The note has two entries.
The first entry is dated May 28, 1847, and was written and signed by Lieutenant Graham Gore and Mate Charles Des Voeux. It reports that HMS Erebus and HMS Terror were wintering in the ice at latitude 70°05′ N, longitude 98°23′ W. The note says the ships had spent the first winter of the expedition at Beechey Island, that they had sailed north up Wellington Channel to latitude 77° before returning south along the west side of Cornwallis Island, and that all was well. The tone is matter-of-fact and positive.
The second entry is dated April 25, 1848. It is written in the margins of the original form, crowding around the first entry in a way that reflects the absence of fresh paper in a deteriorating situation. This entry is in a different hand — that of James Fitzjames.
Fitzjames’s addition to the note records: the ships had been beset since September 12, 1846. Sir John Franklin died on June 11, 1847. The total losses to that date were nine officers and fifteen men. The 105 surviving officers and crew were abandoning the ships on April 22, 1848, under Captain Francis Crozier as senior officer. They intended to march south, toward Back’s Fish River — a route that, if completed, would have brought them approximately 500 miles across some of the most inhospitable terrain on earth to the nearest Hudson’s Bay Company post.
The note was co-signed by Fitzjames, identified as “Captain, H.M.S. Erebus,” and by Captain Francis Crozier, identified as “Captain & Senior Officer.”