Lewis and Clark Winter on the Lower Columbia

During the winter they sought for all the information in their power concerning the country and the inhabitants.

Continuing The Lewis and Clark Expedition,
our selection from an essay published in Great Events by Famous People, Vol. 15 by Robert Southey published in 1905. The selection is presented in 6.4 easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in The Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Time: 1806

In this situation they had nothing but dried fish for food; this weather and these sufferings continued till their clothes and bedding were rotten. At length they reached the open coast, and, having well reconnoitered it, encamped for the winter. This was no very exhilarating prospect. The natives subsisted chiefly on dried fish and roots; the explorers neither liked this diet, nor did there seem enough of it for their supply, nor had they sufficient store of merchandise left to purchase it; they must therefore trust to their hunters for subsistence, and game was not to be found with the same facility here as in the plains of the Missouri. But the sea enabled them to supply themselves with salt, and in about three months trading-vessels were expected, from which, being well provided with letters of credit, they hoped to procure a supply of trinkets for their route homeward. In national expeditions of this nature nothing should be spared which months trading-vessels were expected, from which, being well provided with letters of credit, they hoped to procure a supply of trinkets for their route homeward. In national expeditions of this nature nothing should be spared which can contribute to the safety and comfort of the persons employed. Captains Lewis and Clark should not have been left to the contingency of obtaining supplies; a ship ought certainly to have been sent to meet them. For want of this they suffered great hardships; game became scarce, and in January nothing but elk was to be seen, which of all others was the most difficult to catch; they could scarcely, they said, have subsisted but for the exertions of one of the party, Drewyer by name, the son of a Canadian Frenchman and an Indian woman, who united in a wonderful degree the dexterous aim of the frontier huntsman with the sagacity of the savage in pursuing the faintest tracks through the forest.

During the winter they sought for all the information in their power concerning the country and the inhabitants, and obtained some account of the number of tribes, languages, and population for about three hundred sixty miles southward along the coast; of those in an opposite direction they learned little more than the names, their encampment being on the south of the Oregon [Columbia].

Captains Lewis and Clark were very desirous of remaining on the coast till the ships arrived, that they might recruit their almost exhausted stores of merchandise; but though they were expected in April, it was found impossible to wait. The elk, on which they chiefly depended, had retreated to the mountains, and if the Indians could have sold food they were too poor to purchase it. About the middle of March, therefore, they began their homeward way; the whole stock of goods on which they were to depend, either for the purchase of horses or of food, during a journey of nearly four thousand miles, being so diminished that it might all be tied in two handkerchiefs. But their muskets were in excellent order, and they had plenty of powder and shot.

The opinion which they had formed of the natives on their way down the river was not improved on their return. It was soon found that nothing but their numbers saved the explorers from being attacked. On one occasion, when Captain Clark could not obtain food, he took a port-fire match from his pocket, threw a small piece of it into the fire, and at the same time taking his pocket compass and a magnet, made the needle turn round very briskly. As soon as the match began to burn, the Indians were so terrified that they brought a quantity of wappato * and laid it at his feet, begging him to put out the bad fire. At another place they were compelled to make the Indians understand that whoever stole any of the baggage, or insulted any of the men, would be immediately shot. After some disputes, which ended, however, without bloodshed, and many difficulties, they came to the Chopunnish Indians, with whom they had left their horses; and here they had to wait till the mountains should be passable.

[* A species of arrowhead root.-Ed.]

On June 10th they renewed their journey; but on the 17th they were convinced that it was not yet practicable to cross the mountains, and therefore were for the first time compelled to make a retrograde movement. A week afterward they attempted it again. In the course of that time the snow had melted about four feet; they had good guides, and it was found better travel ling over the snow than over the fallen timber and rocks, which in summer obstructed the way. Having surmounted the diffrculties of this passage, the party separated on the mountain: Captain Lewis went with nine men by the most direct route to the Falls of the Missouri, whence he was to ascend Maria River, and ascertain if any branch of it reached as far south as latitude 50°. Captain Clark, with the rest of the party, made for the head of the Jefferson; there they divided again. Sergeant Ord way and nine men went from there in the canoes down the Missouri; and Captain Clark proceeded to the Yellowstone River, at its nearest approach to the Three Forks of the Missouri, and there built canoes to explore that important stream along the whole of its course. The junction of these two great rivers was the appointed place of meeting.

James Davie Butler began here. Robert Southey began here.

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