John Ross [1777-1856] was probably born at the Old Manse of Inch near Stranraer. He joined the Navy at the age of nine, starting a career of 60 years. He served in the Mediterranean and then for several years in the Baltic and North Seas during the Napoleonic Wars. This included a voyage to the White Sea during which he first experienced Arctic conditions.
In 1818 he was invited to lead an expedition to search for the North West Passage – the sea route from the Atlantic to the Pacific around the top of Canada. The 1819 voyage undertook scientific investigation as well as pioneering navigation. Deep sea samples, mineral and natural history specimens were collected from the expedition’s two vessels the ‘Isabella’ and the ‘Alexander’. These converted whaling ships, built to withstand ice, were strengthened with timber bracing, bottom planking and reinforced iron bows.
This expedition prompted several others in the 1820s but Ross’s next voyage was not until 1829. This second expedition lasted four years. He set out on the steam powered ‘Victory’ on a voyage which was to last four years. The ship became ice-locked and after three winters Ross and the crew abandoned her. Travelling south by sledge they built “Somerset House” for their fourth winter. When the ice melted they set sail in small boats and made contact with the ’Isabella’. This mistake cost him command of further Royal Navy expeditions, but eventually a voyage was sponsored by Sir Felix Booth, the gin manufacturer. The expedition had surveyed hundreds of miles of coastline, collected a mass of scientific data and reached the magnetic North Pole for the first time. Incredibly only three lives had been lost.
John Ross was knighted in 1834 and appointed Consul at Stockholm in 1839. He retired as a Rear Admiral. Amongst other activities he campaigned for Stranraer to be made the mail station for Ireland. He made one further journey in 1850, aged 73; this was in search of Sir John Franklin’s ill fated 1845 expedition, and like other searches, was fruitless. Ross died in 1856 aged 79.
Further reading
Calvert, R. ‘The Ross Story – the Polar explorations of Sir John and Sir James Clark’. Dumfries and Galloway Museums Service, 2001.
Ross, M. J. ‘Polar Pioneers – John Ross and James Clark Ross’. McGill Queen’s university Press, 1994.
