As affecting the fate of my absent husband: Selected Letters of Lady Franklin Concerning the Search for the Lost Franklin Expedition 1848-1860

From her optimistic requests to whaling ships to her persistent demands for Admiralty aid Lady Franklin played a crucial role in the search for her husband. Her correspondence with British prime ministers members of Parliament lords of the Admiralty and a US president presents a private domestic side to a national tragedy and sheds new light on what Sir John Franklin's disappearance meant to England its public and its sense of itself as an imperial power. With comprehensive annotations a descriptive timeline and an introduction that outlines the significance of Lady Franklin's contribution to the "Arctic debate" As affecting the fate of my absent husband is a convincing portrait of the surprisingly disruptive effects - on both the public consciousness and the government bureaucracy - of a single eloquent voice of dissent.As affecting the fate of my absent husband is essential reading not only for anyone interested in Victorian adventure and the Arctic but as an introduction to one of the most fascinating women of the nineteenth century.