The men of the Corps of Discovery had shared every day for nearly two and a half years of their lives together. Surely no other military unit in history has formed such a close bond. They faced nearly impossible odds and achieved monumental accomplishments in spite of those odds. They had learned to know and care deeply for one another and the land. They had conquered half a continent of unmapped wilderness that was inhabited by countless numbers of heretofore unknown Indian tribes whom their country had labeled as “savages,” although with the single exception of the Teton Sioux, the Indian tribes they encountered proved to be accommodating and extremely helpful. The Corps of Discovery could not have achieved its unbelievable march to the Pacific Ocean and back without them. The soldiers of the expedition were unassuming men of great courage and tenacity who conquered not only the wilderness but also the great Rocky Mountains—and they did it all on modest river boats, on foot, and on horseback. They suffered near starvation, the dreadful stormy weather of the Fort Clatsop period, and the incredible physical exertion demanded of them daily.
For the most part during the ensuing years, the men of the Corps of Discovery lost track of each other due to the undeveloped means of communication at the time. What is known of the principle members of the expedition after they returned follows:
MERIWETHER LEWIS was born at Locust Hill Plantation near Charlottesville, Virginia. He was well educated for his time. He was particular, precise, serious, and reserved. According to President Jefferson, the Lewis family was “subject to hypochondriac affectations. It was a constitutional disposition in the family.” Jefferson also called it melancholy, and it would later become known as depression.
In his boyhood, Lewis developed a love of hunting and exploring. He enhanced his skills as a hunter and outdoorsman and developed an interest in plants, animals, and geology which served him well during the twenty-eight months duration of the Corps of Discovery.
As a young man in the army, he fought against Indians in the Northwest Territory, where he learned much about Indians, their character, and their languages. He served in the First Infantry of General Anthony Wayne’s northwestern campaign. In 1801, he was appointed President Jefferson’s private secretary, a position in which he learned much about diplomacy, statesmanship, and national policy.
He became governor of the Louisiana Territory upon the return of the expedition. He died October 11, 1809 on a trip to Washington as he worked to settle financial problems arising from the expedition. An inevitable “conspiracy theory” arose that he had been murdered, but in view of his known genealogical history of depression, both William Clark and President Thomas Jefferson believed it was suicide. A monument was erected in his honor at the place of his death near Nashville, Tennessee.
WILLIAM CLARK was born near Charlottesville, Virginia, of Scottish ancestry. His family was of the lesser gentry, owners of modest estates and a few slaves. His family migrated to Kentucky in 1785 before it was a state, and he came to adulthood near Louisville. His famous oldest brother, General George Rogers Clark, taught him wilderness survival skills.
Blending fairness, honesty, and physical strength with patience, respect, and understanding, Clark recognized the personal dignity of the Indians, honoring their cultures and religious beliefs. He learned military command, engineering, construction and typography during four years as a young army officer with the western branch of the United States Army.
After the Corps of Discovery expedition, he served as head of the Indian Bureau and became governor of Missouri upon the death the Meriwether Lewis. He died in St. Louis in 1838.
SACAGAWEA After returning to the Mandan Villages, details of her life become elusive. It is known that she and her husband, Charbonneau, traveled to St. Louis in 1809 to deliver Pomp to William Clark as they had agreed. Three years later, she gave birth to a daughter but died three months later. Captain Clark raised both Pomp and his sister as his own, providing them with benefits they could never have known with the Shoshone tribe.
POMPEY Baby Pomp, formally Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, was given to Clark by his parents and was raised by Clark as his own. As an adult, Pomp trapped in the Rocky Mountains, scouted for the army, and joined the California gold rush. Nothing more is known of him.
SEAMAN Nothing definite is known about Seaman after the expedition, but he is reported to have been with Lewis on his last fateful journey. When Lewis was buried, Seaman reportedly refused to leave the grave, refusing food and eventually starving to death.
BEN YORK, a slave of the Clark family since birth, was given his freedom by Captain Clark after returning from the expedition. Clark also gave him a dray and six horses, and York engaged in the draying business between Nashville, Tennessee and Richmond, Kentucky. He died of cholera at an unknown date.
JOHN ORDWAY was born in New Hampshire. He was highly regarded by his commanding officers. He kept the orderly books and performed other important duties. After returning from the expedition, Ordway settled in Missouri and became the owner of an extensive estate that included two plantations. He died in 1887, at a ripe old age.
GEORGE DROUILLARD was the son of a French-Canadian father and a Shawnee mother. He was very adept at Indian sign language. He seemed to always be with one of the captains when emergencies occurred that required skill, nerve, endurance, and cool judgment. After returning from the expedition, Drouillard returned to the Rocky Mountains, where he gathered information that contributed to Captain Clark’s final map of the area. He was killed by the Blackfoot tribe in 1810, near the site of Lewis’s scrape with them.
GEORGE SHANNON was born in Pennsylvania. When part of a military party returning an Indian chief to the Mandan villages in 1807, Shannon was shot in the leg by the Arikara Indians. The leg was amputated, and he received a pension from the government for the loss of his leg. He studied law and opened a law practice in Lexington, Kentucky. He was elected to the House of Representatives from Kentucky and later to the United States Senate from Missouri. He died in 1836.
JOHN SHIELDS, born in Virginia, had been a blacksmith, and as such became one of the most valuable men on the expedition as head blacksmith, gunsmith, boat builder, and general repairman for anything. After his discharge from the army, Shields trapped for a year in Missouri with Daniel Boone. He died in 1809 in Indiana.
NATHANIEL PRYOR was born in Virginia, but his family moved to Kentucky when he was eleven. He was one of the few married men on the expedition. Lewis and Clark knew him to be a man of character and ability. Pryor remained in the army and became an officer, serving in the Battle of New Orleans. After his discharge from the army, he married an Osage girl and lived with the Osage tribe until he died in 1831.
PIERRE CRUZATTE was half French and half Omaha Indian. He had been a river man and trader on the Missouri, and he could speak the Omaha language and was skilled in the sign language. He was valuable assistance at the Indian councils and encounters with the various Indian tribes on the lower Missouri. He played the fiddle to entertain the men of the expedition as well as the Indian tribes they encountered, which in no small part helped to achieve and maintain the good will of the native tribes the expedition encountered. Nothing is known of him after the expedition.
JOSEPH FIELDS was born in Virginia, but moved to Kentucky with his family as a child. The Fields brothers were considered two of the expedition’s most valuable men. Both were excellent woodsmen and hunters. He was discharged from the army on October 10, 1806. He is thought to have died in the late 1820’s.
REUBEN FIELDS was discharged from the army with his brother on October 10, 1806. He settled in Indiana, where he died in late 1822.
PATRICK GASS was born near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, of Irish descent. He was a fine carpenter, boat builder, and woodsman. He led the construction of the expedition’s forts at St. Louis, the Mandan Villages, and Fort Clatsop, as well as the making of the wagons at the falls of the Missouri. Gass is known to have served in the military during the War of 1812. He lost an eye in battle and was discharged with a pension in 1831. He died in 1870, at the age of ninety-eight.
SILAS GOODRICH was born in Massachusetts. After the expedition, he re-enlisted in the army and was known to have died by the late 1820’s.
JOHN COLTER was born in Virginia, but his family moved to Kentucky in his childhood. He was quick-minded, courageous, and a fine hunter and was trusted with many special missions. After the expedition, he fell out with Hancock and Dixon within six weeks of being discharged from the Corps of Discovery. He continued in the mountains as a trapper until 1811, when he returned to St. Louis and settled on a farm. He died of jaundice on November 11, 1813.
WILLIAM BRATTON was born in 1778 in Virginia, of Irish parentage. The family migrated to Kentucky. He was a blacksmith and gunsmith as well as a hunter. After the expedition, Bratton returned to Kentucky and re-enlisted in the army during the War of 1812. He later married and settled on a farm in Indiana. He died on November 11, 1841.
TOUSSAINT CHARBONNEAU was born March 20, 1767 in Boucherville, Quebec. He was French-Canadian. He was a trapper, laborer, and interpreter of the Hidatsas language. He could not speak English, and he really didn’t speak Hidatsas very well. Nothing is known of him after his return from the expedition except that he worked for a fur company from 1811-1838 as a translator for the Upper Missouri Agency’s Indian Bureau. He is thought to have died at the Mandan Villages.
FRANCOIS LABICHE was half French and half Omaha Indian. He served as an interpreter and as headman of one of the pirogues during the time with Lewis and Clark.. He was adept in French, English, and several Indian languages, which made him valuable. He was an excellent tracker, hunter, and waterman. Nothing is known of him after the expedition.
JOHN POTTS was born in Germany. After the expedition, he became a trapper in the upper Missouri area, where he was killed by the Blackfoot Indians in 1810.
JOSEPH WHITEHOUSE was born in Virginia, but his family migrated to Kentucky. He kept a journal of the expedition and worked on publishing it after its completion. Nothing more is known of him.
ALEXANDER WILLARD was born in New Hampshire. He was a proficient blacksmith, gunsmith, and hunter. Willard was employed as a blacksmith in Missouri in 1808, served with the army in the War of 1812, and lived in Wisconsin from 1824 to 1852. In 1852, he and his family migrated by covered wagon to California, where he died in 1865 at the age of eighty-seven.