The main pack continuing to press against the grounded bergs, precluding all chance of our escape, Jan. 14.I determined to run the ships into the ice, and endeavour to heave them through it; for the hole of water in which we were shut up, was so completely covered with young ice, I began to have serious apprehensions of the ships being frozen in; and both Captain Crozier and Commander Bird agreed with me in the necessity of the measure. The wind also favouring our intention, we entered the pack at 1.15. p.m., and continued warping, heaving, and boring through it until 9 p.m., when it became so close that we could not move them another inch. When the tide turned, the ice slackened a little, and our labours were renewed; and being calm in the afternoon of the next day Jan. 15.we made encouraging progress, but at 9 p.m. the ice as far as we could see was most closely packed; and its pressure against the land was so great as to heel our ships over considerably and make their timbers crack.
We remained closely beset, and sustaining severe pressure until 4 p.m. on the 16th, when the Jan. 16.floe to which we were fast, striking against a grounded berg, broke up into many pieces, by one of which the Terror was carried off to a distance of several miles from us without our being able to move the ships their own length, the tide sweeping us away in different directions, and thick weather succeeding, we lost sight of her for some hours.
