illuminator newsletter #25
NEW TODAY.
24 August 2023
Sotheby’s of London has today released full images of the lost/2nd set of Franklin Expedition daguerreotypes: 14 portraits, plus 1 group shot in their folding case.
The star of the show is undoubtedly Francis Crozier, whose daguerrotype is missing from SPRI’s set (as is the Sargent portrait). Crozier’s face and eyes can now be seen for the first time without pixelated blocks, and he frankly looks like a different man — much more character and personality than in Greenwich’s somewhat over-exposed copy, which we now see had washed out most of his facial features.
Most importantly, Sotheby’s has released these images in significantly higher resolution than SPRI has ever released their set, and higher even than Greenwich’s NMM has done for their later photographic copies. While Sotheby’s is merely an auction house, this is a public service unequalled by these other institutions. Mostly the barrier has been monetary. Greenwich’s set can be ordered in high resolution at £50 per portrait, for a total of £700 (i.e., it is cheaper to buy a magnifying glass and catch a transatlantic flight). At SPRI earlier this summer, with an in-person viewing of the daguerreotypes scheduled, I and a group of researchers were prevented from even looking at SPRI’s in-house photography of the portraits. Yet today, Sotheby’s of London has made their entire set available online to the general public. For this reason, today is effectively “dags liberation day”: the first time people unable to afford travel to London or Cambridge can study these images free of blocky pixelization, with no financial hurdle or other barriers. While they may sell into private hands, today’s image release means that even after the sale, they will still be the most accessible set for the general public.
Sotheby’s description of their Franklin Expedition daguerreotypes set mentions “a manuscript list of officers in ink on laid paper” which is not yet shown.
Among the other interesting items in the sale is a watercolour of Erebus & Terror during James Clark Ross’s Antarctic Expedition — with a wood frame made from a rudder of HMS Terror (link).
The sale begins in two weeks.
Dive season 2023: The RV David Thompson, Parks Canada’s research vessel for Erebus and Terror, entered the Atlantic and turned north on August 19th. This is weeks late compared to bigger seasons like 2019, but only a couple days behind the 2022 season, which recovered paper from the Erebus steward's pantry.
SINCE THE LAST ISSUE
22 August 2023
New article in Polar Record on HMS Erebus Icemaster James Reid. Written by Frank Michael Schuster, who has helped many of us with our research.
Schuster makes the observation that, when whalers last see Erebus & Terror in Baffin Bay, they mention speaking to Reid on Erebus — the last sign of life from him in the story.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0032247423000189
25 July 2023
Franklin searcher Tom Gross was featured in a recent article in National Geographic (behind a paywall for some readers).
The photography of the SPRI daguerreotypes accompanying this NatGeo article is very slightly the largest resolution of the dags ever shared with the public by SPRI, excepting the three published by Huw Lewis-Jones. That said, they are still low resolution, behind even the mid-resolution versions offered by Greenwich’s NMM — and far behind what is now offered by the auction house Sotheby’s of London.
An accompanying documentary, Lost in the Arctic, is due out today, August 24th (streaming tomorrow the 25th).
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/premium/article/northwest-passage-arctic-ice-sailing-trapped
13 August 2023
New on Illuminator: high resolution photography from earlier this summer of James Clark Ross’ tomb in Aston Abbotts (link).
The End.