Arctic explorer Dr John Rae is honoured
Orkney Islands Council has posthumously bestowed the Freedom of Orkney on the 19th Century Arctic explorer Dr John Rae.
He was born on the island in 1813 and surveyed huge areas of Arctic coastline with the Hudson Bay Company.
His revelations about the fate of Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated expedition to the Northwest Passage were controversial, but the council said it was right to honour him.
John Rae left no descendants, so the Freedom was accepted by a great great great grand niece.
ABERDEEN