#there were supernatural shenanigans afoot and some are immortal who am i to say

[meduseld]

Please drop the Fairholme party composition please

Lol okay so bear in mind this is part grounded part me being unhinged. But, if you go back to episode 3, we get some firm details: the party is repeatedly refered to as being an 8 member party (there is a shot of them later that only appears to show 7 men but one could be scouting ahead, more on that in bit) and it takes its shape from Crozier's original idea with of course Fairholme taking his place as lead and crucially, Crozier says specifically to "swap in two marines".

That gives us a very clear head start when narrowing down. 8 men, one of which is Fairholme and two of which are marines. Given the real marines manifest AND the show giving eliminating all but two candidates (all the others still living are either shown or mentioned with the ships AFTER episode 3) it has to be Privates Joseph Healey (29, from Manchester) and William Reed (28, Bristol). Which working backwards can be justified narratively, they are both Erebus marines thus familiar with Fairholme and his command, as well as older despite being privates. Plus their boss just got brutally murdered, oof.

So what about the other five? We can infer a couple of things. First in the script Crozier was considering taking both Hickey (a petty officer) and Wentzell (an AB) which means both petty officers and ABs are up for grabs. Second, the composition of Gore's party was pretty similar so we can use it as a template. Gore was also 8 men, himself, ONE marine (Bryant), one officer (CDV), one petty officer (Peglar) one medical (Goodsir) and three ABs (Best, Morfin and Tartnell).

With that in mind, we can pretty much confirm he'd be given another 3 ABs, which brings us to six members of Fairholme's party. These were likely whoever Crozier had picked (in the scripts he decides against Wentzell, who we know stays on the ships, and as expanded on below, he wouldn't be able to take them from Erebus). There are enough not accounted for directly in show or shown post ep 3 to pick from. Lets assume Crozier would give him men that were experienced but not "old" so in their late 20s, early 30s.

I basically picked these bc with that starting point: William Jerry (29, Pembroke and veteran of Ross' Antartic journey thus likely on Crozier's list), John Handford (28, Sunderland) and Charles Johnson (28, Halifax. Yes Nova Scotia. That's why him).

For the final two we know that he wasn't spared any medical officers, and that he almost certainly was not spared any other non-petty officers even warrant ones for two reasons: we see the fate of a lot of them in the show but also Erebus just lost a ton of their command structure: Sir John, Gore and now Fairholme as well as their highest ranked Marine. Crozier needs officers, and especially JFJ needs officers and some kind of sense of normalcy on Erebus so they would probably want to minimize taking even more after a Lt and TWO Marines. Not to mention, Sir John's funeral looks to be attended by enough non-petty officers to support this.

So two petty officers, and for balance let's assume one from Terror and one from Erebus. I assume JFJ would have lobbied for this as well. Presumably you would want to minimize the psychological impact or fighting that could happen from the men thinking the break up was "unfair". Four men a ship tracks, even if there were likely still grumblings about who (Erebites were probably pissed as hell Terror mostly lost ABs and so on). Then there is another factor. We pretty much know that at this point Crozier has 0 hope they are getting out via ships, and that petty officers like Peglar are pretty much idle since their jobs depend on them actually sailing. Factor in that they need to be men we don't see after ep 3 and my votes are for, after checking who is around and their ages-experience:

The Erebus Captain of the Foretop (Peglar's opposite number) Robert Sinclair, 25, of Kirkwall.

The Terror's Captain of the Forecastle (in charge of the anchors as well as the head sails) Reuben Male, 27, of Woolwich.

Despite their ages, both those men had years of service aboard ships. Not to mention it's a relatively balanced pick in similar positions that they can spare. Also keeping the repeating and similar names that this show is so famous for.

Finally, look it:

Fairholme seems to be hauling w his men, a good officer like Gore. There are only seven men in the image which could just be an error but. Let's assume they sent someone ahead to scout, possibly Jerry. I almost would have assumed the other Marine, but one of the haulers looks to be in Marine dress so. By the by, historical Sinclair was apparently only 5'5'' so let's assume he is the short king at the end of the right hand side haulers.

Thank you for joining me in my descent into madness, see you next time