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Lewis and Clark Expedition

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The phrases Lewis and Clark and Lewis & Clark redirect here. For other uses, see Lewis and Clark (disambiguation).
Lewis and Clark

The Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804−1806) was the first United States overland expedition to the Pacific coast and back, led by Captain Meriwether Lewis and Second Lieutenant William Clark of the United States Army. It is also known as the Corps of Discovery.

Background

Thomas Jefferson had long thought about such an expedition. While Minister to France from 1785-1789, he had heard of numerous plans to better explore the Pacific Northwest. In 1785, Jefferson learned that King Louis XVI of France planned to send a mission there, reportedly as a mere scientific expedition. Jefferson found that doubtful, and evidence provided by John Paul Jones confirmed these doubts. In either event, the mission was destroyed by bad weather after leaving Botany Bay in 1788. In 1786 John Ledyard, who had sailed with Captain James Cook to the Pacific Northwest, told Jefferson that he planned to walk across Siberia, ride a Russian fur-trade vessel to cross the ocean, and then walk all the way to the American capitol. Since Ledyard was an American, Jefferson hoped him success. Ledyard had made it as far as Siberia when Czarina Catherine the Great had him arrested and deported back to Poland.

In a message to Congress, Jefferson wrote

The river Missouri, and Indians inhabiting it, are not as well known as rendered desirable by their connection with the Mississippi, and consequently with us. ... An intelligent officer, with ten or twelve chosen men ... might explore the whole line, even to the Western Ocean ...

In a letter dated June 20, 1803, Jefferson wrote to Lewis

The object of your mission is to explore the Missouri river, and such principal stream of it as by its course and communication with the waters of the Pacific ocean whether the Columbia, Oregon, Colorado or any other river may offer the most direct and practicable water communication across this continent for the purposes of commerce.

Louisiana Purchase and a western expedition

The famous map of Lewis and Clark's expedition. It changed mapping of northwest America by providing the first accurate depiction of the relationship of the sources of the Columbia and Missouri rivers, and the Rocky Mountains.

In 1803, the Louisiana Purchase sparked interest in expansion to the west coast. A few weeks after the purchase, President Jefferson, an advocate of western expansion, had the Congress appropriate $2,500, "to send intelligent officers with ten or twelve men, to explore even to the Western ocean". They were to study the Indian tribes, botany, geology, Western terrain and wildlife in the region, as well as evaluate the potential interference of British and French Canadian hunters and trappers who were already well established in the area. The expedition was not the first to cross North America but was roughly a decade after the expedition of Alexander MacKenzie, the first European to cross north of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean.

Jefferson selected Captain Meriwether Lewis to lead the expedition, afterwards known as the Corps of Discovery; Lewis selected William Clark as his partner. Because of bureaucratic delays in the U.S. Army, Clark officially only held the rank of Second Lieutenant at the time, but Lewis concealed this from the men and shared the leadership of the expedition, always referring to Clark as "Captain". Many people back in Lewis and Clark's day did not know what the West held.

Dylan Likes Men,Also He Takes It From Behind

Spanish reaction

On December 8, 1803, Lewis met with the Spanish lieutenant governor of Upper Louisiana, Colonel Carlos Dehault Delassus. Since France had never formally taken control of the territory, it was still governed by Spaniards. Delassus refused to let Lewis go up the Missouri until France formally took control of the territory, at which time France would formally give the territory to the United States. Lewis had intended to spend the winter in St. Louis since he needed to gain provisions for the trip and it was too late in the year to sensibly continue on the Missouri. Despite Lewis’ claims that the Expedition was solely a scientific one that would only travel the Missouri territory, Delassus wrote to his superiors that Lewis would undoubtedly go as far as the Pacific coast, citing that Lewis was far too competent for a lesser mission.

While in Cincinnati, Ohio, Lewis had written to Jefferson about going to Santa Fe. This was done for political concerns; Lewis wanted "to give his party a winning issue" in the 1804 expedition. Jefferson was willing for Lewis to wait the winter in St. Louis rather than continue up the Missouri; Lewis could gain valuable information in St. Louis and draw from Army supplies rather than the Expedition’s. Jefferson knew how sensitive the Spanish were about their gold and silver mines and issued a direct order to Lewis not to go to Santa Fe. This also led Jefferson to question Lewis’ judgment. Jefferson’s concern was for naught; Lewis had already decided he had enough to do during the winter to get the Expedition ready for spring than to spend time traveling to Santa Fe.

The fact that the Expedition would travel as much as it could on the Missouri River was done for political reasons. For one, it was imperative to stay out of Spanish territory. Jefferson had told Lewis not to go into Spanish territory. By staying in higher latitudes, the Expedition would avoid crossing into Spanish territory.

Spain had ceded Louisiana to France under the condition that France would not give it to a third party. Spain gave France the territory because Napoleon had put his brother in charge of Spain, and Napoleon’s brother gave Napoleon Louisiana in exchanged for the kingdom of Etruria in Northern Italy. Slaves rebellions in Haiti led by Toussaint L'Ouverture, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, and Henri Christophe in 1802-1803 also led to Haitian independence in 1804, and Haiti was so valuable to France that without it, France's whole colonial empire in the Western Hemisphere Napoleon I had been trying to re-establish would not be sufficiently profitable to justify the cost to France.

Spain wanted to keep the territory as an empty buffer between the U.S. and the many mineral mines in northern Mexico. After the start of the expedition, Spain sent at least four different missions to stop Lewis and Clark. During the Expedition’s stay in the Shoshone’s camps, the expedition was told they were ten days away from Spanish settlements. This warning helped Lewis and Clark stay away from the Spanish, but they never knew the Spanish had sent missions to stop them until after they returned from the journey.

The Spanish sent these expeditions because of the intelligence they gained from an American traitor turned Spanish spy. General James Wilkinson was the commanding general of the United States Army. He was also in the employ of the Spanish government. In March 1804, he sent a message to Madrid telling the Spanish government that the purpose of the Expedition was to journey as far as the Pacific..

Achievements

Black Tailed Prarie Dog
  • Encouraged Euro-American fur trade in the West
  • Opened Euro-American diplomatic relations with the Indians
  • Established a precedent for Army exploration of the West
  • Strengthened the U.S. claim to Oregon Territory
  • Focused U.S. and media attention on the West
  • Produced a large body of literature about the West (the Lewis and Clark diaries)

Expedition members

File:Lewis-and-clark-statue.jpg
Statue of Lewis and Clark in Seaside, Oregon, near the expedition's end
  • Captain Meriwether Lewis — private secretary to President Thomas Jefferson and leader of the Expedition.
  • Captain William Clark — shared command of the Expedition, although technically second in command.
  • York — Clark's black manservant.
  • Sergeant Charles Floyd — the Expedition's quartermaster; died early in the trip. He was the only person who died during the Expedition.
  • Sergeant Patrick Gass — chief carpenter, promoted to Sergeant after Floyd's death.
  • Sergeant John Ordway — responsible for issuing provisions, appointing guard duties, and keeping records for the Expedition.
  • Sergeant Nathaniel Hale Pryor — leader of the 1st Squad; he presided over the court martial of privates John Collins and Hugh Hall.
  • Corporal Richard Warfington — conducted the return party to St. Louis in 1805.
  • Private John Boley — disciplined at Camp Dubois and was assigned to the return party.
  • Private William E. Bratton — served as hunter and blacksmith.
  • Private John Collins — had frequent disciplinary problems; he was court-martialed for stealing whiskey which he had been assigned to guard.
  • Private John Colter — charged with mutiny early in the trip, he later proved useful as a hunter; he earned his fame after the journey.
  • Private Pierre Cruzatte — a one-eyed French fiddle-player and a skilled boatman.
  • Private John Dame
  • Private Joseph Field — a woodsman and skilled hunter, brother of Reubin.
  • Private Reubin Field — a woodsman and skilled hunter, brother of Joseph.
  • Private Robert Frazer — kept a journal that was never published.
  • Private George Gibson — a fiddle-player and a good hunter; he served as an interpreter (probably via sign language).
  • Private Silas Goodrich — the main fisherman of the expedition.
  • Private Hugh Hall — court-martialed with John Collins for stealing whiskey.
  • Private Thomas Proctor Howard — court-martialed for setting a "pernicious example" to the Indians by showing them that the wall at Fort Mandan was easily scaled.
  • Private François Labiche — French fur trader who served as an interpreter and boatman.
  • Private Hugh McNeal — the first white explorer to stand astride the headwaters of the Missouri River on the Continental Divide.
  • Private John Newman — court-martialed and confined for "having uttered repeated expressions of a highly criminal and mutinous nature."
  • Private John Potts — German immigrant and a miller.
  • Private Moses B. Reed — attempted to desert in August 1804; convicted of desertion and expelled from the party.
  • Private John Robertson — member of the Corps for a very short time.
  • Private George Shannon — was lost twice during the expedition, once for sixteen days.
  • Private John Shields — blacksmith, gunsmith, and a skilled carpenter; with John Colter, he was court-martialed for mutiny.
  • Private John B. Thompson — may have had some experience as a surveyor.
  • Private Howard Tunn — hunter and navigator.
  • Private Ebenezer Tuttle — may have been the man sent back on June 12, 1804; otherwise, he was with the return party from Fort Mandan in 1805.
  • Private Peter M. Weiser — had some minor disciplinary problems at River Dubois; he was made a permanent member of the party.
  • Private William Werner — convicted of being absent without leave at St. Charles, Missouri, at the start of the expedition.
  • Private Isaac White — may have been the man sent back on June 12, 1804; otherwise, he was with the return party from Fort Mandan in 1805.
  • Private Joseph Whitehouse — often acted as a tailor for the other men; he kept a journal which extended the Expedition narrative by almost five months.
  • Private Alexander Hamilton Willard — blacksmith; assisted John Shields. He was convicted on July 12, 1804, of sleeping while on sentry duty and given one hundred lashes.
  • Private Richard Windsor — often assigned duty as a hunter.
  • Interpreter Toussaint Charbonneau — Sacagawea's husband; served as a translator and often as a cook.
  • Interpreter Sacagawea — Charbonneau's wife; translated Shoshone to Hidatsa for Charbonneau and was a valued member of the expedition.
  • Interpreter George Drouillard — skilled with Indian sign language; the best hunter on the expedition.
  • "Seaman", Lewis' black Newfoundland dog.

See also

References

  1. Ambrose, Stephen. Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the opening of the American west. (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1996). p. 69.
  2. "Jefferson's Secret Message to Congress". Retrieved 2006-06-30.
  3. "Jefferson's Instructions for Meriwether Lewis". Retrieved 2006-06-30.
  4. http://lewisandclarkjournals.unl.edu/v02.appendix.a.html
  5. Ambrose, Stephen. Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the opening of the American west. (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1996). p122-123
  6. Ambrose 115, 116, 123
  7. http://www.isu.edu/~trinmich/Discoverers.html
  8. Brandt, Anthony. Reliving Lewis and Clark: Louisiana Purchase Ceremony. (National Geographic News, March 23, 2004.)
  9. Ambrose 334, 335

Further reading

History

Notable fiction

These popular fictionalized historical novels have varying degrees of historical accuracy, which is unfortunate as they shaped much of the popular American understanding of the expedition.

Popular culture

External links

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