A sketchbook kept by Captain George Back during the 1833-1835 overland expedition whose purpose was to descend the Thlew-ee-choh-dezeth or Great Fish River (now renamed in his honour the Back River) in an attempt to locate the John Ross expedition which had not bee heard from since it sailed to Prince Regent Inlet in 1829. Back's first sketchbook documenting this expedition from the Ottawa to the Great Fish River (April 26-October 19, 1833) is now in the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge, England. When in the spring of 1834 Back received the news of Ross's safe return to England, Back could turn his attention towards the second object of the expedition, the exploration of the Great Fish River and the charting of the northern coastline from its mouth to Point Turnagain, the furthest point reached by John Franklin on his first overland expedition in 1819-1822. In early June 1834 Back set out from Fort Reliance on Great Slave Lake, but after spending several weeks exploring Chantrey Inlet he was forced to turn back because of the ice and fog, returning to his winter station in late September. This sketchbook documents this undertaking from June 10 to September 26, 1834. In addition, seven views date from March 1835, mostly recording Back's visit to Parry Falls. The sketchbook concludes with nine drawings of animals, and one of icebergs, all of which are undated. It is hard to say whether they document actual scenes witnessed during Back's Arctic explorations or whether they are meant to represent more generalized evocations of his Arctic experience. The sketch of the dugong on folio 41 recto aùnd one of a donkey with an unidentified figure (folio 44 recto) suggest that the sketchbook was used again perhaps at a later date for non-Arctic subjects.
It is interesting to note that Back inscribed the word "Camera" opposite eight of his pencil drawings, indicating his use of an optical instrument, a camera lucida, in sketching these views. Only on the sketches which Back identified as being made with the camera lucida can one discern at the bottom of each composition a small round depression in the paper (8 mm. in diameter) evidently made when the instrument was clamped to the paper.
Among numerous other manuscripts pertaining to the 1833-1835 expedition, Back's letter book (April 19, 1834 to May 1835) and rough journal (2 volumes) are now on deposit at the Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, England. Copies of these journals are available under certain restrictions on LAC microfilm (A-820 and A-821 respectively). Six views from this sketchbook were chosen for engraved or lithographed plates in Back's "Narrative of the Arctic Land Expedition", published in 1836.
This sketchbook was acquired by LAC from Henry Stevens, Son & Stiles, book dealers, London.
This is one of five separate sketchbooks owned by Library and Archives Canada done by George Back during various Arctic expeditions (two sketchbooks from the 1819-1822 expedition; two sketchbooks from the 1825-1827 expedition, and one sketchbook from the 1833-1835 expedition.) LAC also owns single-sheet watercolours from various sources, as well as many single-sheet prints.
