Forgotten Gift of Royalty

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 13 February 1926, Page 11

Forgotten Gift of Royalty

A LOYAL gift, recently found in the Arctic, provides the latest mystery of the Frozen North.

Apparently a present from Queen Victoria to a Polar explorer, the questions still unanswered are: To whom did it belong 1 How did it get to the lonely spot where it has been lost for anything up to fifty years. It is a part of a leather case, bearing the British Grown, with the Royal cypher “Y.R.1." in gold on the front. It was found by Dr. Livingstone, of the Canadian Department of the Interior, while out with a Government Arctic Expedition party at Pirn Island in Smith Sound, latitude 78 deg. 45 min. north. *

Experts on both sides of the Atlantic are busy trying to solve the mystery of the owner, only to find that it deepens at every step.

Admiral Sir George Egerton, who is helping in the research, has communicated the known facts and many theories to the Royal Geographical Societv.

A first suggestion was that the ease

was lost there by one of the officers of Nares Arctic Expedition of tS7S, which was sent out b yrhc British Government. The ships were the Alert and Discovery, and Sir George Egcrton was a member of that party. But Queen Victoria was not “Imperatrix’ ’ until the Boyal Titles Act was passed in 1876, the year of the return of Nares, and it is extremely unlikely that she'would use the '• Y.8.T.” on a gift before that date. Sir George Egerton now suggests that the first conclusion of the Canadian experts cannot be correct.

Sir Frederick Ponsonby has examined the Queen’s private accounts for trace of such a gift, without success. Now the society wants to know if any visit to the north-western extremity of Pirn Island has been recorded before Dr. Livingstone went there, and whether there is any similar case in existence.

The relic appears to be part of a spectacle case for carrying snowgoggles.