Photo of the Arctic2 to the right of the photo Bernier
The Arctic was the ship used on Capt. Joseph-Elzéar Bernier’s three consecutive trips to the high Arctic in 1906-07, 1908-09, and 1910-11.
[LAC, PA-209060]

SS Arctic
The Arctic was the first ship purchased by the Dominion government for its Arctic expeditions. It was used for the Expedition to Hudson Bay and Northern Waters in 1904-05, under the Command of JD Moodie.The Arctic is considered small by today’s standards. It was thirty-seven feet wide at the widest mid-section, and 165-feet long, the length of two tractor trailers end to end. It was equipped with special ice propellers, and had a 275-horsepower auxiliary steam engine to assist pushing through ice or when there was no wind. The ship could make seven knots, but rarely travelled faster than four, or a good walking speed. The Arctic’s sides and bottom were over forty-eight inches thick. Its hull was curved, so that when squeezed by the pack ice, the ship would rise out of the ice rather than be crushed by it. The Fram’s hull was of a similar “coconut” shaped design. The ship was ice-strengthened by having more ribs set closer together than the average ship. Steel plates over the bow and stern further protected the ship against impact with the ice.
Its hull was built of oak and pitch pine with a covering of greenheart, a dense hard wood. Bernier had copper sheathing added to the bow and stern for extra protection against ice before it was repainted a battleship grey with white above the waterline.
[LAC, PA-34475]

SS Neptune
The same Neptune used by Lt. A.R. Gordon on his first cruise to Hudson Bay in 1884 was used for Low’s expedition to Hudson Bay and the Arctic Islands in 1903-04. Although, Gordon had not considered the ship ice-worthy enough for his 1885 voyage, the marine experts twenty years later considered the thirty-year-old Neptune fully suitable to overwinter in Hudson Bay and it became the expedition ship.
[LAC, C001764]:

Diana
The sailing steamship Diana was used for the 1897 Hudson Bay expedition under the command of William Wakeham. It was also one of Job Brothers’ sealing vessels, but had been used until 1888 by the Hudson’s Bay Company as a transport ship. The Diana was built by Scottish shipbuilders in 1870. The wooden screw steamer was 151 feet long, seventeen-feet wide, with a sixteen-foot draft. It was of 473 tons gross and 275 tons net. With its two low-pressure cylinder steam engines, it was capable of seventy horsepower, consuming ten tons of coal per day. It was rebuilt in 1891 by its original builders, and reinforced with beams and braces throughout its hold to cope with the ice-floes it would encounter in Arctic regions. Its hull was sheathed with a skin of greenheart or ironwood planking, and its stem shod with bands of iron. Only Fridtjof Nansen’s Fram was said to be more ice-worthy than the Diana.
The 1897 Hudson Bay Expedition consisted of forty-three men.
[LAC, PA-103463]

SS Alert
For the Hudson Bay and Strait expeditions of 1885 and 1886, Department of Marine and Fisheries used the Royal Navy’s steamship Alert. Launched in 1856 as a barque-rigged sloop, and designed as a fighting ship, the Alert was a mighty vessel of 1,340 tons. Larger than the Neptune, it was 160 feet in length, had a thirty-two-foot beam with a fifteen-foot draught. The steamship was fitted with a full sailing ship rig, and constructed with a strong wooden hull that was sheathed in copper. In 1874, when it was refitted for Arctic service for Sir George Nares’ North Pole expedition, its hull was ice-strengthened with felt-covered iron and then sheathed with teak, Canadian elm, and pitch pine below water.
The 1885 expedition was made up of fifty-two men. Forty-three men were on board for the 1886 expedition to Hudson Bay and Strait.
[LAC, C-086373]

SS Neptune
For the 1884 expedition, the Department of Marine and Fisheries chartered the Newfoundland sealing ship the SS Neptune from Job Bros. & Co. for the sum of $16,500. Built in 1873 in Dundee, Scotland, the barque-rigged sailing steamship was constructed of British oak, sheathed with ‘iron-bar’ and covered with greenheart, a dark green, strong, dense wood. The wooden screw steamer was 109.6 feet long, 29.8 feet beam, and had a depth of hold of 18.4 feet. It could carry over 800 tons of coal and cargo. Because the schooner’s three masts were low, it had little sail power, but its steam engines could achieve 110 horsepower, about eight-knots-an-hour; just over nine miles per hour on land, or the speed of a horse’s trot.
In all, fifty-five men were aboard the Neptune for the Hudson Bay and Strait Expedition of 1884.
[LAC, C001764]

Capt. Joseph-Elzéar Bernier (January 1, 1852 - December 26, 1934) commanded three expeditions to the Eastern Arctic- 1906-07, 1908-09, and 1910-11. He raised the flag on the majority of the islands in the Arctic Archipelago, and claimed the entire Arctic for Canada on Dominion Day, July 1, 1909, in a ceremony at Winter Harbour, Melville Island. [Richard Finnie Collection, Library and Archives Canada, accession number 1987-154, PA-207173.]

Superintendent (Major) John Douglas Moodie (1848 - December 6, 1947) of the Northwest Mounted Police commanded the expedition to Hudson Bay in 1904-05 and set up the first police post on Hudson Bay at Fullerton Harbour. He had accompanied Low’s expedition to Fullerton Harbour in 1903-04, and his experience that year resulted in his being appointed to command the 1904-05 expedition.[Geraldine Moodie, Parks Canada, PC-696.10. ]

Geologist Albert Peter Low (May 24, 1861 - October 9, 1942) commanded the expedition to Hudson Bay and the Arctic Islands in 1903-04. His expedition was the first Dominion Government to overwinter in the Arctic in Fullerton Harbour on Hudson Bay. He also raised the flag on a number of islands in the Eastern Arctic as a show of sovereignty. [Natural Resources Canada 2013, courtesy of the Geological Survey of Canada, GSC 72071.]

Lieut. Andrew Robertson Gordon (February 13, 1851 - March 24, 1893) commanded the three Hudson Bay and Strait Expeditions of 1884, 1885, and 1886, to determine the length of time that the Hudson Bay and Strait would be navigable as a shipping route. [Thomas E. Appleton Collection, Library and Archives Canada, e010691139.]

Dr. William Wakeham (November 30, 1844 - May 20, 1915) commanded the expedition to Hudson Strait and Cumberland Gulf aboard the Diana in 1897 to determine if the length of time that the Hudson Bay and Strait would be navigable as a shipping route was longer than Gordon had suggested. He was also requested to notify whalers in Cumberland Sound off Baffin Island that they were in Canadian Territory.[William James Topley,Topley Series C, Library and Archives Canada, accession number 1936-270,C-75709.]