Harry Peglar
Henry Peter Peglar was an English seaman who served in the Royal Navy. He served as Captain of the Foretop, a Petty Officer rank, on HMS Terror during the 1845 Franklin Expedition, which sought to chart the Canadian Arctic, find the Northwest Passage, and make scientific observations. All expedition personnel died, including Peglar, mostly on and around King William Island. While Peglar's remains have not been identified, several of his personal effects were found with a skeleton by Francis Leopold McClintock, which are among the only written materials known to belong to members of the expedition. Earlier in his career, he engaged in anti-slavery operations in West Africa and served in the First Opium War.
Biography
Early life and education
Harry Peglar was born to John and Sarah Peglar on 22 February 1812 and was baptized on 29 November 1813 alongside his sister Elizabeth, who had been born in 1810. His father was a gunsmith working at 12 Buckingham Row, Petty France, City of Westminster, England. John Peglar was a political radical who voted for Francis Burdett.Harry Peglar was received by the Marine Society, a charitable organization for helping destitute boys and training seamen, on 4 August 1825. When admitted, he was already able to read and write, having possibly received an early education at the Blewcoat School, which was near his father's address.
Naval career
Training and preparations
In September 1825, one month after his admittance into the Marine Society, Peglar was sent to HMS Solebay, a shoreside training station where he was initiated into the navy, being trained in rowing, going aloft, managing sails, making knots and splices, using equipment such as the compass, and working guns and other arms, as well as in reading, writing, habituation to subordination and naval discipline, and religious instruction, going to Deptford Church on Sundays. As with the other seamen, he was provided with an abridged bible, a prayer book, and a full set of clothes and equipment.The Caribbean
Peglar was discharged "with a good character" from Solebay on 14 December 1825, and sent aboard the tender Star to join HMS Clio, stationed in the Chatham Dockyard. Aboard Clio, he served as a supernumerary for victuals as the ship travelled to Portsmouth. He was then transferred to HMS Magnificent, a hospital ship, where he was rated as Boy, supernumerary for wages and victuals, working in the sick quarters. He sailed to Plymouth and then on to Port Royal, Jamaica, where Magnificent became employed as a store ship under Lieutenant John Mundell.The next Royal Navy ship on which Peglar definitively served was the 6th Rate 28-gun HMS Rattlesnake, which travelled throughout the Caribbean in 1826 and 1827. After leaving Magnificent, Peglar had written "tern over to H.M. Hulk Serreapis Commander Ellott ," referring to HMS Serapis, stationed in Port Royal under command of John Elliot. Despite this, Peglar's name does not appear in Serapis
England 1827
On 3 September 1827, only days after returning to England, Peglar joined the ship HMS Perseus, stationed at the Tower of London and commanded by Captain James Crouch. Perseus was a depot ship that served only to collect men to make up the complements of ships in commission. On 14 September, Peglar was sent to HMS Prince Regent, stationed in Chatham and commanded by George Poulett. Peglar was discharged from Prince Regent for an unknown reason, his record explained that he did something to an apprentice, but the details are no longer legible.East India Company and Coast Blockade
After being discharged, Peglar entered the service the East India Company, and sailed under Thomas Larkins aboard the Marquis Camden, bound for St. Helena, as it was bringing Brigadier General Charles Dallas, who was appointed governor. Dallas, his wife, and three daughters landed on St. Helena on 29 April 1828 under a salute of thirteen guns which the crew of the ship manned. Marquis Camden then continued on its scheduled trip to Bombay and China. Shortly after leaving St. Helena, Peglar wrote that Marquis Camden was struck by lightning, which killed a sergeant and private. The ship then called upon the Paracels and Singapore, and visited Krakatoa before returning by St. Helena and returning to The Downs by the English Channel on 7 July 1829. All men were discharged two days later.A Coast Blockade ship in The Downs called Ramillies was the next ship on which Peglar served. The duty of the ship was to investigate smuggling between England and France. Ramillies was known for having been a ship on which Hugh Pigot had previously served 1361 lashes to only 28 men in one morning, bringing the number to 2000 over the next few months. Peglar spent minimal time on Ramillies, and was moved to HMS Antelope, the ship's tender to Ramillies, engaged in the same work.
First return to the Royal Navy, second service with the East India Company
Peglar returned to the Royal Navy aboard HMS Talavera, a 3rd Rate, 74-gun ship that operated out of Sheerness. Hugh Pigot, who had commanded Ramillies had been put in charge of Talavera on 15 September 1829. Peglar wrote to be discharged from Talavera, and was successful in getting it.Successfully out of the Royal Navy again, he rejoined Thomas Larkins aboard Marquis Camden which sailed for St Helena, Bombay, Penang, Singapore, and Macau. He served from 14 February 1832 until he was discharged 31 May 1833. He did not mention this service in his report due to it being unsatisfactory: he was disrated to ordinary seaman in January 1833, confined in irons, and punished with two dozen lashes for drunkenness and mutinous conduct. In his account he noted only one event, when the schooner Royal Tiger fired upon the poop deck of Marquis Camden, killing the Chief Mate John Fenn, who was buried the next day on shore.
Second return to the Royal Navy
Peglar joined, on 4 April 1834, the 18-gun brig-sloop HMS Gannet, which sailed first into the Mediterranean before crossing the Atlantic for four years’ service in North America and the West Indies. Peglar's service may again have been unsatisfactory, as he was rated initially as Captain of the Foretop, a senior petty officer, but served as lesser rates including gunner's crew and captain's coxswain, ending his service as an able seaman. Also aboard Gannet was Thomas Armitage, who would later serve alongside Peglar as gunroom steward aboard Terror, and who was believed to be the man whose skeleton was found with Peglar's items. Two other future Franklin expedition men, Charles Hamilton Osmer and James Walter Fairholme, served aboard Gannet at the same time as Peglar.In February 1838, Peglar was discharged from Gannet, and joined HMS Temeraire at Sheerness as an able seaman. His service was unremarkable, and Sir John Hill recorded his conduct as "indifferent." Peglar then served briefly aboard HMS Ocean, where he entered as an able seaman and rated up to Captain of the Forecastle. He turned over to the sloop HMS Wanderer, keeping his position as Captain of the Forecastle.
HMS ''Wanderer''
Anti-slavery operations
Peglar transferred to Wanderer on 3 December 1839, which sailed for the Caribbean in 1840. Thereafter, Wanderer was employed along the West Coast of Africa, where she fought against the slave trade. Britain had abolished the slave trade in 1807, and since 1808 had employed Royal Navy ships to engage in anti-slavery patrol. Between 1808 and 1860, the West Africa Squadron seized as many as 1600 ships involved in the slave trade and freed up to 150,000 Africans. The work was dangerous, as the ships were rarely made for coastal, river, and swamp operation, and disease and fever were common. The foundations of anti-slavery activity helped redefine the Navy's sense of purpose and frame British conceptions of the civilizing mission.Since 17 November 1839, Wanderer was commanded by Joseph Denman, who managed the ship between Cape Verde and Cape Palmas, Liberia. Due to the activity there, Denman as captain of the Wanderer made treaties with local chiefs and expelled slave-traders before moving on to Sierra Leone where up to 200 slaves were emancipated. Most of the slave ships operating in the area of Sierra Leone and Liberia were registered under Spanish flags, but were owned and operated by American and British slave traders who were pushed to operate in Africa because of domestic laws that banned the slave trade. In 1840, while Peglar was serving aboard, the crew of Wanderer destroyed the last two great slave-processing factories in Western Africa. In May 1840 Wanderer crew mounted a raid and destroyed eight slave depots, freeing 800 slaves bound for Cuba and captured fifteen slaving ships. These operations were the first time direct action was taken against slave camps on land, rather than intercepting ships as they left or entered harbours. The men of Wanderer had to wade through brackish and muddy water, sleep in bogs, and wear perpetually damp clothing, with malaria an ever-present threat that disabled sixteen of the men.
British MP Matthew Forster, who wanted to expand his Gambia-based merchant business, argued against Denman's testimony that Britain should not colonize the coast and declared the destruction of the factories illegal, which led to the slave traders suing Denman and British policy to cease being as aggressive in anti-slavery activity as Denman had wanted.