The Clarence Islands are a Canadian Arctic island group in the Nunavut

Nunavut

Nunavut is the largest and newest federal territory of Canada; it was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the Nunavut Act and the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement Act, though the actual boundaries had been established in 1993...

 Territory. The islands lie in the James Ross Strait

James Ross Strait

James Ross Strait, an arm of the Arctic Ocean, is a channel between King William Island and the Boothia Peninsula in the Canadian province of Nunavut. long, and to wide, it connects M'Clintock Channel to the Rae Strait to the south...

, 10 mi (16.1 km) east of Cape Felix, off the northeast coast of King William Island

King William Island

King William Island is an island in the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut and forms part of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. In area it is between and making it the 61st largest island in the world and Canada's 15th largest island...

. They are approximately 40 km (24.9 mi) west of Kent Bay on the Boothia Peninsula

Boothia Peninsula

Boothia Peninsula is a large peninsula in Nunavut's northern Canadian Arctic, south of Somerset Island. The northern part, Murchison Promontory, is the northernmost point of mainland Canada, and thus North America....

, and approximately 40 km (24.9 mi) northwest of the Tennent Islands.

History

Captain (Sir) John Ross

John Ross (Arctic explorer)

Sir John Ross, CB, was a Scottish rear admiral and Arctic explorer.Ross was the son of the Rev. Andrew Ross, minister of Inch, near Stranraer in Scotland. In 1786, aged only nine, he joined the Royal Navy as an apprentice. He served in the Mediterranean until 1789 and then in the English Channel...

 commanded the Victory during his second Arctic exploration (1829—1833), partly in order to regain credibility after charting a fictional landform, Croker Mountains, during his first Arctic expedition. He chose his nephew, Commander James Clark Ross

James Clark Ross

Sir James Clark Ross , was a British naval officer and explorer. He explored the Arctic with his uncle Sir John Ross and Sir William Parry, and later led his own expedition to Antarctica.-Arctic explorer:...

, to be second in command.

In 1830, while exploring within the Ross Strait, James Ross charted three islands. He named the group "Beaufort Islands" after Capt. Francis Beaufort

Francis Beaufort

Rear-Admiral Sir Francis Beaufort, FRS, FRGS was an Irish hydrographer and officer in Britain's Royal Navy...

, hydrographer

Hydrography

Hydrography is the measurement of the depths, the tides and currents of a body of water and establishment of the sea, river or lake bed topography and morphology. Normally and historically for the purpose of charting a body of water for the safe navigation of shipping...

 of the Admiralty

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, and named the individual islands Adolphus Island, Frederick Island, and Augustus Island, these also being the names of three sons of the Duke of Clarence

William IV of the United Kingdom

William IV was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of Hanover from 26 June 1830 until his death...

. John Ross did not see the "Beaufort Islands".

Upon returning to England in 1833, the expedition's members learned that the Duke of Clarence had ascended to the throne in 1830, becoming King William IV. John Ross reviewed his expedition's chart book with Capt. Beaufort and with the new king. With the notation "changed by His Majesty's command" included, John Ross made changes to the chart: he added six islands and three capes, all with royal Clarence and Fitz-Clarence family names (including Munster Island, Falkland Island, Erskine Island, Fox Island, Errol Island, Cape Sophia, Cape Sidney, and Cape Mary), and renamed the island group "Clarence Islands". While as leader of the expedition, John Ross had authority to name newly charted landforms as he wished, he did not receive authority to add fictional landforms to navigation chart books.

Lady Jane Franklin documented in her diary a meeting she had with Capt. Beaufort regarding the controversial chart book changes:

Captain B. asked me if Sir John's ire had abated against (James) Ross, and he (Captain B.) seemed much tickled at this subject - he was not one he said to take away a man's fair character, but there were some things that ought to be held up to reprobation, and he was now going to tell me a good story. He had the book brought him and he asked me how many islands I counted in the Clarence group. I counted 9 - 3 I said were lilac, and the others white. "Well", says he, "there are but 3, and when the chart was first shown to me, there were only 3 marked down, but Ross having proposed to the King to call them the Clarence Islands, 'Yes, yes,' said the King, 'call them the Clarence islands', and then Ross thought it would be as well to make a few more, so that the Clarences and Fitzclarences might have one apiece." The story was afterwards confirmed to Sir John by Capt. James Ross, who said that his uncle had never seen the islands, had never been there and that it was he, Capt. James, who laid down in the map the true original number.