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The Enterprise and Investigator surrounded by ice, Barro

Engraving showing the Enterprise and Investigator surrounded by pack ice in Barrow's Straits, September 1849. These two ships were used by Sir James Clark Ross's Expedition of 1848-1849 to search the Arctic for signs of Sir John Franklin's ill-fated Arctic expedition of 1845. In 1845 the British Admiralty sent two polar exploration ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, to look for the Northwest passage round the northern coast of Canada. The expedition, commanded by Sir John Franklin, disappeared from view late in 1845 and none of the men were ever seen again. In fact the ships made it to the King William Island region, then got stuck in the ice. With supplies running out the surviving crew abandoned ship and headed south. However, none made it to safety and it is assumed all died from disease, exposure or starvation. From 1848 onwards a number of relief expeditions were sent to find Franklin, but it was only in 1859 that Francis Leopold McClintock was able to confirm Franklin's fate

© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans

Members of the Search Party who found Captain Scott

From left: Sub-lieutenant Gran, Petty-Officer Williamson and Mr E.W. Nelson (biologist), members of the relief party who discovered the bodies of Captain Scott and his companions in the Antarctic Summer of 1912. They sighted Captain Scott's tent on November 12th, 1912, over seven months after the team's tragic death on their return from the South Pole. The men are more lightly clothed than might be expected as the Antarctic November is equivalent to a European June, and so they are wearing ski boots without any fur covering while Williamson is standing in his fur bed socks. Gran is handing out a ration of six biscuits, which are of special nutritive quality and very hard in texture

© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans

English tourist sketching the waterfall from Ossian's

English tourist sketching the Black Linn falls of the Braan River from Ossian's Hall of Mirrors, Dunkeld, Scotland. A dog attacks its reflection and Dr. Factobend smashes a mirror. Doctor Prosody's disaster in Ossian's Hall, Dunkeld. Handcoloured copperplate engraving drawn and engraved by Charles Williams from William Combe's The Tour of Doctor Prosody, in search of the Antique and the Picturesque, through Scotland, the Hebrides, the Orkney and Shetland Isles, Matthew Illy, London, 1821

© Florilegius