Sir William Edward Parry, an English navigator, born in Bath, Dec. 19, 1790, died in Ems, Germany, July 8, 1855. He entered the navy in 1803, and became a midshipman in 1806, serving in the Baltic fleet. In 1810 he was commissioned lieutenant, and sailed to the polar seas about the North cape, where he corrected the admiralty charts of those waters. On the breaking out of the war between Great Britain and the United States he was sent to the North American station, where he remained till 1817, when he joined the arctic expedition of Capt. John Ross as commander of the Alexander, consort of the Isabella, Ross's ship. They left England in April, 1818, and proceeded to Lancaster sound, which they navigated for about 60 m., when Ross, imagining that he saw the way closed before them by a range of mountains, gave orders to return. Parry freely expressed his conviction that the range of mountains was an optical illusion; and as the public generally coincided in this opinion, it was determined in the spring of 1819 to equip a new expedition under his command. With the Hecla, 375 tons, aud the Griper gun brig, 180 tons, under Lieut. Lid-don, he reached Lancaster sound July 30, and sailed through it.

He explored and named Barrow strait, Prince Regent inlet, and Wellington channel, and, entering the water which has since been called Parry or Melville sound, reached on Sept. 4 Ion. 110° W., thereby earning a reward of £5,000 offered by parliament to the first ship's company which should attain that meridian. He wintered at Melville island, and his expedients to preserve the health and spirits of his crews during the long arctic night were scarcely less deserving of mention than his achievements as a discoverer. Exercise was rigorously enforced, all possible precautions were taken against scurvy, and a newspaper and theatre were provided as amusements. On Aug. 2, 1820, after being frozen in for 10 months, the ships were released; but the ice precluded the hope of further progress westward, and Parry returned to England. He was promoted to the rank of commander and elected a member of the royal society, and the narrative of his adventures was published by order of the admiralty. In May, 1821, Parry sailed again with the Fury, accompanied by Capt. Lyon in the Hecla. They were twice frozen in for several months, but made many explorations and discoveries by sea and land. (See Arctic Discovery.) Returning, he arrived at Brassa sound, Shetland, Oct. 10, 1823. During his absence he had been made post captain (Nov. 8, 1821); and in December, 1823, he was appointed acting hydrographer to the admiralty.

His "Journal of a Second Voyage for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage " was published by the admiralty in 1824. The results of these voyages encouraged fur-ther search, and the Hecla and Fury were consequently refitted as speedily as possible. In May, 1824, Capt. Parry sailed again in the Hecla, with Capt. Hoppner in the Fury under his orders. His plan was to pass through Prince Regent inlet, but winter overtook him almost at the entrance of that channel; and soon after the ice broke up, July 20, 1825, his vessels were caught in the drift and carried down the inlet. On Aug. 21 the Fury was driven ashore, and so badly damaged that she had to be abandoned. Her crew and stores were transferred to the Hecla, and Capt. Parry returned to England, having accomplished little or nothing. His "Journal of a Third Voyage for the Discovery of the Northwest Passage " appeared in 1826. He now turned his attention to a plan originally proposed by Scoresby for reaching the pole in boats that could be fitted to sledges, and set sail in the Hecla, March 27, 1827, for Spitzbergen. Here the vessel was left in harbor with a part of the crew, while the remainder, led by Capt. Parry and Lieut. James C. Ross, set out for the pole in two boats, June 20. These boats were framed of ash and hickory, covered with water-proof canvas, over which were successive planks of fir and oak, with a sheet of stout felt interposed.

They were flat-bottomed inside, and had runners so that they could be used as sledges. The adventurers sailed through an open sea for about 80 m., and then found, instead of a solid plain of ice, a surface half covered with water, on which walking and sailing were almost equally difficult. With immense labor they reached lat. 82° 45' N., the nearest point to the pole as yet attained by any expedition. At the end of September they arrived in England, where Capt. Parry published his "Narrative of an Attempt to reach the North Pole in Boats fitted for the Purpose" (1827), and resumed his duties as hydrographer to the admiralty. On April 29, 1829, he was knighted at the same time with Sir John Franklin. Both also received from the university of Oxford the degree of D. 0. L. Parry was appointed commissioner of the Australian agricultural company, and passed five years at Port Stephens, about 90 m. from Sydney. Returning to England in 1834, he was appointed assistant poor-law commissioner for the county of Norfolk; was employed by the admiralty in 1837 to organize the packet service between Liverpool, Holyhead, and Dublin; and in April of the same year received the newly created office of comptroller of steam machinery for the royal navy.

He retired from active service in December, 1846, with the appointment of captain-superintendent of the royal Clarence yard and of the naval hospital at Has-lar near Portsmouth. In 1852 he was obliged to vacate this office on attaining the rank of rear admiral of the white, and in 1853 he was made lieutenant governor of Greenwich hospital. He wrote a treatise on " Nautical Astronomy by Night," " The Parental Character of God," and a " Lecture on Seamen." His life has been written by his son, the Rev. E. Parry (London, 1857).