Our first actual Louis & Clark location is this Boat House and Museum in St. Charles, Mo., which is just northwest of St. Louis. It has a little of everything about the Corps of Discovery that you might want to know, so it’s a great overview of what we’ll be seeing and learning over the next few months. We’ve decided that after today’s post, we’ll only cover what the is new with that museum or location. We were afraid that if we tried to cover everything in every museum, we might confuse you as we go forward and back in time. We hope this way of traveling works for all of us.
boats for the first part of the trip
During the return trip, 4 of Lewis & Clark’s men built 2 bull-boats to travel down the Yellowstone River.
important members of the Corps of Discovery
A seasoned woodsman who had proved his leadership skills, decisiveness, and knowledge of native trading practices, Captain Meriwether Lewis was the private secretary of President Thomas Jefferson for 3 years.
To prepare for the journey, Lewis was specially trained in botany, natural history, geology, and astronomy. He commissioned the keel-boat, personally ordered provisions, and even developed a secret code for reporting back to Jefferson.
Lewis purchased his dog, Seaman, in Pittsburgh for $20. This faithful friend served tirelessly as camp guardian, game retriever, and water rescue dog.
Captain William Clark was an outgoing frontiersman from Kentucky. He was a gifted leader who was able to train a group of frontiersmen, soldiers, and boatmen into the well-disciplined Corps of Discovery that traveled through almost 8000 miles of dangerous wilderness.
The expedition offers lessons in leadership, teamwork, and scientific study that are studied today. After the trip, Clark was territorial governor of Missouri and remained in the region. We’ll see more about his responsibilities after the trip in a future post.
York was the first man selected for the Corps of Discovery since he was the family slave of William Clark and they were about the same age. While he didn’t have a say in where he would go, he was one of the main hunters for the group.
Many times on the journey, York was an ambassador for the expedition, provoking curiosity and bridging barriers. He was the first black person to vote in the new territory when they men were deciding where to make camp for the winter at the Pacific Ocean and the Columbia River.
I had hoped that Clark would have set him free after the expedition because of all York had done for the men, but that didn’t happen, and York was never freed by Clark.
Sacagawea was a Lemhi Shoshone gift of 16 or 17 when she and her French-Canadian fur trapping husband joined Louis & Clark. The couple were living among the Mandan and Hidatsa in North Dakota. She had been abducted during a raid by the Hidatsa when she was either 11 or 12. [We’ll be staying in the Mandan area in a couple of weeks so we can learn more about the area when we’re there.]
In April 1805, Sacagawea, her husband Charbonneau, and their 2-month old baby boy, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau (nicknamed Pomp or Pompey) set out with the expedition. She helped them in so many ways: knowledge of plants helped the Corps find food, teaching the men to make leather clothes and moccasins, and kinship with the Shoshone helped the men secure horses to cross the Rocky Mountains.
Sacagawea returned to the Mandan Hidatsa Villages in 1806, while the Corps continued east. Not much is known about her later years, but it is thought that she died from fever in 1812.
Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, or Pomp, was born at Fort Mandan on February 11, 1805. He was less than 2 months old when the expedition took off toward the Pacific Ocean. Sacagawea carried him on her back the entire way, and he was a favorite among the men.
Thinking he was too young to be separated from his mother at the time, his parents brought Pomp to Clark in St. Louis a few years later. When he was 18, a visiting German prince invited Pomp to accompany him to Europe. After 6 years there, he returned to the American West where he became a hunter, trapper, and guide; eventually he settled in California. At age 61, after hearing of a gold strike, Pomp set out for Montana. He died along the way after contracting pneumonia in Oregon.
Pierre Cruzatte joined the Corps of Discovery right here in St. Charles and was certainly one of the most interesting members of the Lewis & Clark expedition. He was recruited as a boatman because of his experience traveling and trading along the Missouri River. His ability as a river-man helped them to reach the Pacific Ocean by the winter of 1805.He was also skilled as an interpreter.
Surprisingly, his skill at playing the fiddle was an important tool for the expedition, not only for entertaining and boosting the morale of the Corps, but also for sharing music with the tribes they visited and building friendships. Throughout the journals, his fiddle music was mentioned as a source of merriment and enjoyment.
Perhaps Cruzatte is best remembered for a hunting accident because his eyesight was very poor. Mistaking Captain Lewis for an elk, Pierre took a shot, and hit the Captain in the rear end. While the wound was not serious, it was a great embarrassment to everyone involved.
legacy of Lewis and Clark
- In 1803, the French surprised America by selling the immense Louisiana Territory.
- President Jefferson ordered Lewis to assemble an expedition to provide critical knowledge of the newly acquired lands and chart a route to the Pacific Ocean.
- The men of the Corps of Discovery made their way through this vast land, living mainly off its resources and adapting themselves to the new conditions they found.
- The Lewis & Clark Expedition ranks among the major expeditions of the world.
- From May 1804 until September 1806, it carried the destiny, as well as the 15-star and 15-stripe flag of our young nation, up the Missouri River, over the Rocky Mountains, and on to the Pacific Ocean.
- This epic feat not only sparked national pride, but it also vitally affected the course and growth of the United States of America.
- They encountered native peoples and unfamiliar animals.
- By boat, on foot, and on horseback, they went across seemingly endless plains, pushed over jagged mountains, made it through tangled forests, and encountered powerful river currents and raging water.
- Under the leadership of Lewis and Clark and 3 hardy sergeants, the explorers met danger as a matter of course, suffering hunger, fatigue, and sickness.
- Only 1 man lost his life to a disease [appendicitis] that could not have been cured by the doctors of his time.
- The journals of the men provided scientific descriptions of more than 140 animals, including coyotes, prairie dogs, mule deer, and pronghorn antelope.
- Clark’s maps of the land and rivers, along with important positions of landmarks, provided accurate information for those who would follow in their footsteps.
stops along the way
Camp Wood (December 12, 1803 – May 14, 1804)
By December 1803, the Captains had arrived in the St. Louis area and selected the site of the Wood River fort on the Illinois side of the Mississippi opposite its confluence with the Missouri River to spend the winter. We’ll show you two replicas of Camp Wood in the next post.
Since the expedition was a military undertaking, Lewis and Clark thought it prudent to remain on the U.S. side of the Mississippi River until after a flag-changing ceremony which occurred in March 1804.
They recruited and trained about 40 men who would form the Corps of Discovery. When spring arrived and the rivers were no longer flooding, the group left Camp Wood on May 14, 1804. Two days later they would arrive in St. Charles [just northwest of St. Louis along the Missouri] and waited for Captain Lewis to arrive overland from St. Louis.
St. Charles (May 16, 1804 – May 21, 1804)
Captain Clark arrived in St. Charles with 3 boats (a keel-boat and 2 pirogues that we’ll see in a future post) and about 40 men on May 16. While waiting for Captain Lewis, they rearranged their boats’ stowage [a frequent activity], made more purchases, and enjoyed the hospitality of the people of the town.
Lewis arrived in St. Charles with a group of well wishers from St. Louis on May 20, and the group left the next day as they were cheered on from the shore.
first encounters with Indians (August – September 1804)
President Jefferson wanted the expedition to contact the various Indian tribes whose lands they would be passing through and tell them of the changes made by the Louisiana Purchase.
The first council was held on August 2, 1804, with the Missouri and Oto Indians. Their encounter was peaceful, the peace pipe was smoked, and gifts of special medals with Jefferson’s likeness on them were given, along with cloth, gunpowder [but not guns], and promises for more trade.
[From other sources, I read that the council met at the base of some bluffs (the result of the last glacier). So we have council + bluffs: Council Bluffs that we know today on the Iowa side of the Missouri River across from Omaha.]
Fort Mandan (November 2, 1804 – April 7, 1805)
Do you know what winters are like in the Dakotas? If so, you’ll understand the following information.
As winter approached, the men settled at a site across the river from a village of friendly Mandan Indians [today it’s Bismark, ND]. As snow fell and the temperatures fell, Fort Mandan was completed as their winter quarters.
While there, Lewis and Clark not only visited with the Indians, but also met with trappers and traders who lived in the area. This is where they met and hired Toussaint Charbonneau as a guide and interpreted, but it was his wife, Sacagawea, who became an important member of the expedition.
on to the Rocky Mountains (April 7 – July 27, 1805)
In less than 3 weeks after leaving Fort Mandan, the expedition arrived where the Missouri River and the Yellowstone River meet [we know it’s the Williston, ND, area in northwest North Dakota since we were there on a previous trip]. Here the men saw an area that was a hunter’s paradise, filled with elk, beaver, buffalo, and waterfowl.
Everyone marveled at the beauty of the Rocky Mountains in the distance, and not long after they came to the Great Falls of the Missouri River. (We can’t wait to see this area.) While the falls were beautiful, it took 3 weeks for the men to pull, push, and haul their equipment around them. Finally they reached the Three Forks of the Missouri River where Sacagawea had been kidnapped several years ago.
They now started to search for the Shoshone Indians who they had heard had horses that they would need for the expedition to could cross the mountains.
Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean (August 1805 – December 7, 1805)
By August 1805, the men had not yet found the Shoshone Indians. Finally Lewis and 2 other men took off to try and make contact with the Indians and their chief, Cameahwait. Clark and the rest of the men followed after them slowly because they were carrying their supplies.
When the 2nd group caught up and Sacagawea saw the people of her childhood, she was overcome with happiness. Then she recognized her brother, the chief.
The men were to endure rain, snow, sleet, and hunger, but they pushed on until they could see the prairie and an Indian village far below. Soon men were cutting large trees to fashion canoes to travel the fast-flowing rivers of the west. They stopped only for rest and food and took many risks since winter was fast approaching. The Columbia River was finally reached, but dangerous rapids were obstacles in front of them before they arrived at the Pacific Ocean—the goal of the long and hazardous expedition.
Fort Clatsop (December 7, 1805 – March 23, 1806)
On December 7, 1805, the party chose a location for their winter quarters along a river 7 miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. Clark’s plan called for a stockade of 50 feet square, with 2 rows of common walled cabins. Slowly Fort Clatsop took shape. It was built of the “straightest and most butifullest logs” the men could find, and it was named for a tribe of friendly Indians who lived nearby.
The captains spent time writing in their journals, and Clark worked on his detailed maps. Although thoughts of home were always on their minds, the captains knew it would be foolish to start back until April of the following year since the winter snow was deep along the plains of the Columbia and in the Rocky Mountains.
the return trip begins (March 23, 1806 – August 12, 1806)
The return journey was just as hard going upstream against the currents of the Columbia and Snake Rivers. After crossing the Rocky Mountains, the Corps of Discovery divided themselves into 2 groups. One group was led by Lewis and traveled northward in the same direction they had come the year before to to pick up their supplies that they had left along the way for their trip home.
Clark experienced a bout of anxiety when he did not find Lewis among his men and then saw him laying wounded in a canoe. Louis had been shot by mistake by one of the crew while hunting. Clark dressed the wound and tried to make him comfortable, but Lewis had difficulty walking and sitting down for several days.
back to civilization (August 12, 1806 – September 23, 1806)
After a stop at the Mandan Village, the Corps of Discovery said goodbye to Charbonneau, Sacagawea, and Pomp. The men moved very quickly with the current of the river with home on their minds. They began to meet more and more traders on their way upriver and were enthusiastically greeted at the few settlements along the river.
The crew remained for the night, sheltered in several St. Charles homes, and the next morning took off toward St. Louis where their arrival was heralded by a great celebration.
frontier remedies
One of the questions I had as we were starting out on this trip was “How did Lewis and Clark get prepared for all that was going to be needed?” Lewis turned out to be the medical specialist for his men. When he was growing up he learned from his mother what healing and medicinal plants were available.
Both men recorded more than 150 species new to science and sent seeds to Jefferson that continue to produce generations of new plants, such as members of the currant family.
As Lewis was growing up, his mother had been a healer, treating patients with herbs. In addition to learning her methods, Lewis studied medicine with Dr. Benjamin Rush, the most-respected physician of the times (and a signer of the Declaration of Independence).
Lewis himself delivered Sacagawea’s baby, hastening labor with the powder of rattlesnake rings. With all of the “strange” ways of treating the men on the expedition, only one member died, Sgt. Charles Floyd. He probably passed away from a burst appendix; a condition fatal anywhere in the world at that time.
help from the American Indians
The 2 men on the expedition had mothers from the Omaha tribe. Their ability to translate the Omaha language, and Sacagawea’s help with other tribes, were important as they traveled west. Later on in these posts I have a diagram of how the translating had to happen. It seemed like the game of Telephone to me.
One of the chiefs of the Mandan tribe told Lewis and Clark as they were facing their first hard winter, “If we eat, you shall eat; if we starve you will starve.”
The Boat House and Museum gave us such a great overview of the Corps of Discovery and what Lewis and Clark did for the United States.
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