Exploration is risky business

Exploration is risky business. That's what can be seen from the fate of the persons below. All of them died during one of their voyages of exploration. Of each is given the place and year of death as well as its cause (if I have been able to find the second). Not included are people who died after getting back home from illnesses, wounds or other problems met during their travels. For some of these explorers the place of death or the cause of death given here are not certain, but only the most probable guesses.

Thorvald Eriksson (North America, ca. 1004): Killed in a fight with indians.
Master Philippus (Palestina, 1177): Disappeared while looking for prester-king John.
Thomas of Tolentino, James of Padua, Peter of Siena and Demetrius (near Bombay, 1321): Burned for blasphemy against Muhammad.
Jaime Ferrer (West Africa, 1346): Disappeared.
Nuño Tristão (Gambia, 1447): Died on the first day of his return voyage as a result of poison arrows.
John Cabot (North America, 1498?): Possibly disappeared on his second voyage.
Bartolomeu Dias (off South Africa, 1500): Lost in a storm during Cabral's voyage to India.
Gaspar Corte-Real (North America, 1501): Disappeared
Miguel Corte-Real (North America, 1502): Disappeared while looking for his brother
Juan de la Cosa (near Cartagena, Colombia, 1510): Dies from wounds of poison darts.
Afonso de Albuquerque (Goa, India, 1515): Died of an illness while his ship, coming back from Hormuz, was in the port of Goa.
Juan Diaz de Solis (Rio de la Plata, 1516): Killed by Indians.
Vasco Nunez de Balboa (Acla, Panama, 1519): Beheaded on accusations of treason.
Alonso Alvarez de Pineda (Pánuco, Mexico, 1520): Killed in a fight with Huastec Indians.
Juan Ponce de Leon (Florida, 1521): Died from an arrow wound.
Ferdinand Magellan (Mactan, Philippines, 1521): Killed in a fight with the sultan of Mactan.
Duarte Barbosa (Cebu, Philippines, 1521): Treacherously killed by the raja of Cebu.
Rodrigo de Bastidas (Carribean Sea, 1526): Dysentery.
García de Loaisa and Juan Sebastián de Elcano (Pacific, 1526)
Pánfilo de Narváez (Gulf of Mexico, 1528): Drowned near the mouth of the Mississippi.
Giovanni da Verrazano (Guadeloupe, 1528): Killed and eaten by Caribs.
Alvaro de Saavedra Céron (Pacific, 1528): Died at sea in an attempt to sail back from the Spiceries to Mexico
Diego de Almagro (Cuzco, Peru, 1538): Beheaded after losing a war about Cuzco to the Pizarro family.
Hernando de Soto (near Natchez, Mississippi, 1542): Fever.
Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo (San Miguel Island, California, 1543): Complications of a broken leg, suffered in an Indian attack.
Pedro de Valdivia (Chili, ca. 1545): Killed in a fight with indians.
Francisco de Orellana (Amazon, Brazil, 1546)
Saint Francis Xavier (Shangchuan Island, China, 1552): Fever.
Hugh Willoughby (Murmansk, Russia, 1554): His expedition was forced to winter without preparations against the cold.
Richard Chancellor (Aberdour Bay, Scotland, 1556): Died on shipwreck returning from his second voyage.
Humphrey Gilbert (Atlantic, 1583): Lost at sea in foul weather.
Timofeyevich Yermak (Irtysh river, Siberia, 1584): Drowned while trying to reach his boats after being surprised by a Tartar ambush.
Thomas Cavendish (South Atlantic, 1592): Died at sea during an attempt to make a second circumnavigation.
Alvaro de Mendaña de Nehra (Santa Cruz, 1595): Fevers.
Francis Drake (off Panama, 1596): Dysentery.
Willem Barents (Barents Sea, 1597): Scurvy and general weakness.
Jacques Mahu (Atlantic, 1598): Fevers.
Sebald de Weert (Batticaloa, Ceylon, 1602): Killed in a struggle when the king of Ceylon tries to imprison him.
John Davis (Bintang Island, near Singapore, 1605): Killed by Japanese pirates.
Bento de Goes (Jiuquan, China, 1607): Exhaustion, or possibly poisoning.
Henry Hudson (Hudson Bay, Canada, 1611): Left afloat in a shallop by mutineers.
Etienne Brulé (Canada, 1632): Killed by Hurons for unknown reasons
Jacques Marquette (Illinois, 1675): Dysentery.
René Robert Cavelieur, Sieur de La Salle (eastern Texas, 1687): Murdered by his own men.
Louis Jolliet (Gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada, 1700)
James Knight (Marble Island, Canada, 1721)
Vitus Bering (Bering Island, Siberia, 1741): Another scurvy victim.
Marion du Fresne (New Zealand, 1773): Killed by Maoris.
James Cook (Hawaii, 1779): Killed in a skirmish with Hawaiians.
Francisco Garcés (mouth of Gila, Arizona, 1781): Killed in an Indian revolt.
Jean François de la Pérouse (Vanikoro Island, Santa Cruz, 1788): Shipwreck
John Ledyard (Cairo, Egypt, 1788)
Daniel Houghton (West Africa, 1791): Robbed by his Moor guides, left alone and died, either from his wounds or of starvation.
Antoine Raymond d'Entrecasteaux (at sea near Java, 1793): Dysentery and scurvy.
Francisco José de Lacerda (Southern Africa, 1798)
Friedrich Hornemann (Nigeria, 1801?): Disappeared after departure from Tripoli in 1799, probably died in Nigeria in 1801, possibly of dysentery.
Nicolas Baudin (Port Louis, Mauritius, 1803): Died of illness on the way home from Australia.
Henry Nicholls (Guinea, 1805): Fevers.
Mungo Park (near Bussa, Nigeria, 1806): Drowned while trying to flee from an attack by locals.
George Drouillard (Three Forks, Montana, 1809): Murdered and mutilated by Blackfoot Indians.
Johann Ludwig Burckhardt (Cairo, Egypt, 1817): Died of dysentery while preparing to depart for Timbuktu.
Walter Oudney (Senegal, 1824): Illness.
Alexander Gordon Laing (near Timbuktu, Mali, 1826): Murdered by his guide.
Hugh Clapperton (Sokoto, Nigeria, 1827): Illness.
Jedediah Strong Smith (near Cimarron River, US, 1831): Killed in a surprise attack by Comanches.
Thomas Simpson (near Red River, Canada, 1840): Went mad and killed himself and two others.
John Franklin (King William Island, Canada, 1847)
Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Leichhardt (Australia, 1848?): Disappeared, probably in or around the Simpson Desert.
Roderick Mitchell (Australia, 1852?): Drowned.
James Richardson (Kukawa, northeast Nigeria, 1852?): Malaria.
Adolf Overweg (Kukawa?, 1853?)
Joseph René Bellot (Canadian Arctic, 1853): Drowned.
James Sinclair (Oregon Country, 1856): Killed when trying to save a group of settlers from an Indian attack.
Robert O'Hara Burke & William Wills (Cooper's Creek, Australia, 1861): Starvation.
Henri Moubot (Laos, 1861)
Eduard Vogel (Wadai, Central Africa, 1865): Assassinated on orders of the sultan on suspection of being a spy.
Alexandrine Tinné (near Ghat, Libya, 1869): Killed by roving Tuaregs.
Charles Francis Hall (northwestern Greenland, 1871): Illness, or possibly murder through poisoning.
David Livingstone (Ilala, Zambia, 1873): Pneumonia and dysentery.
George Washington De Long (Lena river delta, Siberia, 1881)
Nikolai Mikhaylovich Przhevalski (Karakol, Central Asia, 1888): Typhus.
Eduard Schnitzer (Emin Pasha) (Kinema, Congo, 1892): Beheaded by Arab soldiers on the orders of a local chief.
Salomon August Andrée (Spitsbergen, 1897?): Died of carbon monoxide poisoning in his tent, in which he wintered after an attempt to reach the northpole by balloon.
Robert Falcon Scott (Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica, 1912): Starvation and freezing.
Charles-Eugene de Foucauld (Tamanrasset, Algeria, 1916): Probably killed by a group of Muslims, possibly because he was suspected of being a spy.
Ernest Henry Shackleton (South Georgia, 1922): Heart failure.
Percy Harrison Fawcett (Mato Grosso, Brazil, 1925?): Disappeared in the Brazilian jungle.
Carl Akeley (Belgian Congo, 1926)
Roald Amundsen (off Spitsbergen, 1928): Plane crash.
Alfred Lothar Wegener (Greenland, 1930): Exhaustion.

A more happy tale surrounds these cases:

the Chinese monk Hsüan Chao (India, ca. 681)
John of Montecorvino (Cambaluc (Beijing), China, 1328) and other early 14th century Chinese missionaries
Pedro de Covilham (Ethiopia, after 1526)
Francisco de Serrão (Ternate, Indonesia, date unknown)
Matteo Ricci (Beijing, China, 1610)
William Adams (Japan, ca. 1620)
Samuel de Champlain (Québec, 1635)
Adam Schall von Bell (Beijing, China, 1666)
William Balfour Baikie (Nigeria, 1864)

They settled in the area they visited or explored, and remained there until their death.