Barrow’s Boys: The Original Extreme Adventurers is a non-fiction book written by Fergus Fleming. Published in 1998, it tells of the exploration expeditions undertaken by the British during the nineteenth century under John Barrow’s programme.
Notable people within[]
- Sir John Barrow, 1st Baronet
Publisher’s summary[]
The atlas of 1816 was littered with blanks. What was the North Pole? Was there a Northwest Passage? What lay at the heart of Africa? Did Antarctica exist? In his quest to find the answers to these questions, John Barrow, Second Secretary to the Admiralty, launched the most ambitious programme of exploration the world had ever seen. Between 1816 and 1845 his hand-picked teams of elite naval officers scoured the globe’s empty spaces. Often at odds with each other and working in utterly surreal conditions – cocked hats in the Arctic, frock coats in the Sahara – they entered the void. Their ignorance of the conditions they would encounter, allied to Barrow’s insouciant way with maps, make this a tale of absurdly dangerous comedy as well as harrowing personal endeavour.
Full summary[]
Fleming introduces John Barrow, Second Secretary to the Admiralty from 1804 to 1845, who is very interested in the exploration of the world. Having grown up in a hamlet in England, he becomes well-versed in academic and naval subjects, travelling to China and South Africa. Barrow starts writing geographical articles in 1809 for the journal Quarterly Review, in which he frequently projects incorrect and unoriginal theories. He successfully persuades the Admiralty to send off many expeditions from 1816 to 1845, starting with the search of the African river Niger.
In 1816, there was little knowledge of the upstream Niger. There were many incorrect theories about where it originated from and where it flowed to circulated at the time. Barrow falsely believed that it flowed into the Congo and sent out an expedition under James Hingston Tuckey to explore the river. The ship was unable to sail far downstream and the crew continued on foot. The men were plagued by yellow fever and the survivors soon returned home in defeat, much to the surprise of Barrow.
Barrow’s next goal is to find the Northwest Passage, a way to cross from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean over North America. Undeterred by previous failed expeditions, he sends two separate missions to the Arctic in 1818: one to find the Northwest Passage, led by John Ross, and one to find the North Pole, led by David Buchanan. Ross fails to find a passage – likely due to a mirage caused by refraction. Buchanan’s trip to the North Pole was also a failure due to bad weather and impassable ice, and he too returned home. However, Ross receives a lot more criticism for not finding the passage, which ruins his career.
Two more missions are sent off to find the Northwest Passage in 1819; one of them (led by William Parry) is to search around Lancaster Sound, which Ross had dismissed. Well-equipped, the two ships set sail. The party explores the waters in and around Lancaster Sound before heading north and settling for winter in a small cove. Despite the cold and dark Arctic winter, the men enjoy themselves and belatedly exit the harbour in July. Due to ice, the Parry only comes as far as spotting Banks Island before heading home to be celebrated for his efforts.
The second mission, led by John Franklin, is vaguely instructed to travel overland to the northern coast of Canada and map it. Travelling over the Coppermine River, the men reach the Arctic Ocean. Only a small amount of the Canadian coastline is mapped before their return, which is filled with such starvation that the men resort to eating lichen, their spare shoes and, in one case, fellow men. Locals come to the rescue of the party, and around half of them survive the mission. Despite the expedition’s poor preparation and the massive failure Franklin encountered, he is celebrated for his sufferings.
Barrow sends a small and cheap expedition led by Joseph Ritchie through the Sahara desert in hopes of finding the Niger inland. Their initial plan of taking a caravan from Tripoli to Timbuktu falls through as those are rare. Instead, the Pasha advises them to tag along with the Bey of Fezzan’s caravan and convert to Islam. However, this only leads them to Murzuk, also a Libyan town. The group is severely underfunded and Ritchie dies, leaving his companions Lyon and Belford alone with little equipment. They spend some time mapping the city’s surroundings for future travellers before heading home.
Lyon is next sent to the Arctic with Parry to continue the quest for the Northwest Passage. The party, consisting of two ships, travels further south than previous missions, crossing through Hudson Strait. The men winter at a small island in Foxe Basin, where they conduct evening schools for crew members and meet the natives of the region. Freed of the ice again, the men continue some more along Melville Peninsula before heading home in disappointment due to bad ice conditions and health reasons.
Barrow next plans a large attack on the Northwest Passage from four angles, one of which being Parry’s mission to Prince Regent’s Inlet. After a peaceful winter, a ship damaged by ice forces an early return. Lyon encounters even worse luck: Plagued by the effects of the Admirality’s penny-pinching, historically bad ice and his own decisions, his crew’s lives are saved by luck multiple times. They, too, return home in defeat. However, Franklin prepares well for his next trip along River Mackenzie, which pays off greatly and leads to a good deal of Canada’s coastline being mapped. Captain Beechey’s trip through the Bering Strait is also a success.
Another mission to find the Niger is sent off. They are to travel to Bornu, a kingdom around Lake Chad. Upon arriving in Murzuk, animosity breaks out due to there being no clear leader of the expedition. This continues during their journey to Lake Chad, where the Sheikh treats them with generosity. Their participation in a raiding party leads to the discovery of a small river flowing into the lake, which they (falsely) believe to be part of the Niger. On another trip, two of the men, Oudney and Clapperton, get fairly close to their goals and Clapperton learns that Timbuktu is nearby. However, Oudney dies and the entire expedition soon returns home.
One Gordon Laing is dispatched to Timbuktu due to his geographical findings, which revealed that a connection between the Nile and Niger is highly unlikely. En route, he far exceeds the intended expenditure and earns a reputation as a madman. Close to Timbuktu, Laing is attacked by tribesmen and continues the journey heavily injured. In 1826, he reaches his goal, being the first European to do so. He is killed on his return journey. A Frenchman finds the man’s remains and belongings during his own stay in Timbuktu in 1828, sparking an Anglo-French argument and many rumours.
Clapperton and several other men are to explore the Niger and Timbuktu by travelling overland from the coastal town of Badagry to Sokoto. The African leg of the trip starts off with hardship and illness, causing most of the explorers to die. However, the locals treat the men with much friendliness. Clapperton returns the favour by handing out so many gifts to regional chiefs that he slows down the mission. He also learns about the death of Mungo Park and crosses the Niger. After Clapperton’s death in Sokoto, his servant, Richard Lander, manages a solo trip back south to Badagry and arrives in England in 1828.
The most ambitious trip to date (1827) is to feature Parry travelling to the North Pole over the ice via reindeer-pulled sleighs. An unsuccessful test of their crafts in Svalbard makes the men realise they will have to pull the boats themselves. Undeterred, they leave for the ice, finding clusters of uneven floes instead of the expected flat sheets. Due to physical exhaustion and the ice pack moving southward, Parry abandons the mission. Having set a new record for the northernmost reached point, the party returns to Britain less than half a year after setting out. This trip marked the end of Parry’s career as an explorer.
A short-lived new Lord High Admiral raises the Admiralty’s stinginess after his departure, causing them to reject John Ross’s idea of finding the Northwest Passage with a small engine-powered ship, so he finds a sponsor by the name of Felix Booth. He becomes a man of the moment and the Admiralty ends up helping out by donating boats. However, spirits worsen as the trip actually starts and the party discovers that the ship is slow, leaky and bad. The mood rises again in Greenland, where Ross picks up food and supplies.
Barrow focuses on the Niger again – Richard Lander wishes to return to explore the river. The cheap and low-risk mission consisting of Lander and his brother is sent off in 1830. After bribing their way out of Badagry, the siblings reach Bussa on the Niger. Much time is spent trying to find canoes for a trip downstream, which proves to be slow but safe business. Closer to the river delta, they are captured by pirates and held ransom. The duo is freed and returns to England a year and a half after setting out, having proven that the Niger flows into the Gulf of Benin.
The author goes on an excursus about the Royal Geographical Society, which was co-founded by Barrow in 1830. One of his suggestions was to explore Australia, mainly to avoid the land being colonised by the Dutch or French instead. Back in 1824, he attempted to create a “second Singapore” on the northern coast of Australia, which failed and was abandoned in 1829. Another created settlement was in the same area and closed down in 1849. However, Barrow didn’t mind the failures as Australia wasn’t his main interest.
The author returns to John Ross in the Arctic: First, he explores Somerset Island, missing a strait leading to the Northwest Passage. During the crew’s first winter, they maintain friendly relations with the natives and Ross’s nephew James goes sledding. After two summers of little progress due to weather conditions, Ross calculates that if the next winter – their fourth one – is as bad as the current one, the crew may die of starvation. He abandons the ship after creating a partial supply line overland to Somerset Island, where he spends another winter before leaving. The malnourished men are saved by a whaler, which had assumed them dead.
Upon Ross’s return home, he is given medals, knighthood, and much positive attention. However, this soon turns against him, as Barrow still dislikes the explorer. The rights for his journal are handed over to the Admiralty and Barrow makes negative comments on its writing style. The developer of the ship’s engines is another critic, but Ross quickly shuts him down as they were clearly malfunctioning. Yet some criticism was more valid: He added nonexistent islands to maps to please Royals by giving them their names, and had a contradictory fame-hungry dispute with his nephew.
Rest to be added
See also[]
- Hornblower and the Crisis by C.S. Forester
- Sea of Glory by Nathaniel Philbrick
- Endurance by Alfred Lansing
- Erebus: The Story of a Ship by Michael Palin
- Undaunted Courage by Stephen E. Ambrose
- Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
Sources[]
To be added