John Franklin
1786–1847 · British (Lincolnshire) · Victorian Era
Known for: Led the doomed expedition to find the Northwest Passage—all 129 men died in the worst disaster in polar exploration history
Franklin was a Royal Navy officer nicknamed 'the man who ate his boots' after an earlier expedition went horribly wrong. His final expedition in 1845 sailed with the ships Erebus and Terror into the Canadian Arctic and vanished.
Franklin died in 1847; the survivors attempted to walk to safety, dying one by one. Evidence suggests lead poisoning from canned food and, eventually, cannibalism. The wrecks were found in 2014 and 2016. His disaster galvanized decades of search missions that mapped the Canadian Arctic.
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