Comments on: On Cannibalism

By: Michael Robinson

Michael Robinson — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 16:07:00 +0000

@Charit You may be right about the Franklin party. Perhaps we are too quick to attribute failure to stuffy British ideas about travel rather than the conditions that they found themselves in. Still, I can’t help but think that if 120 Inuit were together in the Arctic they would have spread out and found other resources. But even there, perhaps the parallels don’t work since Franklin’s men were outfitted for a particular mode of shipboard life and that, once faced with disaster, were eager to escape the Arctic rather than try to survive in it. Still I think your point stands: we need to be careful in our attributions of blame.

By: charit vinswyth

charit vinswyth — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 06:28:30 +0000

The idea that “doing things the English way” would have prevented the Franklin survivors from hunting efficiently is frequently aired. In fact, the problem was more likely that even supremely efficient hunters like the Inuit would have had a hard time supporting a party as numerous as that of the Franklin survivors. Inuit bands in the area did suffer from starvation.

As for cannibalism, I’ve always wondered if one reason why the Scott party (I’m going in the other direction, I know) was so intent on having their bodies found was a reluctance for there to be any mystery about their deaths or about to what “last resorts” they might have been driven. Just a thought. If nothing else, Scott and his men knew the history of polar exploration and were certainly aware of the shadow over the Franklin expedition that Rae created and Dickens tried to dispel. I do think that in the end, Scott would have eaten dogs, if he’d had them. But then, if he’d had dogs, he might not have had to eat them. Or at least, not all of them.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 16:49:53 +0000

this is really good stuff

By: Requiem for Franklin on a G String « raincoaster

Requiem for Franklin on a G String « raincoaster — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 11:04:53 +0000

[...] only Franklin had toted a pair of these along on his fatal expedition, perhaps things might have gone very differently. While Gizmodo says there is no word on whether [...]

By: Chris Valade

Chris Valade — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 01:08:45 +0000

Cannibalism among Franklin crew members occurred at or near McClintock’s Boat Place, in Erebus bay, King William Island. (The site located by Barry Ranford in 1992). The 40 pounds of chocolate in the sledge mounted boat found by Hobson and McClintock here is puzzling. The chocolate doesn’t fit in with a party that has resorted to cannibalism. It can be seen with the Greely Expedition and with the Donner Party that starving people tend to boil and chew leather before eating their own dead.

Franklin scholars have pointed out that “chocolate is not food.” Still, I would expect the chocolate found in Erebus Bay to have been eaten as the food supplies were rationed out. This would be prior to the remaining survivors turning to the last resource.

There are a number of ways to explain the 40 pounds of chocolate. The men in the boat could have belonged to a party that came later. The chocolate could, somehow, have gone undiscovered (unlikely in my opinion).

By: Asia on Top « Time to Eat the Dogs

Asia on Top « Time to Eat the Dogs — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:54:12 +0000

[...] European conquests in Asia and America in the early 16th century did much to boost European self confidence. (See for example, Abraham Ortelius’s frontispiece for his 1580 Atlas in my post on cannibalism) [...]

By: Russell Potter

Russell Potter — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 02:54:05 +0000

Eric, you must be thinking of the voyage of Robert Hore in 1536. The sad result of his voyage is described in detail by Hakluyt; as paraphrased at the American Journeys website, “Robert Hore, thirty “gentlemen,” and two crews totaling ninety sailors embarked in two vessels from Gravesend in April 1536. After a difficult voyage of two months that carried them far enough north to see icebergs, they finally reached Cape Breton in Canada. Already low on supplies, they replenished their stock from islands of seabirds in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. While one ship sailed off to fish, the other attempted to find a hospitable landing point on the Labrador Coast. Unfortunately, their initial encounters with the local peoples were unpromising; attempts to find a village simply drove the Indian inhabitants into hiding. The crew failed to find even enough food to sustain themselves, and as their food supply dwindled they scavenged for “herbs” and roots on the mainland. A small party who went ashore to look for food returned only one survivor. He confessed that the group had been reduced to killing and eating their comrades, and as the sole survivor he persuaded other starving crewmembers to follow his example. The captain admonished the sailor, but cannibalism appeared to be the only solution to their problem. The crew had already drawn lots to see who would be murdered and eaten to prevent the others from starving when a French ship arrived in sight. The English seized it and set sail for home, arriving at Cornwall in October 1536.”

Not sure where the idea comes, though, that they ought to have turned to lobsters and snails — lobsters would have required special traps and rigs to catch, and snails, though perhaps abundant, might have done little better for them than brine shrimp did for Greely’s party centuries later — the postponement, rather than the prevention, of starvation.

By: Michael Robinson

Michael Robinson — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 01:42:40 +0000

Eric, I’ve never heard of this. But it does have all the makings of a British-explorers-doing-it-the-British-Way tale…though usually these were tied to the 19th century rather than the 17th century. Let me know if you find out any more about it.

By: Eric

Eric — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 21:18:30 +0000

Bait for the shrimp. I love it! We sure can get illogical about our survival and food.

I recall a tale (how accurate=?) of a group of British officers who survived a shipwreck in Newfoundland (?) sometime in the 1600′s. They starved to death on the island they were on, even though the area was chock full of lobster, crab and snail. It was implied that the officers knew the inverts were there, but it was unseemly for men of their class and station to eat lobster and snails.

Are you familiar with this story? I believe I heard it from a marine historian in connection to a historical marine ecology lecture.

By: Michael Robinson

Michael Robinson — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 15:08:23 +0000

Good point Charles. It makes me think about Nat Philbrick’s book Heart of the Sea, where he lays out the broad tolerance for cannibalism among sea-faring communities. Perhaps in the case of Franklin and Greely, the threshold of behavior was higher because they were seen as national figures. Or perhaps its a factor of who the public critics were. I doubt that many came from sea-faring communities.