of Torrington’s head. They revealed levels ranging from 413 to 657 parts per million (ppm), very similar to the extremely high levels previously identified in hair samples taken from Torrington.