The Eminent Sir John

HMS Erebus: johnhorton.ca

The Eminent Sir John

What a formidable reputation he has
attained for a man who failed to
accomplish what he set out to do; find
the Northwest Passage to the Sea. How
amazed he and Lady Franklin would be
to know how the world has long been
invested in searching for that old sea dog
his crew and the Erebus and the Terror.
How insistent he had been that he
deserved recognition for his long naval
career in Her Majesty's fleet, unwilling
to venture any further into obscurity
and old age without another commission
that would seal his reputation in glory
forever. In that sense, his aspiration has
been achieved. It would remain for the
future and environmental change beyond
the power of any human to open that 
famed passage to the sea that intrigued and
eluded his intention and his efforts, whom
the Inuit recalled through verbal legend
to illuminate his desperate plight and
that of his men. In death, glory no longer
eludes and the timely discovery of the
ships shoaled and sunk in the Arctic
discovered in Victoria Strait a century
and a half after that voyage of despair
seals forever his place in the annals of
seafaring enterprise in an era of discovery.