Next11. Parry, William Edward, Sir (1790-1855)
Narrative of an Attempt to Reach the North Pole: in Boats Fitted for the Purpose, and Attached to His Majesty's ship Hecla, in the year MDCCCXXVII, under the Command of Captain William Edward Parry. London: John Murray, 1828.
The departure of the sledge-boats from Hecla in her berth on Walden Island, from William Edward Parry, Narrative of an attempt to reach the North Pole, 1828.
The Enterprise and Endeavour pulled up on an ice floe for the night, from William Edward Parry, Narrative of an attempt to reach the North Pole, 1828.
After three attempts at a Northwest Passage by sailing west through the Arctic archipelago, Parry offered to try his hand at a different route, going straight north over the Pole.
Previous attempts had not gotten beyond Spitsbergen, because of the heavy pack ice, and so Parry took with him on the Hecla two twenty-foot sledge-boats, a kind of amphibious craft, that could be towed over the ice on runners, and then take to the open sea, if they found any.
The Hecla made it as far Walden Island, north of Spitsbergen, and at that point the two sledge-boats—named Enterprise and Endeavour—proceeded north on their own. However, they ran into a southerly flow of floes that made the going very slow and difficult. They eventually made it to a latitude of 82º 45’, a mark that would stand for nearly half a century, but they had to turn back as the season turned colder.
By now it was pretty clear to everyone that the path to the North Pole did not lie on the eastern side of Greenland.
