Resolute by Martin W. Sandler

Author:Martin W. Sandler
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9781402781537
Publisher: Sterling
Published: 2010-12-06T16:00:00+00:00

“Till her destination is decided,” the newspaper had stated. It was a good question. According to the laws of salvage, the abandoned Resolute now belonged to the George Henry’s owners. But almost as soon as she arrived in New London, a representative of the British government had appeared, laying claim to the vessel on behalf of the Crown. For a while it appeared that Anglo-American relations, already strained after a series of commercial and political disputes, would become more seriously threatened. But then one of Great Britain’s favorite American citizens stepped in. Henry Grinnell had won the hearts of all Englishmen when he had sent two expeditions out to look for John Franklin. Now he wrote a letter to British authorities politely suggesting that, since the George Henry’s owners had suffered a great financial loss when its captain abandoned his whaling to save the Resolute, England should give up its claim to the ship. Almost immediately, the British complied. To Henry Grinnell, the compliance was but the first step in a larger plan he had for the Resolute. For in the miraculous recovery of the ship he saw the opportunity for the United States to truly cement its relations with Great Britain. On January 7, 1856, he wrote a letter to the United States Secretary of State:

I consider [this] of great importance, and that is to make every effort to cultivate and extenuate a kind feeling between this country and Great Britain and further I must say an act of comity and justice towards a brother nation…The ship Resolute, a National vessel, fitted out by the Government of Great Britain for the humane and merciful object of assisting the crews of two ships … for the rescue of Franklin and his party whom you well know was making explorations in the Arctic Regions, has been fallen in with by an American Whaler, abandoned, and safely brought into the port of New London. And now allow me to make a suggestion that the Government of this country take possession of that ship, convey her to the Navy Yard at Brooklyn, put her in good condition and send her properly officered and manned from our Navy to the Government she belongs to and deliver her up without any compensation. Of course compensation would have to be given to those interested in the Whaler, from what I can learn this compensation would probably be from $30,000 to $50,000.

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