Scott Cookman

This is a non-fiction account of Franklin's last polar expedition, and its tragic failure. Cookman makes the case that the major cause of the failure and loss of life was the poor food, particularly the canned food. The book contends that the supplier used sub-standard ingredients, and did not properly sterilize the food during the canning process. As a result, the author believes that many of the men died from botulism poisoning.

This book provided a fascinating look at the sheer logistics and complexity of planning and provisioning the Terror and the Erebus for the years' long voyages. Its descriptions of the conditions under which the food was processed rivals those in Upton Sinclair's The Jungle.

"The provisioner, Goldner certainly knew stinking meat from fresh, whole vegetables from peelings, and bone, animal hair, mold and rat droppings when he saw them. Even if he did not venture out of his tiny paper-filled office, he could hardly have avoided smelling them. But to Goldner, it looked and smelled like money. What he couldn't see or smell was the fact that it was a bacterial and viral Chernobyl approaching meltdown."

Although, other than its demonization of the provisioner Goldner, the book, as nonfiction, is not generally character-driven, it does portray Franklin as an incompetent, over-the-hill commander, and sypathetically portrays Crozier as the experienced and able arctic explorer who was passed over for command for class reasons. A very interesting read.… (mehr)

Heard about this particular book from a client who had a family member searching by air for any remains/artifacts from this expedition.
It's of great interest and I have other books on the subject, also.
Started reading aloud with Winston - during the summer on the MI cottage sunny hillside. But, he still didn't want to hear anymore about just how cold it was and how these men suffered from the cold.
It is a bit gruesome at times.
So I finished and shared the highlights of rest of book.
Read in 2005.… (mehr)

The problem of historical mysteries is that they are often very hard to solve. The problem with mystical historians is that they often think they can solve them anyway.

We know, in very broad outline, what happened to John Franklin's Northwest Passage expedition: The men went to the ice, they were frozen in, they abandoned their ships, they died trying to get home. But we don't know why. There are many oddities about their behavior, even though their senior officers should have been well-equipped to handle the job.

The result has inevitably been much speculation. Driven mad by lead? Poisoned by botulism? Depressed by the lack of sun? Dead of scurvy?

Many scholars have backed one or another hypothesis. Sadly, the data does not exist to prove any of them. That there was lead in the men seems certain. That there were problems with some of the Goldner canned goods they carried seems likely. That they suffered from scurvy seems certain. But if I had to bet, I'd bet on scurvy above all.

Cookman doesn't. It's all one hypothesis for him, and he beats on it with droning regularity. One gets the feeling that he's perfectly willing to chase Goldner's soul into Hell if it will help him get back at this long-dead innovator (who may, in fact, have been guilty of nothing worse than poor quality control in his still-experimental process). Is it possible that Cookman's hypothesis is right? Yes, it is. But he puts too much effort into his thesis, and not enough into studying the alternative. Throw in some rather blatant errors, and a rather overwhelming intensity, and the result is simply not very convincing. What is needed is a more neutral analysis. I hope it happens someday.… (mehr)