Admiral Sir George Back
Admiral Sir George Back
Sir George Back was a distinguished British Royal Navy officer and Arctic explorer who significantly contributed to mapping North America’s Arctic coastline. He joined John Franklin’s overland expeditions (1819–22 and 1825–27), surveying the Coppermine and Mackenzie Rivers, and led his own expeditions in 1833–35, discovering and navigating the Great Fish River (now Back River), and in 1836–37, attempting to chart Hudson Bay’s northern coast despite severe ice trapping his ship, HMS Terror (lost in the legendary Franklin Expedition of 1846-8), for ten months. His 1833–35 expedition, initially to search for missing explorer John Ross, mapped uncharted regions and earned him a knighthood in 1839 and the Royal Geographical Society’s medals. Back’s resilience and mapmaking skills cemented his legacy as a key figure in Arctic exploration. As an artist, his accomplished watercolours and sketches provided invaluable visual records of Arctic exploration, capturing the region's stark beauty with precision and finesse.
