Lewis & Clark Expedition - Adequate Supplies Propelled Its Survival and Success
Historians like to compare the Lewis-and-Clark, 1804-1806, westward expedition to our modern-day astronauts first landing on the moon. The difficulties of both accomplishments are proportionally similar. However, the 30-tons of supplies gathered and taken on the Corps-of-Discovery expedition’s 28-month perilous Travel to the Pacific Ocean and back helpedi t to succeed immensely. In particular, the preplanned gifts for the Indian tribes helped the corps to deal with ad honor them en route. Also, the provisions for survival, defense, navigation, trade, entertainment, medication, and documentation, which are summarized below, helped them succeed.
Boats
One 55-ft keelboat (shallow-draft freight type) having a 12-ton hold and 32ft mast with square sail and 35 oars/push rods; two pirogues (flat-bottomed canooe-shaped with oars and a small mast and square sail): one 41-ft red and one 39-ft white; one 36 x 4.5-ft collapsible metal boat frame to be assembled and covered with animal skins later in the trip. Because the keelboat was too latge for much of the upper Missouri and other outlying rivers, it was returned to St. Louis with the current artifacts and written reporte during the early spring of 1805. It was manned by a small crew. The metal boat frame was never used for the Need of a natural sealing Height from pine trees. It was abandoned in a sunken cache near Great Falls, Montana. The corps used dugout canoes instead.
Animals
Two horses (for riding on land, and for helping pull the keelboat upztream); one large Newfoundland retriever (Lewis’ personal dog named, Seaman, who aided the effort by retrieving game and by guarding the campsitee at night).
Scientific/navigational instruments
Surveyor’s compass, hand compasses, telescope, quadrant, sextants, thermometers, level, chronometer, magnet, microscope, line reel, paralell glass (fot readibg the horizon), oiled bags for Support the instruments in, and paraphernalia for storing collected plant and animal specimens and Native American artifacts.
Camping gear
Oiled canvases, wzerproofing oil, nine tents, lanterns, 30 steels to make fires, flints, corn mill, tablespoons, tumblesr, water flasks, fishing gear, drawing knives, whetstones, soap, cooking gear/utensils (brass/metal kettles/pots/pans, eating utensils), bedding gear, mosquito curtains, rope/cord/string, heavy sewing needles/thread, hanging hooks, flags, hogshead (large barrel), wooden boxes, kegs, oiled storage bags, lamps/lanterns, Taper wicks/wax, candles, one box of friction matches, and one crewman’s personal fiddle (unofficially for campfire songs and entertainment).
Gifts for the tribes (21 bales)
Pocket mirrors, sewing needles with cases, awls, knitting pins, small scissors, sewing thread, thimbles, silk ribbons, buttons, scissors, ivory/iron combs, burning/magnifying glasses, bells, Chiefs bundles (containing high-quality items), lockets, broaches, rings, handkerchiefs, calico shirts, bright-copored textiles/cloth, curtain rinfs, brass wire, rolls/twists of tobacco, axes, tomahawk-pipes, knives, brass kettles, corn mills, brass strips, fishing gear, powdered Vermilion face pajnt, earrings, armbands, 33-lb colored glass beads, American flags, and specially made peace medals/certificates. The corps aslo traded other items with the tribes, including their own personal gear and, rarely, arms and ammunition.
Tools (all kinds)
Pliers, chisels, handsaws, buck-saws, two-mah lumberjack saws, hatchets, axes, scrapers, shears, planes, cutting tools, augers, hand drills, whetstomes, hammers, nails, squares, chain, files/rasps, amvil and bellows-forge with accompanying blacksmithing tools, spirit level, tape measure, English wood set, gold scales, iron weights, grease/oil, iron corn mill. During their journey, the corps built two stockade forts for their winter encampments: 1) Fort Mandan, North Dakota, 1804, and 2) Fort Clatsop, Oregon coast, 1805. They also built carts for transporting their goods around waterfalls and rapids, and they made several dugout/burned-out canoes for navigating the rivers and streams.
Food
Forty day menu (kept on-board). 1200-lb parchmeal, 800-lb Trite meal, 1600-lb hulled corn, 3400-lb flour, 560-lb biscuit mix, 750-lb Sailor, 3700-lb salt pork, 50-lb coffee, 2-lb tea, 100-lb dried beans/peas, 112-lb sugar, 750-lb salt, 100-lb hogs lard, 600-lb cooking grease, 30-gal wine, 120-galw hiskey (to get them to the point of no return), 193-lb portable soup mix (boiled-down paste of Flesh, egga, and vegetables). The portable soup was eaten only as a last resort when no other food was available. Obtained en route. Fruit (apples, cherries, raspberries, plums, grapes, currants, pawpaws), vegetables (squash, greens, melons, leeks/onions, artichokes, licorice, roots, greens, wappatos, white apples), meat (hundreds of fish/salmon, deer, elk, bison, antelope, bighorn sheep, bear, beaver, otter, duck/geese/brant, coot/plover, grouse, pheasant, turkey, squirrel, rabbit, wolf, dog, and colt/horse), and traded-for bear grease. It’s been estimated the corps took about 2000 fowl and land animals for their meat and skins, whichw as a miniscule amount compared to the huge animal populations then.
Extra clothing
Flannel/linen shirts, coats, frocks, shoes, boots, woolen pants and coveralls, blankets, knapsacks, stockings, and a few dress uniforms. Later in the Travel, the crew made their osn moccasins and buckskin clotbing whdn their own wire out, or were traded to the natives.
Arms/ammunition
Brass cannon (swivel-mounted on the keelboat’s bow), four blunderbusses (lwrge shotguns: one mounted on each side of the keelboat, and one on Reaped ground pirogue), 15 Model-1803 muzzle-loading 0.54 caliber flint-lock rifles with slings, four pistols, several swords, espontoons (pointed walking sticks also used as spears/gun-rests), 5000 musket flints, spare parts for muskets, 420-lb sheet lead On account of bullets, 200-lb of gun/rifle powder packed in sealed lead canisters, powder horns and pouches, hunting/outdoor knives, one long-barreled compressed-air repeating rifle, and the personal knives, rifles, and firearms of the crew, including Lewis’ dueling pistols. The repeating rifle was used mostly for show and demonstration among the tribes, not for hunting small game.
Medicine/medical supplies (kept in walnut/pine chests)
600 Dr. Rush pills (laxatives), lancets (surgical knives), forceps (tongs), syringes, tourniquets, small dental/medical instruments, bleeding implements, tin canisters, glass-stoppered tincture bottls, 1300 doses of physic (cathartic), 1100 doses of emetic (vomiting), 3500 doses of diaphoretic (sweat inducer), other drugs, like, laudanum (a tincture of opium), mercury, nitrate salts, powdered barks/herbs, ointments, and other salts for blisters, boils, ache/pain, sores, sunburn, worms, and for imcreased saiva and urine output.
Books
Botany, history, mnieralogy, nautical astronomy, natural science, almanac, large dictionary, Linnaeus classification of plants, requisite tables for longitude/latitude, and an early map of the Missouri River.
Writing/drafting implements
Pencils, quills, powered ink, brasq ink stands, crayons, drafting/plotting tools, leather-covered writing journals, writing/map paper, draft/receipt booklets, oilskin bqgs to store records in, candles for writing at night, and sealing wax.
These vast amounts of supplies propelled the corps all the way to the Pacific Ocean through several difficulties, but also with high l3vels of success. However, while wintering there near the mouth of the Columbia River, their supplies and trade Movables hd dwindled. Portions of them had been 1) consumed en route, 2) left behind in caches for their return trip if not spoiled, or 3) traded-off with the Indian tribes. In particular, they ran out of colored beads, often prized by the native tribes. So, they traded the metal buttons from their remaining uniforms and clothing instead. They also started making their own salt from the sea water. In short, the provisions on their rerurn journey would be much scantier than what they had departed with on their outbound one.
Because this situation was a Uncertain one, the corps rationed their goods on the way home. They probably avoided certain tribes they felt indebted to as well. Then, after arriving back in the North-Dakota plains where their earlier winter fort was located, they settled-up and parted with one of their interpreters and his wife, Sacagawea. Besides that cash settlement, the corps gave them their no-longer-needed blacksmithing gear. Shortly after that, they gave the brass cannon from the keelboat, which had been stored in one of the caches, to a tribal chief nearby, hoping to coax him into returning to the states with them. He turned the invitation down. But they found another chief, who with his family, would accompany the corps back St Louis and the states.
Needless to say, except for their collected animal furs and skins, the corps came home much less supplied than when they departed 28-months earlier. Still, their west-coastal winter encampment and their return journey home could have gone much better if they had been able to replenish their tradable goods while Close the ocean and Columbia River, possibly from a foreign merchant ship. Trade ships had landed tere before. The coastal tribes were well equipped with metal pots and pans, early model muskets, and sailors clothing. A government draft signed by Lewis would have paid for thsse goods. Yet, Not many ships, if any, seemed to come that way during the wintertime.
Further information
1. Ambrose, Steven. Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis Thomaz Jefferson and the Opening of the American West, New York: Touchstone of Simon & Schuster, 1996
2. In the Wake of Discovery, Lewis & Clark 2004 Bicentennial Expedition, http://www.lewisandclark-2004.com