Northwest Passage/Timelines
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Chronology of the Search for the Passage
1539: Francisco de Ulloa sails up the inland side of Baja California in search of the legendary Strait of Anián.
1576: The first of Sir Martin Frobisher makes three voyages to Baffin Island in search of the passage and gold.
1609: Henry Hudson sails up Hudson River in search of the passage; he later explored Hudson Bay, where he presumably met his death after being set adrift by his mutinous crew.
1619: Norwegian Jens Munk's expedition.
1719: James Knight's expedition into the northwest corner of Hudson Bay.
1741: Christopher Middleton's search for the Passage near Wager Bay.
1746: William Moor and Francis Smith's disputatious voyage fails to get much further than York Factory.
1770-2: Samuel Hearne's overland journey to the mouth of the Coppermine River proves that no passage exists south of that point.
1791-1795: The Vancouver Expedition surveys the inland waters of the Northwest Coast, proving that no passage exists south of the Bering Strait.
1818: Sir John Ross circumnavigates Baffin Bay, but returns without venturing into Lancaster Sound.
1819-1820: William Edward Parry, Ross's former second-in-command, enters Lancaster Sound and earns the Parliamentary Prize.
1845: Sir John Franklin's ill-fated expedition departs from Greenhithe.
1903-05: Roald Amundsen makes the first successful voyage through the entire passage in his ship the Gjøa.
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