Edward Adams (surgeon)

For other people with similar names, see Edward Adams (disambiguation).

Edward Adams (24 February 1824 – 12 November 1856) was an English Royal Navy officer, naval surgeon, naturalist, artist and Arctic explorer.

Edward Adams
Born	(1824-02-24)24 February 1824 Great Barton, Suffolk, England
Died	12 November 1856(1856-11-12) (aged 32) Sierra Leone, West Africa
Branch	Royal Navy
Service years	1847–1856
Rank	Assistant surgeon
Postings	Royal Hospital Haslar Naval Hospital Devonport HMS Investigator HMS Enterprise
Expeditions	Ross expedition (1848) Collinson expedition (1850)

Early life and career

Adams was born at Great Barton, near Bury St Edmunds, on 24 February 1824. He became interested in natural history as a child. He qualified as a surgeon in April 1847, and in August of the same year became an assistant surgeon at the Royal Hospital Haslar in Gosport, Hampshire, before securing a transfer to the Naval Hospital in Devonport three months later.

Arctic exploration

Ross expedition

In 1848, four months after his transfer to Devonport, he volunteered to join Sir James Clark Ross on his Arctic expedition to search for traces of Sir John Franklin's missing Northwest Passage expedition. Adams was aboard HMS Investigator under Captain Edward Joseph Bird. They left in May 1848, but returned 18 months later without success.

Collinson expedition

In January 1850, Adams left on another expedition to look for Franklin. This time he was aboard HMS Enterprise under Captain Richard Collinson. They reached the Bering Strait in August, and Adams was put ashore at St. Michael, just north of the Yukon delta, to investigate reports of possible survivors from Franklin's crew. He rejoined the Enterprise in July 1851, sailing east below Banks Island and Victoria Island, and penetrating further east than any ship previously. They returned to England in 1855.

Sierra Leone

Adams passed his full naval surgeon's exams, and travelled to west Africa in May 1856, on board the steamship Hecla. He died there of typhus, and was buried at Sierra Leone.

In naming the yellow-billed loon, English zoologist George Robert Gray honoured by Adams naming its species epithet after him: Gavia adamsii.

References

Bibliography

• Adams, E. (October 1878). "Notes on the birds of Michalaski, Norton Sound". Ibis. 20 (4): 420–422. doi:10.1111/j.1474-919X.1878.tb07055.x.
• Barr, W. (2007). Arctic Hell-Ship: the voyage of HMS Enterprise, 1850–1855. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press. ISBN 9780888644725.