![\"\"](\"https:\/\/images.newscientist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/25190659\/SEI_223157672.jpg\")
<\/div>The Franklin expedition was dramatised in television show The Terror<\/p>\n
AMC<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n
Human remains recovered from the British Royal Navy\u2019s doomed Franklin expedition have been identified as Captain James Fitzjames using DNA and genealogical evidence. The unfortunate officer has also been confirmed as the first known victim of cannibalism among the expedition members.<\/p>\n
In 1845, an expedition led by Sir John Franklin set out to find a navigable North-West Passage through the Arctic with 129 men aboard the ships HMS Terror and HMS Erebus. But in 1848, Captain James Fitzjames, commander of the HMS Erebus, left a report in a stone cairn recording how the survivors had decided to abandon the ships. Later, the unidentified skeletal remains of many sailors were discovered in various locations across the Canadian Arctic.<\/p>\n
Now researchers have put a name to some of those remains. \u201cIdentifying an individual using molecular methods often takes time because descendants need to be involved in the process,\u201d says Treena Swanston<\/a> at MacEwan University in Canada, who was not involved in the study.<\/p>\n Douglas Stenton<\/a> at the University of Waterloo in Canada and his colleagues identified Fitzjames by comparing the Y chromosome profiles from a tooth that was found on Canada\u2019s King William Island with cheek swabs taken from one of Fitzjames\u2019s descendants. The descendant donor had a demonstrated genealogical relationship with Fitzjames through the captain\u2019s great-grandfather.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Cut marks on this mandible, now identified as that of James Fitzjames, indicate it was cannibalised<\/p>\n Anne Keenleyside<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n The discovery also makes Fitzjames the first identified victim of cannibalism among the Franklin expedition\u2019s members. Earlier analysis by the late bioarchaeologist Anne Keenleyside<\/a> had revealed cut marks on many of the recovered remains, with one lower jawbone \u2013 now identified as belonging to Fitzjames \u2013 having multiple cut marks.<\/p>\n This indicates some of the last survivors who were trekking overland resorted to eating parts of Fitzjames\u2019s body and those of several other sailors. The finding \u201creveals the desperation of the Franklin sailors\u201d, says Swanston.<\/p>\n Such research also reinforces the importance of testimony from Indigenous Inuit people, she says. The Inuit reported seeing about 40 men dragging a ship\u2019s boat on a sledge and made the first discoveries of bodies showing signs of cannibalism.<\/p>\n Topics:<\/p>\n<\/section><\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/images.newscientist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/25190957\/SEI_223157917.jpg\")
<\/div>