In February, 1867, Hall visited Igloolik, the winter quarters of Parry in 1822. He improved the next year by following up the west side of Melville Peninsula, completing and surveying the short gap between Rae’s farthest, 1846, and Parry’s farthest in Fury Strait, 1825. The winter of 1868-1869 was spent at Fort Hope, where he at last succeeded in securing Eskimo aid for the final attempt to reach King William Land. He started in March, 1869, in company with ten Eskimos and dog sledges.
Crossing Rae Peninsula to Committee Bay and _via_ Boothia Isthmus, the party reached James Ross Strait, distant some sixty miles from King William Land. Here he had difficulty in persuading the natives to continue, but at Simpson Island the success of a musk-ox hunt restored their good humour, and they consented to proceed. On the 12th of May, 1869, Hall reached the mainland; his stay was necessarily very brief, as his native companions could not be persuaded to linger in such a desolate country.
[Sidenote: _RELICS OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN_]
Upon his return to Repulse Bay, Captain Hall, in a letter to Mr. Henry Grinnell, dated June 20, 1869, writes in part:—
“The result of my sledge journey to King William’s Land may be summed up thus: None of Sir John Franklin’s companions ever reached or died on Montreal Island. It was late in July, 1848, that Crozier and his party of about forty or forty-five passed down the west coast of King William’s Land in the vicinity of Cape Herschel. The party was dragging two sledges on the sea-ice, which was nearly in its last stage of dissolution; one a large sledge laden with an awning-covered boat, and the other a small one laden with provisions and camp material. Just before Crozier and party arrived at Cape Herschel, they were met by four families of natives, and both parties went into camp near each other. Two Eskimo men, who were of the native party, gave me much sad, but deeply interesting, information. Some of it stirred my heart with sadness, intermingled with rage, for it was a confession that they, with their companions, did secretly and hastily abandon Crozier and his party to suffer and die for need of fresh provisions, when in truth it was in the power of the natives to save every man alive. The next trace of Crozier and his party is to be found in the skeleton which M’Clintock discovered a little below, to the southward and eastward of Cape Herschel. This was never found by the natives. The next trace is a camping place on the sea-shore of King William’s Land, about three miles eastward of Pfeffer River, where two men died and received Christian (?) burial. At this place fish-bones were found by the natives, which showed them that Crozier and his party had caught while there a species of fish excellent for food, with which the sea there abounds. The next trace of this party occurs about five or six miles eastward, on a long point of King William’s Land, where one man died and was buried. Then about south-southeast two and a half miles further, the next trace occurs on Todd’s Islet, where the remains of five men lie. The next certain trace of this party is on the west side of the islet, west of Point Richardson, on some low land that is an island or part of the mainland, as the tide may be. Here the awning-covered boat and the remains of about thirty or thirty-five of Crozier’s party were found by the native Poo-yet-ta, of whom Sir John Ross has given a description in the account of his voyage in the _Victory_ in 1829-’34. In the spring of 1849, a large tent was found by the natives whom I saw, the floor of which was completely covered with the remains of white men.