Northwest Passage

Northwest Passage, inland water routes along the north coast of North America linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. John Cabot explored the coast around Newfoundland in 1497, thinking it was China; Henry Hudson sailed to Hudson Bay and beyond (1609–11); William Baffin and Robert Bylot sailed up Davis Strait an found a passage between Baffin Island and Greenland (1616). Explorations opened up important new lands, but not until Robert McClure's expedition of 1850–54 was the existence of a passage weaving among the Arctic islands proved. The first complete journey was made when Roald Amundsen sailed west from Baffin Bay through Lancaster Sound (1903–06). The first west-to-east journey was accoplished by a ship of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, St. Roch, in 1942.