John Hartnell was an English seaman who took part in Sir John Franklin's Northwest Passage expedition and was one of its first casualties, dying of suspected zinc deficiency and malnourishment during the expedition's first year. He was buried on Beechey Island, next to John Torrington, who became the expedition's first fatality on News Year's Day of 1846, and William Braine, who died three months later on 3 April. The expedition had not yet run into trouble at this time and proper burials in the Arctic permafrost could be afforded. Because of the region's icy conditions, he was found in a remarkably well-preserved state when a scientific expedition exhumed his remains in 1984 to determine a cause of death.
Together with his brother Thomas he was assigned to as an able seaman on the Franklin Northwest Passage expedition. They set off from Greenhithe on 19 May 1845 with two ships, the other being. The trip was expected to last about three years, so the ships were packed with provisions that included more than of flour, of high-proof alcohol, and of tinned meat, soup, and vegetables. However, the expedition was never heard from again after July 1845.
Death and analysis
Pathology reports suggest that Hartnell had a damaged right eye, and it is unclear whether this happened before or after his death. According to his grave marker, Hartnell died on Beechey Island, on 4 January 1846, at the age of 25. In 1852, an expedition sent to find Franklin and his men arrived at Beechey Island. Commanded by Edward A. Inglefield, the crew of the Isabel included a physician, Peter Sutherland. Inglefield published a journal reporting their findings. In 1984, professor of anthropology Owen Beattie from the University of Alberta and a group of scientists arrived at Beechey Island to examine the bodies and determine what may have happened to the three men whose lives ended on the tiny speck of land in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. One of Hartnell's distant relatives, Hartnell's great-great-nephew, physics professor Brian Spenceley, was the expedition's photographer. Beattie was surprised to see Hartnell's incredibly well-preserved, mummified remains through the melting ice, he was even more surprised to see that Hartnell's body had already been autopsied. Beattie and his team also noticed that Hartnell's right eye seemed damaged beyond the sinking-into-the-sockets effect that would have occurred from prior thawing. When Hartnell's cap was removed, they saw a great deal of hair – used to determine that his body contained large amounts of lead at the time of his death. However, a 2016 analysis conducted on samples of Hartnell's removed fingernail and toenail found that malnourishment and zinc deficiency may have been his actual cause of death.
Hartnell's brother, Tom, played by Jack Colgrave Hirst, is a supporting character in the television adaptation of the novelThe Terror, and the burial of the three crewmen on Beechey Island is mentioned in the first episode.
