Contents Letters: Lewis’s air gun and Shannon; Eagle Feather; Nez Perces 2 From the Directors: Thanks to all for a great year 6 From the Bicentennial Council: Beauty, values, legacy 8 Lewis and Clark and the Louisiana Purchase 11 It wasn’t the expedition’s purpose, but exploring the new U.S. territory further validated the Corps of Discovery’s mission By Bard Tennant Journey’s End for the Iron Boat 14 Evidence suggests it ended up as scrap metal in North Dakota By H. Carl Camp Louisiana Purchase, p. 11 Empty Kettles in the Bitterroots 18 The captain’s assumptions about Rocky Mountain geography and the availability of game proved a recipe for near starvation By Leandra Holland Portable Soup: Ration of Last Resort 24 “Veal glue” helped stave off disaster in the Bitterroots By Kenneth C. Walcheck Mathew Carey: First Chronicler of Lewis and Clark 28 He reported on the expedition as history in the making By Doug Erickson, Jeremy Skinner, and Paul Merchant Reviews 36 Moulton’s one-volume abridgment; Saindon’s three-volume Jefferson and Lewis, p. 19 anthology; another look at Tailor Made, Trail Worn Soundings 41 Clark’s signature found on book that may have gone on expedition By John W. Jengo L&C Roundup 43 New librarian; L&C trains; David Lavender From the Library 48 New developments in the library and archives On the cover Lewis and Clark in the Bitterroots, John F. Clymer’s oft-reproduced painting, aptly illustrates the rigors of the explorers’ passage across some of the most forbidding terrain in the continental United States. Two of the articles in this issue—Leandra Holland’s “Empty Kettles in the Bitterroots” and Kenneth Walcheck’s “Portable Soup: Ration of Last Resort” (pages 18 and 24, respectively)—deal with that harrowing episode in the Lewis and Clark saga. Courtesy Doris Clymer and The Clymer Museum of Art, Ellensburg, Wash. Mathew Carey , p. 28 August 2003 We Proceeded On ! 1 Letters Lewis’s air gun and the lost George Shannon August 2003 • Volume 29, Number 3 There is a question related to Meriwether prime reason they were used for poach- We Proceeded On is the official publication of Lewis’s air gun that I didn’t discuss in my ing game—so Lewis’s air gun would have the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, article on that subject (WPO, November been a poor choice for signaling Shannon. Inc. Its name derives from a phrase that appears 2002) but that might be of interest to read- My guess is that Whitehouse had a bit of repeatedly in the collective journals of the ers: Did Lewis use his air gun to signal mental confusion in his journal rewrite expedition. 2003 Private George Shannon when he became and made a mistake in connecting the E. G. Chuinard, M.D., Founder lost near the junction of the Beaverhead shots with the absence of Shannon. ISSN 02275-6706 and Wisdom (today’s Big Hole) rivers? Lewis strongly implies that he fired the The second of two August 7, 1805, jour- air gun in order to test the repairs made Editor J. I. Merritt nal entries by Private Joseph Whitehouse to it. If he had wanted to signal Shannon, 51 N. Main Street says the gun was used for that purpose, the captain could have used a number of Pennington, NJ 08534 but this is doubtful. other, much louder, weapons at his dis- 609-818-0168 Shannon had been sent out hunting the posal—including blunderbusses, mus- [email protected] day before and had failed to return. kets, rifles, and horse pistols. Art Direction Lewis’s journal entry for August 7 states, The vagueness and ambiguity so of- Margaret Davis Design “Dispatched Reubin Fields in surch of ten found in the journals gives us retired Princeton, New Jersey Shannon. … my air gun was out of order guys something to do in our spare time. Printed by James Printing & Design, and her sights had been removed by some MIKE CARRICK Trooper, Pennsylvania accident[.] I put her in order and regu- Turner, Ore. Editorial Board lated her. she shot again as well as she ever did.” There is no indication that the two Gary E. Moulton, Leader matters—Shannon’s whereabouts and Lincoln, Nebraska problems with the air gun—are related. Eagle Feather’s resting place Robert C. Carriker Sergeant John Ordway’s entry for the Readers of my ar- Spokane, Washington same day states, “Capt. Lewis … Shoot ticle in the May WPO Robert K. Doerk, Jr. the air gun. the man G. Shannon not re- about Eagle Feather, Fort Benton, Montana turned yet. the morning cool, but the day the Arikara chief Glen Lindeman warm.” Whitehouse in his first journal who died in Wash- Pullman, Washington entry that day writes, “Capt. Lewis took ington, D.C., in an observation & Shot the air gun. the lost 1806, after journey- Membership Information man not returned. the day warm, the large ing there at the urg- Membership in the Lewis and Clark Trail horse flyes troublesome &c.” ing of Lewis and Heritage Foundation, Inc. is open to the public. Neither Ordway nor Whitehouse Clark, might be in- Information and applications are available by connects the air gun and Shannon’s situ- terested in a photo- writing Membership Coordinator; Lewis and ation; nor, as noted, does Lewis. But in a graph I recently Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, P.O. Box second entry dated August 7, Whitehouse took of the site where he was most prob- 3434, Great Falls, MT 59403. apparently rewrote and expanded upon ably buried. It shows S Street N.W. be- We Proceeded On, the quarterly magazine of his initial observations, saying the shots tween 19th and 20th streets, near what is the Foundation, is mailed to current members were meant to attract Shannon’s atten- now Dupont Circle. This was once in February, May, August, and November. Articles appearing in this journal are abstracted tion: “Captain Lewis ... fired off his air Holmstead’s Cemetery. The two buildings and indexed in HISTORICAL ABSTRACTS and gun several times in order that the Man in the photo appear to be from the mid- AMERICA: HISTORY AND LIFE. that went out a hunting ... Yesterday & 19th century and were probably among who we suppose is lost might hear the the first built on the site of the former Annual Membership Categories report.” burial ground. By coincidence, Eliott Student $30 This is curious, since anyone who has Coues lived in the same Dupont Circle Individual/Library/Nonprofit $40 shot air guns knows they don’t make area when he was working on his 1893 Family/International/Business $55 Heritage Club $75 much noise. I have never heard an air rifle edition of the Lewis and Clark journals. Explorer Club $150 of Lewis and Clark’s day fired, but I have MARK CHALKLEY Jefferson Club $250 read an article about firing an original (ca. Baltimore, Md. Discovery Club $500 1810) Staudenmayer breechloading air Expedition Club $1,000 rifle. The author does not say whether the Leadership Club $2,500 shots were loud, but in a passing descrip- Nez Perce envoys The Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, Inc. tion of air guns generally he says they are is a tax-exempt nonprofit corporation. Individual “almost silent.” In the literature of air- I was delighted to read Robert R. Archi- membership dues are not tax deductible. The portion gun history, the “quietness” of the shot bald’s column in the February WPO, “New of premium dues over $40 is tax deductible. is almost always mentioned—that is the grave marker in St. Louis to honor Nez 2 ! We Proceeded On August 2003 Letters Perce envoys who died there.” Those four Native Americans are heroes of mine. While studying at Western Evangelical Seminary, in Portland, Oregon, I wrote a paper that discussed their visit to St. Louis in the winter of 1831-32. My research in- dicated that three were Nez Perce and the fourth was Salish (Flathead). William Walker, Jr., a Christian who was half Wyandot Sioux, had been sent from Ohio to Missouri to select land for a Wyandot Todd Schmidt reservation, and he arrived in St. Louis at the same time. The story that these four 1/3 sq. Indians desired to learn the way to eter- nal life so impressed Walker that he wrote materials in envelope to G.P. Disosway, a Methodist merchant in New York who underwrote mission- ary work among the Wyandots. Disosway in turn sent Walker’s letter to The Christian Advocate & Journal and The Zion’s Herald with an appeal for sup- port of missionaries west of the Rockies. The letter was published in March 1833. In his letter, Disosway said the Indi- ans told of witnessing the white man’s religious ceremonies. One white hunter, they said, told them that the Indian mode of worship was wrong and displeasing to the Great Spirit, that the white man’s re- ligion was better, and that those who did not embrace it would be lost. The hunter said the white man had a book that told of the ways to learn of the One Great Spirit. The Indians called a council and agreed: “If this be true, we must know more about it; it is a matter than cannot be put off.” For more on all this, see Albert Atwood, The Conquerors (Boston, Jennings and Graham, 1907), pp. 17-18; James W. Bashford, The Oregon Mission- aries (New York, Abington Press, 1918), pp. 19-21; and John M.