Some of this article's listed sources may not be reliable . Please help improve this article by looking for better, more reliable sources. Unreliable citations may be challenged and removed. ( July 2018 ) ( Learn how and when to remove this message )

William Braine (1814 ? 3 April 1846) was a British explorer. He served as a marine in the Royal Marines . From 1845 he was part of an expedition to find the Northwest Passage , but he died early in the trip and was buried on Beechey Island. His preserved body was exhumed in 1984, to try to determine the cause of death. ^[1]

Early life [ edit ]

William Braine was born in Oakhill , Somerset in 1814, and enlisted in the Royal Marines during the 1830s. He was assigned to HMS Erebus during Franklin's Lost Expedition . ^[2]

1845 Franklin expedition [ edit ]

Braine was a part of Sir John Franklin's final expedition to find the Northwest Passage. ^[3] The trip was expected to last about three years, so the ships were packed with provisions which included more than 136,000 pounds of flour, 3,684 gallons of high-proof alcohol and 33,000 pounds of tinned meat, soup and vegetables. ^{[4] [5]}

Death [ edit ]

Braine died ten months into the expedition, and was buried on Beechey Island with John Torrington and John Hartnell . ^[6] He died last, and his corpse was in the worst condition, having been gnawed by rats before burial. ^[7] Modern postmortem examinations suggested symptoms of tuberculosis and lead poisoning . ^{[8] [9]} However, other studies suggest tuberculosis was unlikely to have contributed to his death. ^[10]

References [ edit ]

Further reading [ edit ]

• Beattie, Owen; John Geiger (1998). Frozen In Time: The Fate of The Franklin Expedition . Douglas & Macintyre. ISBN   1-55054-616-3 .