Sir George Back, an English navigator, born at Stockport, Nov. 6, 1796. He entered the royal navy in 1808, was for five years a French prisoner of war, subsequently served on the Trent, Lieutenant Commander John Franklin, and accompanied Capt. David Buchan on an expedition to Spitzbergen. In 1819 he accompanied Sir John Franklin's expedition from the western shore of Hudson bay to the northern coast of America, near the Coppermine river. The party reached Fort Enterprise in July, 1820, and determined to winter there, while Mr. Back returned to Fort Chipewyan (a distance of 500 miles), to obtain fresh supplies. He acquitted himself of this duty after undergoing the most terrible hardships from cold and hunger, and rejoined his party in March, 1821. The expedition returned to York Factory in 1822, and early in 1825 Lieut. Back joined Franklin's second expedition, designed to cooperate with Beechey and Parry in their efforts to discover from opposite quarters the northwest passage. He penetrated as far as lat. 70° 24' N., lon. 149° 37' W.; and on Franklin's setting out from Great Bear lake, on the return of the expedition, he was left in charge of the remaining officers and men at Fort Franklin. On the breaking up of the ice he started for York Factory, and thence set sail for England, where he arrived in 1827. In 1833 he took charge of the party sent out in search of Sir John Ross, and was exposed to hardships and perils no less appalling than on the previous expeditions.

Receiving intelligence of Ross's safety, he returned home in 1835, obtained his post rank, and in June, 1830, took command of the Terror on a fresh Arctic voyage, but without accomplishing anything. He was knighted in 1837, and made rear admiral in 1857. He has published a "Narrative of the Arctic Land Expedition," etc. (London, 1836), and a "Narrative of the Expedition in II. M. ship Terror" (1838).