October 22, 1804
It has been nearly a month since my last entry in this journal, but this is not because the days have been uneventful. To the contrary.
We have had a successful council with the Arikara people—a very friendly tribe. They were astonished by our airgun. When we offered them a taste of whiskey, they refused, saying they were surprised their great Father to the east would offer them whiskey, which would make them act like fools. They gave us bushels of corn, Indian tobacco, and buffalo robes, which we will need now that winter is upon us.
Several men have joined us on our final push to the Mandan village, including an Arikara chief who is hopeful that we can help him achieve peace between his people and the Mandans....
CAPTAIN LEWIS had not been scratching in the red book because he was in a serious rambling mood, despite the prickly pear alongshore. The ground was covered with this spiny cactus and it was hard to find a place to walk without it biting you. On most days we left camp at sunup and walked until after dark. It was as if he knew the coming winter would curtail his rambling and he wanted to get in some extra walking while he still could.
We explored a number of abandoned Indian villages. The Captain went through the empty lodges, looking closely at what was left behind, pacing off how big each village was, and piecing together what it had looked like before the Indians moved on or died from diseases. He wrote this information down in the journal he and Captain Clark were keeping for President Jefferson.
There were thousands of buffalo on the prairie and dozens of wolves hunting them, a fatal dance I never tired of watching. The wolves came to the hunt with a plan in their hearts. They ran at the herd, then watched carefully through the billowing dust for a sign of weakness. When a weak animal was found they cut it out from the herd, running it to exhaustion before moving in for the kill. A wolf snapped at its hind legs, two or three others worried its flanks, and the fastest, strongest wolf latched its teeth onto the buffalo's nose, riding the massive head down until its beard collided with the ground. Sometimes the wolves chose badly. They were gored. They were trampled. They died on the flat dusty prairie. Their steps faltered, but the dance never ended.
Around this time there was another dance going on in our camp. Private Moses Reed was leading it, and the only partner he could find was Private John Newman.
About the only thing Reed had learned from running the gauntlet was not to open his mouth against the captains in the presence of most of the other men. He now transferred his words into Private Newman's head, who in turn spoke them with his mouth. Whenever Reed got a chance he would slink up near Newman like a wolf and prey on his mind with poisonous words.
"Do you believe me now? I ran away to get me a better life and now I'm being treated just like a slave—in fact worse than a slave. The captains treat York better than me, better than all of us!
"It's time we did something about this. If we can get a few men on our side before we get to the Mandan village, we can take our oppressors down. Next spring we'll trap a few weeks and go back to our gals with our pouches filled with money.
"We won't get that land they promised us, I can tell you that. Those Tetons almost killed the lot of us and some of the Indians up ahead are worse. We're going to die out here. Every last one of us, we're all going to die. And that girl of yours back home? How long do you think she's going to wait around for you?"
Hearing these words day after day was just too much for poor Newman. One night the men sat around the fire talking about this and that—the Arikara women, what the Mandan women would be like, would it ever stop raining, how cold the winter would be....
Newman was sitting quietly, as he usually did, staring into the fire, holding a cup of hot coffee in his hands to warm them—when suddenly he stood up and threw his mug onto the ground.
"I'm sick of being a slave!" he shouted. "Aren't all of you? It's time we knock the captains down a peg or two and take this expedition over! Who's with me?"
The men stared at him in mute bewilderment. Not even John Colter, who was seldom wordless, had anything to say.
"You're all cowards!" Newman spit. "I'm a young man with my whole life before me, and I intend to live it as a free man!"
Captain Clark, having heard the commotion all the way from the keelboat, strolled up to the fire. "Private Newman, would you care to recant those mutinous words you have spoken?"
Private Newman glared at him defiantly. "No sir, I would not."
"Confine him," Captain Clark said calmly, and strolled back to the keelboat.
The next day a court-martial was held and Newman was charged with expressing mutinous words. He was sentenced to seventy-five lashes, removal from the permanent party, and hard labor until he could be sent back to Saint Louis in the spring with the French boatmen.
After the lashing Newman was a changed man. He recanted what he had said and stopped listening to Reed. He hoped he could get back into the captains' good graces and continue with us in the spring, but the captains could not afford to have a weak-spirited or mutinous man as a member of the permanent party.
October 26, 1804
Tomorrow morning I will walk ahead to the Mandan village and make certain of our welcome.
I spent a good portion of the morning looking over my animal collection, in particular the prairie wolf Captain Clark managed to kill a few weeks ago. The animal is quite different from the larger gray wolfand is definitely a different species, but certainly a canine of some type. It was a female....
IT WAS MY LITTLE beauty, whom I had not seen since the captains had fired upon her and missed. I knew she was still following us, but she seemed to have grown cautious again after her brush with the captains. I had hoped that experience would prevent her from showing herself again. It did not.
Captain Clark shot her while I was on a ramble with Captain Lewis. When we got back to camp we found her stiffened body lying on the keelboat deck, her golden eyes dulled by death. I could not watch as the Captain measured her and stripped her fur away.
Colter yawns.
"How much more is there?" Drouillard asks.
"A good bit more," Colter says, flipping through the pages.
Drouillard looks at Mountain Dog and Watkuweis. "Colter's eyes are getting sore. We will continue reading tomorrow."
Watkuweis takes the red book, slips it back into the otter skin pouch, and hands it to Mountain Dog. "We will return tomorrow night," she says.
Colter and Drouillard watch them walk away and spread their blankets on the ground.
"So where the devil do you think they got that book?" Colter asks.
"Guess we'll find out after you finish reading it," Drouillard says.
Within a few minutes both men are asleep.
EARLY THE NEXT morning I follow Mountain Dog out onto the prairie to help search for buffalo. It takes us all day to find a herd, and we don't get back to camp until after dark.
After we eat, Mountain Dog gets the otter bag from his tepee and we join Drouillard and Colter at their fire.
"Are Colter's eyes rested?" Watkuweis asks Drouillard.
"I suspect so," he says with a smile. "He's had them closed most of the day."
"What did she say?" Colter asks.
"She wants you to read."
Colter opens the red book....
October 29, 1804
We are now with the Mandans, trying to find a good spot to build our winter fort.
There was a prairie fire this morning in which several Mandans were burned to death while they were out hunting buffalo....
WHEN THE INFERNO died down, I followed Drouillard and Tabeau out onto the scorched flatland to view the devastation. We found the charred remains of buffalo, wolves, foxes, rabbits, and humans.
"Gray Squirrel and his wife, Running Water," Tabeau said, looking down at two bodies. "Grass fires move as fast as the wind. They didn't have a chance."
"Caw! Caw! Caw!"
White Feather landed on a burnt buffalo skin not far from the bodies. It had been a long time since I had seen him, and I figured he had stopped following us. I was happy he was back.
"Caw! Caw! Caw!"
Drouillard and Tabeau continued their conversation and did not give the crow a single glance. I walked over to the buffalo skin and White Feather flew away. Something moved beneath the skin and I started digging. There was a cry to go along with a movement, which quickly turned into a loud wailing. Drouillard pushed me aside and Tabeau flipped the skin over. It was a child making the noise.
"I'll be," Tabeau said. "Gray Squirrel's son. When the fire came they must have rolled him up in the wet skin. There isn't a blister on him."
"Why didn't they crawl under the skin themselves?"
"Not big enough."
Drouillard picked the boy up and carried him back to the Mandan village.
November 3, 1804
We have started building our fort. It is located across from the first Mandan village....
THERE WERE TWO Mandan villages, one on the east side of the Missouri and one on the west side. A little farther north were three Hidatsa villages situated on the smaller Knife River.
The Mandans lived in large earth lodges about forty feet around. In each village there were forty lodges, with at least ten people living in each lodge. At night they brought their horses and dogs right into the lodge to sleep alongside them.
The men built our fort across from the first Mandan village. The gated wall surrounding the fort was made out of stout trees and stood eighteen feet tall. The captains had the swivel gun put on top of the wall in case we were attacked. Inside were two rows of small huts for the men to sleep in, a foundry, and a plaza to hold council with the Indians, of whom there was a steady flow.
The Mandan and Hidatsa villages functioned like the wharves I had grown up on, but instead of using money, transactions were based purely on trade. Each lodge was a store filled with goods. Cheyenne, Arikara, Sioux, Otos, French and English from Canada, Spaniards, and men and women from half a dozen other tribes traveled across the prairie sea to trade their wares here. A good horse might cost three tanned buffalo robes, one hundred blue beads, and twenty pounds of corn. The Indian who traded the horse would take what he got and trade it for something he and his family needed.
The Mandans were experienced traders. When we first arrived they offered us a few gifts of meat and corn, but after that it was all business. Dozens of Mandans showed up at the fort every day with bushels of corn and squash, meat, buffalo robes, furs, and other items. The men would sit down with them in the plaza and the long process of haggling over prices would begin.
It wasn't long before the cold descended and held us in its icy fist. The river froze solid and our men walked around with buffalo robes wrapped around themselves, the hair sides against their bodies. The Mandans didn't seem to be bothered by the cold. They wore thin moc casins and often spent the night out on the windswept prairie without a fire or a robe to keep them warm. Because of my fur, I was not particularly bothered by the cold. In fact I preferred the cold to the heat of summer.
When the men were off duty they huddled around the fires in their huts, trying to keep the chill away, or walked over to the Mandan villages to visit with the women.
The captains spent most of their time inside the fort. Captain Lewis worked on his notes for President Jefferson, and Captain Clark refined the maps of where we had been.
One day a Frenchman named Toussaint Charbonneau showed up at the fort and walked in on Captain Lewis unannounced, catching him in the middle of working on his animal collection. Charbonneau did not know better than to disturb the Captain when he was working.
"My name is Toussaint Charbonneau," he said with a heavy accent. "I would like to be your interpreter."
Captain Lewis looked up and glared at the intruder for a full minute without uttering one word. Charbonneau had a bushy unkempt beard, shoulder-length gray hair, and a unique smell to him that I placed somewhere between a buffalo's and a raccoon's. He took his hat off. The top of his head was as bald as a newborn mouse pup. While the Captain continued his silent stare, Charbonneau looked around the hut casually, without the slightest idea that his host was irritated.
"We already have an interpreter," Captain Lewis said finally, and looked back down at the skull he had been examining.
"You mean Drouillard?"
Captain Lewis looked up again as if he were surprised that Charbonneau was still standing there. "That's exactly who I mean."
"Ha!" Charbonneau slapped his ample belly.
Captain Lewis flushed in anger. He didn't like this loud Frenchman and he was about to throw him out of the hut when Captain Clark walked in.
Captain Lewis took a deep breath to calm himself. "We have a visitor," he said. "This is Toussaint Charbonneau."
"I've heard the name," Captain Clark said, putting his hand out. "You live up with the Hidatsas?"
"Yes, I do."
"He wants to be our interpreter," Captain Lewis said.
"But we have an—"
"I have already told Mr. Charbonneau that George Drouillard is our interpreter. He was not impressed."
"Perhaps I should start again," Charbonneau offered, finally seeing the Captain's annoyance.
"By all means," Captain Lewis said.
"I didn't mean any offense. I'm sure your man Drouillard is a good man, but does he speak fluent Shoshone?"
The captains looked at each other in surprise, not sure they understood. None of us had ever even seen a Shoshone Indian. But the captains were depending on the Shoshone tribe to sell us horses when we reached the mountains next summer. Making peace with the Shoshones and trading for their horses would be critical to the success of the expedition. The captains had been talking about the problem just that morning over breakfast.
"And I suppose you speak fluent Shoshone?" Captain Lewis asked.
Charbonneau launched into an involved answer, but Captain Lewis didn't understand what he was saying. "Tabeau!" he called. Tabeau stuck his head into the hut. "Can you find out if this man actually speaks the Shoshone language?"
Charbonneau and Tabeau spoke in French for several minutes.
"He does not speak Shoshone," Tabeau explained. "But he has two Shoshone wives living with him up at the Hidatsa village. The women were captured in a Hidatsa raid a few years ago and Charbonneau here won them in a bet with the warriors who owned them. He says he'll bring them with him. He also says that he's a skilled boatman."
The captains asked Tabeau to take Charbonneau outside.
"What do you think?" Captain Lewis asked.
"We need someone who can speak Shoshone. I don't suppose he'll allow one of his wives to come along without him."
"Probably not. And even if he were willing, having an unescorted woman along could pose a problem."
Captain Clark nodded in agreement. "We could use another boatman."
"True."
The captains talked for quite some time before calling Charbonneau back in. After another long discussion they reached an agreement with him. Charbonneau would be hired, and he would bring one of his wives with him.
The following week he brought his two wives to the fort. They were just girls, no more than fifteen or sixteen years old. When they were introduced to the captains they stared down at the ground shyly. Charbonneau had chosen the girl named Sacagawea to accompany us in the spring. "In the Hidatsa language," he said, "Sacagawea means Bird Woman."
The name fit her well. She was a small-boned girl with long crow-colored hair, pulled back and braided in the Indian way. I walked up to her and she immediately scratched my ears. As I stood there enjoying her attentions, I picked up an odd scent from her that could mean only one thing—Bird Woman was carrying a pup inside her. The captains were clearly unaware of this, and I suspected Charbonneau was no less ignorant. They would all find out soon enough.
When they left, Captain Lewis said, "I hope Sacagawea is strong enough to endure the rigors of our journey."
Bird Woman would surprise us all.
January 12, 1805
We brought in the New Year by taking a large group of men to the first Mandan village for dancing and merriment. A good time was had by all...
WE ENJOYED our time among the Mandans, but after a few weeks the men were already talking about proceeding on, hoping for an early spring. I was eager to leave as well. I had gotten used to wandering and discovering new sights and smells. The fort was secure and comfortable, but also confining. I spent a good part of each day roaming through the Mandan villages or out hunting with Drouillard.
Captain Lewis spent most days inside the fort, working on his notes and preparing his collection, which would be sent back with the French voyagers in the spring.
As the winter progressed, food became scarce. Our hunters often came back hungry and frostbitten, without a scrap of meat to show for their efforts.
The captains started doctoring the Indians in exchange for meat and produce. They treated wounds, colds, rheumatism, bad teeth, frostbite, and a number of other ailments. The word spread and every morning a dozen Indians lined up outside the captains' huts, each with an armful of food, to wait their turn for the white medicine.
A second business was set up using the forge and the blacksmith and gunsmith skills of Private John Shields. The Indians brought in hoes that needed mending, axes that needed sharpening, and broken rifles. Eventually there wasn't a broken hoe in any of the Mandan and Hidatsa lodges. The axes were all sharpened, and all the Indians' rifles were as good as new.
Business dropped off. The captains remedied this by helping Shields design a battle-ax—an item that became so popular he and the men helping him could hardly keep up with the demand.
I thought Shield's ax business was a little odd. On the one hand, the captains were telling the Indians to stop warring with one another. On the other hand, they were making battle-axes that the Indians would certainly use in raids. One day a Hidatsa war chief stopped by the Captain's hut on his way to pick up a battle-ax at the forge. He asked permission to raid the Sioux and Arikaras when the weather broke in spring. He got the ax but was told not to use it, which I could see made no sense to him.
February 11, 1805
Sacagawea began her labor today. Captain Clark and I are tending her, but the birth is taking an inordinate amount of time. I have grown very fond of her since she and her husband moved into the fort with us....
THE CAPTAIN wasn't alone in his feelings for Bird Woman. Soon after she and Charbonneau moved into the fort, she announced that she was pregnant. There was some heated debate among the men over the wisdom of her joining our tribe. They thought a woman with a child would be too much of a burden. But as they got to know her, the subject began to fade. There was something about her quiet shyness that appealed to all the men. And by the time she gave birth, they were looking forward to having a human pup on the journey.
Bird Woman spent many evenings picking burrs out of my fur. And from time to time she slipped me a dead mouse, because she knew I was partial to them. These two acts of kindness were more than enough to endear her to me forever.
Bird Woman's labor was long. The captains fretted over her as if they were the expectant fathers, not Charbonneau. After a time René Jessaume, one of the French traders living with the Mandans, suggested to Captain Lewis that he feed her a bit of rattlesnake rattle to hurry the labor along. "It works every time," René insisted.
Captain Lewis was doubtful, but he was getting desperate. He broke up a bit of rattlesnake rattle, put it into a cup of water, and offered it to her.
Sure enough, a few minutes after she drank the mixture down, our tribe had a new member. They named the pup Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, but Captain Clark called him Pomp, which is the name that seemed to stick.
About a month after Pomp was born Charbonneau and his family got kicked out of the fort. The problem began when the captains sat down with Charbonneau to go over his contract and he became uppity with them. He told the captains he would not perform any camp duties, carry any loads, or stand guard duty. He also informed them that he expected to be free to leave the party at any time and that they would have to supply him with provisions if he did. This of course was unacceptable and be was asked to leave that very day.
The captains were very disappointed at this turn of events and so were the men. The fort just wasn't the same without Bird Woman and Pomp. The men missed making faces and uttering odd guttural sounds at her pup. I missed them, too.
A few days after their departure I crossed the frozen river to the Mandan village where they were staying, to see how they were doing in their new circumstances.
Long before I reached the village I heard Bird Woman's voice, but she sounded more like an angry bear than a bird. She was calling her husband every bad name she could think of in Shoshone and Hidatsa. As best I could figure out between curses, Bird Woman wanted to go home to her family below the big mountains and could not believe Charbonneau's arrogance had ruined this prospect.
I did not hear Charbonneau utter a single word all during this harangue. The conversation was so one-sided, I thought she must have killed him and she was shouting at his corpse; but I was wrong. The buffalo-hide door of the lodge flew open and he stumbled outside in a daze, with Bird Woman still shouting at him.
Charbonneau found Tabeau and begged him to go over to the fort and intercede with the captains on his behalf. He told Tabeau that he would do anything the captains asked if they would just allow him and Bird Woman to go with them.
Tabeau crossed over to the fort and argued the case. The captains let Charbonneau stew for a few more days in Bird Woman's wrath, but they finally gave in and hired him back.