LEWIS AND CLARK ROSTER

Clark, William (1770-1838), American explorer, Native American agent, and frontier politician, who served as co-leader, with Meriwether Lewis, of the Lewis and Clark expedition (1804-1806), the first overland exploration of the American West and Pacific Northwest. Clark was born in Caroline County, Virginia. In 1784 the Clark family moved to the Kentucky frontier, establishing a plantation called Mulberry Hill near present-day Louisville. Clark followed the powerful examples of his brothers Jonathan and George Rogers Clark, both of whom made military life the path to success. In 1789 William joined a militia company and soon became an infantry officer in the army of General Anthony Wayne. During service in the Indian wars in the Ohio Valley, Clark gained a reputation for leadership and courage. He met Meriwether Lewis at this time when Lewis served briefly in Clark's rifle company. Under General Wayne, Clark took part in the Battle of Fallen Timbers (near what is now Toledo, Ohio) in August 1794, which destroyed the power of the Native Americans in Ohio. Clark also grew to be an experienced frontier diplomat, earning Wayne's praise for a dangerous scouting mission in 1796. When debts incurred by George threatened Clark family lands in Kentucky and Indiana, William resigned his commission and spent the next eight years defending family interests.

In June 1803 Lewis asked Clark to join him as co-leader on a government-sponsored expedition through the Louisiana Territory to the Pacific Ocean. Clark was promised a captain's commission to match Lewis's rank, but bureaucratic confusion made him a lieutenant. Despite this, both Lewis and U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, who commissioned the expedition, always considered Clark an equal partner in command. As commanding officers on the Lewis and Clark expedition, Lewis and Clark informally divided leadership responsibilities. Clark was the expedition's mapmaker. Years of frontier experience had taught him to understand and record intricate terrain-land, rivers, and mountains. Clark's army experience also prepared him to be the expedition's most able negotiator and diplomat, a role he played in many meetings with Native Americans. The expedition to the Pacific made Clark both famous and influential.

For the rest of his life he played a key role as a federal Native American agent and territorial politician. In 1807 Clark was appointed agent for the tribes west of the Mississippi River. During the War of 1812 (1812-1815) Clark worked to organize western defenses against British and Native American attacks. At the end of the war Clark and other federal officials negotiated a series of Native American treaties that reestablished American power in the West. As a Native American agent and governor of the Missouri Territory (1813-1821),

Clark earned the respect of many native people who knew him as "the red-head chief." After Lewis's death in 1809, Clark assumed responsibility for completing the report of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Clark employed American financier and diplomat Nicholas Biddle to prepare the two-volume collection, finally published in 1814. The large map of the West that Clark drafted for the report is a landmark in the geographic understanding of the American West.

LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITION.

Little was known about western America when the Lewis and Clark Expedition set out in 1804. Twelve years earlier Captain Robert Gray, an American navigator, had sailed up the mouth of the great river he named the Columbia. Traders and trappers reported that the source of the Missouri River was in the mountains in the Far West. No one, however, had yet blazed an overland trail. President Thomas Jefferson was interested in knowing more about the country west of the Mississippi. In 1803, two years after he became president, he asked Congress for $2,500 for an expedition. To head the expedition, Jefferson chose his young secretary, Captain Meriwether Lewis. Lewis invited his friend Lieutenant William Clark to share the leadership. Both were familiar with the frontier and with Indians through their service in the army.

(See also Lewis, Meriwether; Clark, William.)

Before Lewis and Clark set out, word came that Napoleon had sold an immense tract of land to the United States (see Louisiana Purchase). The expedition would therefore be exploring American territory. Plans for the expedition were carefully laid. The party was to ascend the Missouri to its source, cross the Continental Divide, and descend the Columbia River to its mouth. In preparation for the historic journey, Lewis studied map making and learned how to fix latitude and longitude. In the winter of 1803-04 the expedition was assembled in Illinois, near St. Louis. The party consisted of the two leaders, Lewis and Clark; 14 soldiers; nine frontiersmen from Kentucky; two French boatmen; and Clark's servant, York. On May 14, 1804, the explorers started up the Missouri in a 55-foot (17-meter) covered keelboat and two small craft. On July 30 they held their first powwow, or meeting, with Indians at a place the explorers named Council Bluff. (Council Bluffs, Iowa, across the river from the site, perpetuates the name with the slight change.) On October 26 they reached the camps of the Mandan Indians. On a site close to present-day Stanton, N.D.,

the explorers built Fort Mandan and spent the winter. It was here that they hired Toussaint Charbonneau, a French interpreter, and his Indian wife, Sacagawea, the sister of a Shoshone chief. While at Fort Mandan, Sacagawea gave birth to a baby boy. This did not stop her from participating in the group. She carried the child on her back for the rest of the trip. As an Indian interpreter she proved invaluable. In the spring of 1805 the keelboat was sent back to St. Louis with dispatches for President Jefferson and with natural history specimens. Meanwhile, canoes had been built. On April 7 the party continued on up the Missouri. On April 26 it passed the mouth of the Yellowstone, and on June 13 reached the Great Falls of the Missouri. Carrying the laden canoes 16 miles (25 kilometers) around the falls caused a month's delay. On July 13 the canoes were launched again above the falls. On the 25th the expedition reached Three Forks, where three rivers join to form the Missouri. They named the rivers the Madison, the Jefferson, and the Gallatin. For some time the explorers had been within sight of the Rocky Mountains. Crossing them was to be the hardest part of the journey. They decided to follow the largest of the three forks, the Jefferson.

They were now in the country of the Shoshone, Sacagawea's people. Sacagawea eagerly watched for her tribe, but it was Lewis who found them. The chief turned out to be Sacagawea's brother. He provided the party with guides and horses for the difficult crossing of the lofty Bitterroot Range. After crossing the divide late in September, they reached a point on the Clearwater River. From here they were able to proceed by water. On Nov. 7, 1805, Clark wrote in his journal, "Great joy in camp," for after a journey of over 18 months, the Pacific Ocean was within view

On the Pacific shore, near the mouth of the Columbia, they built a stockade, Fort Clatsop. There they spent the winter. On March 23, 1806, the entire party started back. On June 24, with 66 horses, they began to cross the mountains. In the Bitterroot Valley the two leaders separated to learn more about the country. Clark headed for the Yellowstone River and followed it to the Missouri. Lewis, with nine men, struck off toward the northeast to explore a branch of the Missouri that he named the Marias. On this trip he had a skirmish with Indians, the only one of the entire journey. Later, while out hunting, he was accidentally shot by one of his own men. He recovered after the party was reunited and had stopped at Fort Mandan. There they left Sacagawea and her family. The party reached St. Louis on Sept. 23, 1806. Their arrival caused great rejoicing, for they had been believed dead. They had been gone two years, four months, and nine days, and had traveled about 6,000 miles (9,650 kilometers). Lewis and Clark brought back much new material for map makers and specimens of previously unknown wildlife. American settlers and traders soon began to travel over the route they had blazed. The expedition also provided useful support for the United States claim to the Oregon country.

BRATTON, William Pvt.-------------{1804}

CHARBONNEAU, Toussaint --------{1804}------- with Clark.. Charbonneau, Toussaint (fl. 19th century), French fur trader, husband of Sacagawea, accompanied Lewis and Clark on their westward expedition

COLTER, John Pvt.---------{1804}------------

COLLINS, John Pvt.--------{1804}-------------

CRUZATTE, Peter Pvt:-------{ 1804}-----------

DROUILLARD, George,------{1804}

FIELDS, Reuben Pvt: ---------{1804}----------

FIELDS, Joseph Pvt.----------{1804}----------

FRAZIER, Robert Pvt. --------{1804}----------

GASS, Patrick Sgt:-----------{1804}---------

GIBSON, George Pvt.----------{1804}----------

GOODRICH, Silas Pvt.----------{1804} ---------

HALL, Hugh Pvt :-------------{1804}----------

HOWARD, Thomas P. Pvt -------{1804}----------

LABICHE, Francis Pvt---- ----{1804}----------

MCNEAL, Hugh Pvt. -----------{1804}----------

POTTS, John Pvt. -----{1804}----------

PRYOR, Nathaniel Sgt.--------{1804}----------

SACAGAWEA -{1804}------(1788-1812)--- was Guide for Clark

SACAGAWEA (1786?-1812?). In 1804 the Lewis and Clark Expedition arrived among the Mandan Indians of North Dakota ..They hired the French fur trapper Toussaint Charbonneau and his Indian wife, Sacagawea, to guide them to the West coast. In the Northwest, Sacagawea has become a legend. Memorials have been raised in her honor, in part for the fortitude with which she faced hardship and deprivation on the arduous journey.

Sacagawea was born in about 1786, probably near present-day Lehmi, Idaho. She was a member of the Snake tribe of the Shoshone Indians. In 1800 she was captured by a party of Hidatsa Indians. They in turn sold her to Charbonneau. Lewis and Clark met the couple near present-day Bismarck, N.D. The explorers were especially eager to have Sacagawea along to help them make contact with the Shoshone, whose chief was her brother Cameahwait.

On Feb. 11, 1805, she gave birth to a baby boy, who was taken along when the expedition set out on April 7. Sacagawea and her husband went with the expedition to the coast, and on the return trip they remained in North Dakota.

It is possible that they later traveled to St. Louis, Mo., to leave their son with Clark to be educated.

Sacagawea is believed to have died on Dec. 12, 1812, at Fort Manuel on the Missouri River in Dakota Territory. If so, her grave is located near Lander, Wyo. In 1875, however, an Indian woman claiming to be Sacagawea was living among the Wind River Shoshone in Wyoming. This woman died in 1884.

SHANNON, George Pvt.---------{1404}---------

SHIELDS, John Pvt -----------{1804}--------

THOMPSON, John B. Pvt.-------{1804}---------

WERNER, William Pvt. --------{1804}---------

WHITEHOUSE, Joseph Pvt. ----{1804}----------

WILLARD, Alexander Pvt. ----{1804}----------

WINDSOR, Richard Pvt.-- ----{1804}----------

WISER, Peter Pvt.-----------{1804}---------

YORK ------------{1804}-----black Slave of Clark Party