Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West
by Stephen Ambrose
This non-fiction work is superb. Reading it many years ago motivated me to
read informative historical novels like A.B. Guthrie’s excellent narratives set
in the Yellowstone, Montana , Idaho
I was enthralled with the book’s six maps. I referred to all of them frequently to make
clear to me the time-progression, geographical location sequence of events that
are such an important component of the telling of the Lewis and Clark
Expedition accomplishment. If I were
younger and had the financial resources to indulge myself, I might be tempted
to follow the route the Corps of Discovery took from St.
Louis , Missouri , to Fort Clatsop , Oregon
“Undaunted courage” describes best the greatest attributes
of the two captains and their exceedingly well-disciplined, resolute men. Delving into the unknown stirs some element
of fear in any person. Imagine yourself
signing onto an expedition that intends to take you more than a year into diverse
land not previously explored, boats to be poled up the Missouri River, portages
to be undertaken because there had to be – if not falls – rapids too violent to
ride, mountains to cross over passes not yet known, overland transport between
the end of the Missouri River and some unknown tributary of the Columbia River
the difficulty and duration of which you would learn only when you had to deal
with it. And what of the lack of food,
the prospect of starvation, especially in the mountains, after you have left
the bison-filled plains east of the Continental Divide? And what of the Indians? Your expedition – though heavily armed --
will be vastly outnumbered by any tribe it encounters. If any tribe wishes to exterminate you, it
can. You must pray that you captains
have the skill to prevent this. Pray
that each tribe’s human universal avarice is satiated sufficiently to receive
from it tolerance of your temporary presence. Finally, will you be able to stand the rigors
of your daily labor, which will require you to consume 6,000 calories of
food. Will you succumb to dysentery,
influenza, sexually transmitted diseases caught from intercourse with native? Lewis or Clark would be your doctor. The remedies to be used would be whatever
they are able to concoct.
There are particular scenes in this book that rival in
excitement and wonder the best scenes written by a skilled novelist. Here is one example.
Lewis and Clark needed to find the Shoshones just east of
the Continental Divide. The Shoshones,
they had been told, had many horses -- horses the expedition needed to cross
the Rocky Mountains to find the Columbia River ,
horses Lewis and Clark hoped to obtain through barter. They had reached the three forks that become in
western Montana the Missouri
River . They had chosen to
follow the most westerly fork – the Jefferson River
– hoping to encounter friendly Shoshones.
They had been unsuccessful. Game
had become scarce. Lewis divided the
expedition into two groups, both of which headed west overland. Eventually, Lewis sighted an adolescent brave
on a horse from a distance of several miles.
Lewis hailed him, but the brave fled.
I will allow Stephen Ambrose to narrate the rest.
On Tuesday morning,
August 13, 1805, Lewis set out early, headed west on a plain, heavily and
recently used Indian trail that fell down a long, descending valley. …
At nine miles, Lewis
saw two Indian women, a man, and some dogs. When he had arrived within half a mile of them, he
ordered Drouillard and the two privates to halt, unslung his pack and rifle and
put them on the ground, unfurled a flag, and advanced alone at a steady pace
toward the Indians. He hailed them,
using a word he believed meant “white man,” but actually meant “stranger” or
“enemy.” The man hurried away.
Lewis’s men rejoined him.
After less than a
mile, topping a rise, they came on three Indian women, one a twelve-year-old,
one a teen, and the third elderly, only thirty yards away. At first sight, Lewis laid down his rifle and
advanced on the group. The teen ran off,
but the old woman and the child remained.
Seeing no chance of escape, they sat on the ground and held their heads
down; to Lewis it looked as though they had reconciled themselves to die.
He approached and took
the elderly woman by the hand, raised her up, said,“tab-ba-bone,” and rolled up his shirtsleeve to show her
his white skin. … Drouillard and the
privates joined him. From their packs he
gave the woman some beads, a few moccasin awls, a few mirrors, and some
paint. His skin and the gifts, and his
friendly attitude were enough to calm her down.
Through Drouillard’s
sign language, he asked her to call the teen back, fearing that otherwise the
girl might alarm the main body of Shoshones.
The old woman did as asked, and the teen reappeared. Lewis gave her some trinkets and painted the
“tawny cheeks” of the women with some vermillion. When the Indians were composed, Lewis told
them, through Drouillard, that he “wished them to conduct us to their camp that
we were anxious to become acquainted with the chiefs and warriors of their
nation.” They did as requested, and the
group set off, the Indians leading.
After two miles, the
long-anticipated and eagerly sought contact took place. Sixty warriors, mounted on excellent horses
and armed for war with bows and arrows plus three inferior rifles, came on at
full speed. When they saw Lewis’s party,
they halted.
… The Indians were
overwhelmingly superior. It would have
been the work of only a moment for them to overwhelm Lewis’s party. …
But rather than
assuming a defensive position, Lewis laid down his rifle, picked up his flag,
told his party to stay in place, and, following the old woman who was guiding,
advanced slowly toward he knew not what.
A man Lewis assumed
was the chief rode in the lead. He halted
to speak to the old woman. She told him
that these were white men “and exultingly showed the presents which had been
given.” This broke the tension. …
The chief
advanced. Saying “ah-hi-e, ah-hi-e,”
which Lewis later learned meant, “I am
pleased, I am much rejoiced,” the chief put his left arm over Lewis’s right
shoulder and applied his left cheek to Lewis’s right cheek, continuing “to frequently vociferate the word
ah-hi-e.”
This first meeting
between Shoshones and Americans went better than Lewis could have dared to
hope. He had been exceedingly
lucky. The war party had ridden out in
response to the alarm given by the man who had fled earlier that day. The Shoshones expected to find Blackfeet and
might have attacked without pause save for the old woman. Had Lewis not met her, and had she not
responded so positively to his appeals and gifts, there might well have been a
firefight.
There is great irony in this incident. Ambrose criticizes Lewis for not having Sacagawea
accompany the party. She was one of two
young Shoshone girls that had been captured by a Hidatsa raiding party four
years earlier at the Three Forks. A
French Canadian trapper, Toussaint Charbonneau, won the two girls from their
captors in a bet. Both girls became
Charbonneau’s wives. Lewis had signed
Charbonneau on as a member of the expedition because of the girls’ knowledge of
the Shoshone language. Sacagawea, turned
fifteen, was the wife chosen to accompany him.
Why had Lewis decided not to include Sacagawea in his scouting party? Ambrose wrote:
The captains shared a
hubris, that they could handle Indians.
They believed they needed Sacagawea’s interpreting ability only to trade
for horses, not to establish contact. … it would seem that the captains allowed their
self-confidence, and perhaps their male chauvinism, to override their common
sense.
The great irony is that the chief who in friendship placed
his cheek against Lewis’s cheek happened to be Sacagawea’s brother.
If you enjoy American history and have not read it,
“Undaunted Courage” should be at the top of you “To Read” list.
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