Four dead men of the doomed Franklin expedition finally get their names back — 178 years later

Captain Sir John Franklin’s 1848 Arctic expedition ended with all 129 men dead. University of Waterloo anthropologists have now identified four more men by matching skeletal DNA to living descendants.

Captain Sir John Franklin’s 1848 Arctic expedition ended with all 129 men dead. University of Waterloo anthropologists have now identified four more men by matching skeletal DNA to living descendants.

Why naming the dead takes so long

Identifying remains this old is painstaking. Arctic weather leaves only fragments of usable DNA after more than 170 years, and a fragment means little on its own. Researchers need DNA from living descendants, traced through family records, to compare it with. Each identification depends on genealogy, willing families, and lab work lining up, which is why names come back a few at a time.

What to do, step by step

1. Note what was actually identified: in this case, four more men, matched by skeletal DNA to living descendants.
2. Look for how the match was made: remains DNA compared against DNA from descendants.
3. Separate identification from explanation. A name tells us who a man was, not yet how he died.
4. Check who did the work; here, University of Waterloo anthropologists building on earlier identifications.
5. Expect progress in small steps, as more descendants are traced and more remains can be tested.