Pierre Dorion and his family spent the winter of 1810–1811 somewhere in the St. Louis area, but if any details were ever recorded—which itself seems unlikely—they have been lost. And although Dorion was a native French speaker, spoke enough English to get by, was fluent in number of Sioux dialects, and knew Indian sign language well—and had rudimentary skills in a variety of Indian languages—he is not known to have left any record of himself, not a diary, letter, or note of any kind, not even an x for his signature, assuming he was illiterate, a not unreasonable conjecture. So it is quite understandable that the record of his life up to 1804, when he met Lewis and Clark, is a blank slate, and that for the next six years mentions of him are random and fragmentary—he’s in Yankton Sioux country; he’s in St. Louis preparing to escort a group of Yankton Sioux up the river; he’s guiding Lisa through the Dakotas to the Mandan and Hidatsa villages. He appears briefly, then disappears for months or years on end.
That all changed early in 1811. A flurry of recordkeeping tracked Dorion’s movements from Missouri to the Great Plains to the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast and back to the Idaho wilderness. The thirty-four months from March 1811 to January 1814—the last thirty-four months of his life—are chronicled with careful detail by a variety of diarists. For a third of that period, we know where he was and what he was doing virtually every day; thereafter he is mentioned frequently enough to leave no question about his whereabouts and his activities. One could argue, no doubt, that international markets and competing corporations had initiated the series of events resulting in Dorion’s final years being so well documented, but in his practical world the stone that started the avalanche was a simple whiskey bill.
Not staying at the winter camp at the mouth of the Nodaway River, Wilson Price Hunt had returned to St. Louis, arriving on January 20, 1811. Hunt’s greatest difficulty, wrote Washington Irving, “was to procure the Sioux interpreter. There was but one man to be met with at St. Louis who was fitted for the purpose, but to secure him would require much management.” That man was Dorion, of course. He had presumably provided for his family the last several months by hunting, trapping, and fishing and possibly laboring in a shop that built canoes. But all of this provided a subsistence and nothing more—Dorion knew that his chance to make some real money would come in the spring, when traders heading up the Missouri would remember that he was the one man “fitted for the purpose” of serving as a Sioux interpreter.[1]
Dorion also knew that the fierce competition between the Pacific Fur Company of Astor and the St. Louis Missouri Fur Company of Lisa et al. had made his services more valuable than ever. The Astorians, as was well known in St. Louis, planned to follow Lewis and Clark’s route all the way to the Pacific. They were running late and had to get up the Missouri as fast as possible. Lisa and his men were also going up the river, just as they had in 1807 and 1809, but this biannual trip held particular significance. As Irving explained, “What had become of [Henry] and his party was unknown. The most intense anxiety was felt concerning them, and apprehension that they might have been cut off by the savages. At the time of Mr. Hunt’s arrival at St. Louis [in January of 1811], the Missouri Company were fitting out an expedition to go in quest of Mr. Henry. It was to be conducted by Mr. Manuel Lisa.”[2]
This meant that both groups had to pass the feared Lakota Sioux, Indians that Thomas Jefferson had made special mention of in his instructions to Lewis and Clark. “On that nation we wish most particularly to make a friendly impression,” he wrote, “because of their immense power.” But when the captains met the Lakota in September of 1804, negotiations quickly broke down, threats were uttered, and the two groups faced off with rifles cocked and arrows drawn. Lewis ordered the cannon loaded with musket balls. “Had that cannon fired,” wrote Stephen Ambrose, “there might have been no Lewis and Clark Expedition. The exploration of the Missouri River country and Oregon would have had to be done by others, at a later time.” Luckily, a Lakota chief stepped forward and made a conciliatory move, sparing both sides from a good deal of bloodshed. But the indignant Clark hardly forgave and forgot. When he and Lewis came back down the river two years later, he yelled from the boat to a band of Lakota warriors that his men would kill any of them who came too close. When he wrote a lengthy description of several different Indian nations, he called the Lakota “the vilest miscreants of the savage race . . . the pirates of the Missouri.”[3]
In his accounts of the near-catastrophe in Lakota country, Clark made it clear that misunderstandings arose immediately because, in his words, “we discover our interpreter do not Speak the language well.” The captains had made a major mistake in leaving Pierre Dorion Sr. at the Yankton Sioux villages so he (and presumably Pierre Jr.) could accompany representatives of that nation to St. Louis. The elder Dorion spoke fluent Sioux and had lived among the Sioux for more than two decades—along with translating accurately he could have advised Lewis and Clark on everything from matters of protocol and nuance to Lakota history and tradition. As Lewis and Clark attempted to follow Jefferson’s mandate to befriend the Lakota people, nothing could have been more crucial than having an experienced, savvy interpreter. Instead, they called on Pierre Cruzatte, a member of the crew who spoke his mother’s Omaha language, to do the impossible and communicate with the Lakota, who certainly didn’t understand Omaha. Cruzatte apparently spoke to some Omaha prisoners who did their best to pass on the messages to and from the Sioux, but that failed. “Cap Lewis proceeded to Deliver a Speech which we oblige to Curtail for want of a good interpreter,” wrote Clark. In the midst of this chaos, with both the explorers and the Indians quite uncertain about what the other side was saying, patience grew short and tempers flared. Speaking of one of the chiefs, Clark wrote, “his insults became So personal and his intentions evident to do me injurey, I Drew my Sword (and ordered all hands under arms).”[4] A “good interpreter,” however, would have been in a position to stop perceived insults from escalating, something well known by Hunt and Lisa. Both had been in St. Louis when Lewis and Clark returned, and both had had ample opportunity to question Clark in the intervening four and a half years. Neither was about to make the same mistake as Lewis and Clark and venture into Lakota territory without a Dorion to rely on.
Hunt and Lisa also knew that Pierre Jr., the undisputed successor to his father, was indeed the one man in St. Louis capable of acting as Sioux interpreter. Dorion’s unpaid whiskey tab was hardly a deterrent to Lisa’s rehiring him—quite the opposite, it made the prospect more likely because Lisa was the kind of man to leverage the debt in his favor: Dorion could work off part or all of the bill while providing a valuable service at the same time. Hunt, on the other hand, was just as desperate to hire Dorion and, since most of his company was waiting at the mouth of the Nodaway River, would be ready to leave sooner.
Exactly when Hunt first approached Dorion is not known, but he apparently did so not long after his arrival on January 20, no doubt discovering—if he didn’t know already—that Dorion’s bill with Lisa “remained unsettled, and a matter of furious dispute, the mere mention of which was sufficient to put him [Dorion] in a passion.” But, as Irving observed, “the moment it was discovered that Pierre Dorion was in treaty with the new and rival association, [Lisa] endeavored, by threats as well as promises, to prevent [Dorion’s] engaging in their service.” But Lisa’s negotiating strategies—which served him so well in tense encounters with Indians—failed him at this crucial moment: “His promises might, perhaps, have prevailed; but his threats, which related to the whiskey debt, only served to drive Pierre into the opposition ranks.” Even then, Dorion was no easy bargain. After negotiating with Hunt for two weeks, he agreed “to serve in the expedition, as a hunter and interpreter, at the rate of three hundred dollars a year, two hundred of which were to be paid in advance.”[5]
About that same time, John Bradbury, an English botanist interested in seeing the Missouri River country and collecting plant specimens, expressed an interest in going up the river with the Astorians. “As they were apprised of the nature and object of my mission,” wrote Bradbury, “Mr. Wilson P. Hunt, the leader of the party, in a very friendly and pressing manner invited me to accompany them up the River Missouri, as far as might be agreeable to my views.” Bradbury accepted the invitation, “to which an acquaintance with Messrs. Ramsey Crooks and Donald M’Kenzie, also principals of the party, was no small inducement.”[6] Bradbury was joined by fellow English botanist Thomas Nuttall. Nuttall left no known record of the voyage, but Bradbury’s extensive journal has become the primary record relating to the first part of the Astorians’ westbound expedition.
Just as Hunt and the others were preparing to make their departure, five American hunters who had signed on with Hunt the previous autumn arrived in St. Louis complaining of ill treatment by the partners at the winter camp. “What was worse,” wrote Irving, “they spread such reports of the hardships and dangers to be apprehended in the course of the expedition, that they struck a panic into those hunters who had recently engaged at St. Louis, and when the hour of departure arrived”—on the morning of March 12, 1810—“all but one refused to embark.”[7] If that weren’t enough, Dorion—at the last minute, according to Irving—refused to board the boat unless Marie and Baptiste and Paul could also come along. Hunt agreed. Like Lewis and Clark, he had planned a journey across the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean with no intent of taking anyone but adult males, mostly in their twenties and early thirties. But, in a development no one would have prophesied, both expeditions included an Indian woman and her infant son—two sons in Marie’s case. And the instant this young Iowa woman boarded the boat with her boys, she formed a permanent link with the unassuming Shoshone woman now known as Sacagawea. The parallels between the two are startling, and the most fascinating parallel still lay in the future.
What was not surprising was that Lisa somehow got word almost immediately that Dorion had left with Hunt. “In the evening,” wrote Bradbury, who had delayed his departure to await the mail expected to arrive the next morning from Louisville, “I was informed by a gentleman in St. Louis, that a writ for debt had been taken out against Dorion . . . by a person”—Lisa—“whose object was to defeat the intentions of the voyage.”[8] Bradbury further learned that Lisa intended to intercept Hunt’s boat at St. Charles and have Dorion arrested.
Knowing that the loss of Dorion could jeopardize the entire mission, Bradbury packed up his things and made arrangements for himself and Nuttall to travel overland on horseback and inform Hunt before he reached St. Charles. Bradbury and Nuttall left St. Louis at 2:00 in the morning, never revealing what obstacles they encountered and how they possibly found the boat. Bradbury simply said he “effected” his plan and warned Dorion. Irving reported that Dorion “immediately landed and took to the woods, followed by his squaw laden with their papooses, and a large bundle containing their most previous effects, promising to rejoin the party some distance above St. Charles.” But could Dorion be trusted? After all, he “was at the very time playing an evasive game with his former employers; who had already received two-thirds of his year’s pay, and his rifle on his shoulder, his family and worldly fortune at his heels, and the wild woods before him.”[9] So Hunt hoped for the best.
They reached St. Charles around noon on March 13, and lawmen presumably sent by Lisa searched for Dorion in vain. Whether they attempted to interrogate Hunt or anyone else is not known, but that was the last official attempt to apprehend Dorion. “We slept on board the boat,” reported Bradbury, “and in the morning of the 14th took our departure from St. Charles, the Canadians measuring the strokes of their oars by songs, which were generally responsive betwixt the oarsmen at the bow and those at the stern: sometimes the steersman sung, and was chorused by the men.”[10]
A verse from one of their favorite songs, rendered in English, went like this:
Behind our house there is a pond,
Fal lal de ra.
There came three ducks to swim thereon:
All along the river clear,
Lightly my shepherdess dear,
Lightly, fal de ra.[11]
“We soon met with Dorion,” continued Bradbury, “but without his squaw, whom it was intended should accompany us. They had quarrelled, and he had beaten her, in consequence of which she ran away from him into the woods, with a child in her arms, and a large bundle on her back.” Hunt sent a Canadian voyageur to search for Marie. “The day was very rainy, and we proceeded only nine miles, to Bon Homme Island, where we encamped.” The voyageur returned not long after that and reported that his search had been unsuccessful. This left Dorion in an agitated state, reportedly regretting his harsh treatment of his wife and spending a “solitary and anxious night” worrying about her and the boys. But, as Bradbury reported: “About two hours before day, we were hailed from the shore by Dorion’s squaw, who had been rambling all night in search of us. She was informed, that we would cross over to her at daybreak, which we did, and took her on board.”[12] This was the first—but not the last—mention of Dorion beating his wife. Neither Bradbury nor Irving mentioned what injuries she suffered from the beating, and neither seemed particularly surprised that such a thing should happen.
That same day, an article appeared in the Louisiana Gazette:
Mr. Wilson P. Hunt left this place last Monday, with a well equipped barge, to join his associates, at the Otto village, to proceed on his expedition to the Columbia river. His party amount to about seventy able bodied men, nerved to hardship.
We understand the New-York Fur Company, to whom Mr. Hunt is attached, have dispatched a well furnished ship, to meet the party on the shores of the Pacific.
Mr. Hunt is accompanied by Mr. Bradbury and a Mr. Nuttall, who are deputed to this country, to explore and make known its riches, in the Animal, Vegetal and Mineral kingdoms, for which purpose they are provided with the necessary tests. Mr. B has devoted nearly 12 months to the examination of this neighborhood, and has been enabled to introduce to England, a very considerable number of Plants, before unknown to the Botanic gardens of that country. From the superior advantages which the country of Le baut Missouri furnish, we trust these gentlemen will return with a rich scientific harvest, gratifying to the philosopher, and probably useful to society in general.[13]
On March 17, Hunt’s party landed at a French village named La Charette, across the river from where Crooks had met Lewis and Clark in September of 1806 and near where he had met Lisa the next spring. Two more historic meetings were in the offing. “On leaving Charette,” wrote Bradbury, “Mr. Hunt pointed out to me an old man standing on the bank, who, he informed me, was Daniel Boone, the discoverer of Kentucky.” Bradbury had a letter of introduction from a Colonel Grant, one of Boone’s nephews, and went ashore to talk to Boone. The boat went on ahead. “I remained for some time in conversation with him,” continued Bradbury. “He informed me, that he was eighty-four years of age; that he had spent a considerable portion of his time alone in the back woods, and had lately returned from his spring hunt, with nearly sixty beaver skins.” Either Boone was exaggerating or forgetful or Bradbury misunderstood him—the famed explorer was a mere seventy-seven years old and would live until 1820. We can’t say whether his and Bradbury’s long conversation touched on his first glimpse of Kentucky, his daring rescue of his daughter, or how he and several other defenders of Boonesboro had withstood a six-month siege by a combined force of British and Indians, but it is doubtful that Boone mentioned the loss of his Kentucky lands, his court-martial, or how his obsession with “elbow room” was a key factor in his son’s torture and death.[14]
Leaving Boone to contemplate his incredible life of heroic acts, not-so-heroic acts, triumph, tragedy, and disappointment—or perhaps nothing beyond his sixty beaver pelts or the recent rainstorms—Bradbury made his way through the woods and back to the river. “As the boat had disappeared behind an island, and was at too great a distance to be hailed,” he wrote, “I got across [to the south side of the river] by swimming, having tied my clothes together, and inclosed them in my deer skin hunting coat, which I pushed before me. I overtook the boat in about three hours, and we encamped at the mouth of a creek called Boeuf, near the house of one Sullens. I enquired of Sullens for John Colter, one of Lewis and Clarke’s party, whom General Clark had mentioned to me as being able to point out the place on the Missouri where the petrified skeleton of a fish, above forty feet long, had been found.”[15]
Colter had ventured back to civilization almost ten months earlier, in May of 1810, but his fame had arrived several months before that, in December of 1809, when Dr. Thomas published his article describing Colter’s flight from Blackfoot Indians in the Missouri Gazette. This was the same month that Bradbury appeared in St. Louis, and he apparently read the article, for he arranged to interview Colter upon his return. “This man [Colter] came to St. Louis in May, 1810,” he wrote, “in a small canoe, from the head waters of the Missouri, a distance of three thousand miles, which he traversed in thirty days. I saw him on his arrival, and received from him an account of his adventures after he had separated from Lewis and Clarke’s party.”[16]
Sullens told Bradbury that Colter lived about a mile away and sent his son to tell Colter of the party’s arrival, but Colter did not appear that evening. “At day-break,” wrote Bradbury, “Sullens came to our camp, and informed us that Colter would be with us in a few minutes. Shortly after he arrived, and accompanied us for some miles, but he could not give me the information I wished for. He seemed to have a great inclination to accompany the expedition; but having been lately married, he reluctantly took leave of us.” Irving added that Colter “had many particulars to give them concerning the Blackfeet Indians, a restless and predatory tribe, who had conceived an implacable hostility to the white men, in consequence of one of their warriors having been killed by Captain Lewis, while attempting to steal horses.” Colter was therefore “urgent in reiterating the precautions that ought to be observed respecting” the Blackfoot because “the expedition would have to proceed” through their territory.[17]
Such advice likely strengthened Hunt’s resolve to follow the Yellowstone River rather than the Missouri across present Montana; whether it convinced him to avoid the Three Forks area altogether is not known but is distinctly possible. Talking with Colter just a few weeks later, Henry Marie Brackenridge, on his way up the Missouri with Crooks and McClellan’s old nemesis Lisa, offered this account:
The course of the Rocky mountains, is nearly north and south, and about the same length with the Allegheney mountain, but much higher, and more resembling the Alps, or Andes. Immence peaks, and clothed with eternal snows. They subside towards the south, and are lost before they reach the gulf of California. At the head of the Gallatin Fork, and of the Grosse Corne of the Yellow stone, from discoveries since the voyage of Lewis and Clark, it is found less difficult to cross than the Allegheney mountains; Coulter, a celebrated hunter and woodsman, informed me, that a loaded wagon would find no obstruction in passing.[18]
This inconspicuous paragraph, buried in a much longer article by Brackenridge, offered tantalizing clues about things past and things to come. Although Colter descended the Gallatin River for some distance after escaping from his Blackfoot pursuers, he likely passed eastward to Clark’s Fork of the Yellowstone before reaching the source of the Gallatin. He had apparently concluded, however, that the head of the Gallatin lay in the same general region as the source of the Grosse Corne, or Bighorn River. He was more correct than he could have realized. The area that Colter ventured into during that memorable winter of 1807–1808, now best known for Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, held not only spectacular mountain ranges and lakes and countless other natural wonders, it was also an astounding and unparalleled source of steams and creeks, supplying and resupplying water to the great rivers of the West, with the Snake River flowing west to the Columbia and on to the Pacific; the Madison and Gallatin flowing northwest and the Yellowstone northeast to the Missouri and on to the Gulf of Mexico; and the Green River flowing south to the Colorado and on to the Gulf of California. But for a band of explorers trying to reach the Columbia and stay clear of Blackfoot Indians at the same time, the key river was the Grosse Corne. It begins at a lake in the Rocky Mountains, flows southeast into a mountainless basin, cuts sharply north through a mountain gap, and then heads north, northwest, and finally northeast, where, 646 miles from its source, it joins the Yellowstone, at the very spot where Lisa constructed Fort Raymond late in 1807. This is the Bighorn River, called the Wind River for its first 185 miles.
Colter may not have seen the source of the Gallatin, but he did see the source of the Wind/Bighorn. He did not, however, follow the Bighorn River south from its mouth—not at all. Instead, he ascended the Yellowstone River toward the present site of Billings, Montana; cut southwest into Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin; continued largely south all the way to the Wind River Basin; and ascended the Wind River itself to its head at Brooks Lake, meaning that he had seen the source and mouth of the Bighorn but very little in between. Nor did he have names for the river and lake he had discovered. After his return to St. Louis, however, Colter had consulted with William Clark as Clark created his master map of the west. Clark had also talked with and obtained maps from Drouillard in 1808 or 1809; based on their own explorations and their discussions with Indians, the three men had correctly concluded that Brooks Lake—called Lake Biddle by Clark—was the source of the Bighorn.[19]
As for the pass that was “less difficult to cross than the Allegheny mountains,” Togwotee Pass lay just a few miles west of Brooks Lake, offering a passage over the Continental Divide that could indeed accommodate a loaded wagon. Six months after talking to Colter, Hunt had the opportunity to ascend Wind River to its source at Brooks Lake and then cross Togwotee Pass, unaware that this would give him a straight shot to a branch of the Columbia. Instead, he chose Union Pass, southwest of Togwotee Pass, causing him to take a much more roundabout route westward. Hunt soon regretted his decision not to follow Wind River, and though he never said so, he almost certainly regretted not being accompanied by the man who had carefully scouted the area and was in the habit of memorizing crucial details, the man who had been on the verge of dropping everything to go West once more but who had reluctantly taken his leave, standing alone in the rain and watching as the boats faded from view.
On March 21 the incessant rain finally ceased, and Hunt and his men arrived at a French village called Côte sans Dessein. “After we had formed our camp,” wrote Bradbury, “the interpreter [Dorion] went into the village, where he had some acquaintance. On his return, he informed us that there was a war party of Indians in the neighborhood, consisting of the Ayauwais [Iowa], Potowatomies, Sioux, and Saukee Nations, amounting to nearly three hundred warriors.” Dorion had also learned that the war party “were going against the Osages; but having discovered that there was an Osage boy in the village, they were waiting to catch and scalp him. [Dorion] also informed us, that we might expect to fall in with other war parties crossing the Missouri higher up.” The group was alarmed at this “unpleasant news.” True, they were “well armed [and] determined to resist any act of aggression,” but even with a cannon and much better guns than the Indians likely had, they would be outnumbered more than fifteen-to-one if they met a war party of three hundred.[20]
Dorion gave Marie the bad news: Hunt’s party was heading into Osage country, and warriors from her native Iowa nation were about to go to war with the Osage. Not surprisingly, Bradbury said she “appeared to be much afraid of the Osages during our passage up the river.” That night and the coming nights, the men slept—or tried to sleep—with their rifles, powder, and ammunition close by and ready. The rain started again and continued for the next three days. “Our bread was now becoming very mouldy, not having been properly baked,” noted Bradbury. “Mr. Hunt anxiously waited for a fine day to dry it, together with the rest of the baggage.”[21]
The next day, March 25, they met “a boat with sixteen oars” on its way from Fort Osage to St. Louis to pick up fresh supplies. The news from the fort was not good: “The Great Osages had lately killed an American at their village.” The weather matched the men’s mood—the incessant rain continued. Three days later Bradbury recorded another bad omen: “This evening we had a most tremendous thunder storm; and about nine o’clock, a tree, not more than fifty yards from our camp, was shivered by lightning. Mr. Hunt, Mr. Nuttall, and myself, who were sitting in the tent, sensibly felt the action of the electric fluid.” The next morning, Bradbury walked with Hunt and others to a settler’s house. “We heard that war had already commenced between the Osages and the confederate nations, and that the former had killed seven of the Ayauways [Iowa]. This determined us to continue our practice of sleeping on our arms, as we had done since the 21st.”[22]
But no alarm was sounded the following day, nor the one after that, nor the next, and the partners, hunters, and voyageurs—and the Dorion family—settled into the slow, wearisome, day-to-day life of inching up the river. They watched for Indians but saw none. Bradbury marked the days with details that were interchangeable: a cup of water left “full in the boat, was found to be nearly all solid ice” at dawn; “the carcasses of several drowned buffaloes passed us”; “we had another severe thunder storm”; “the navigation became less difficult.” Dorion presumably went out with the hunters, who killed deer and bear. How Marie kept her boys occupied is unknown. Luckily, through careful attention, luck, or both, no serious accident befell either of the boys, even though, as everyone knew, accidents were common. Less than a year earlier, as Clark and his wife and son and others descended the Ohio River on their return to St. Louis, one such accident struck: “A fiew minets after [we] arrived at the Mississippi,” he wrote, “rachiel”—apparently the daughter of one of Clark’s slaves—“fell between the boats and Drowned.”[23]
On April 6 the hunters found a “bee tree” and returned “to the boat for a bucket, and a hatchet to cut it down.” Bradbury walked with them back to the tree. “It contained a great number of combs, and about three gallons of honey.” Turning philosophical, Bradbury accurately forecast the future, writing that the spread of European bees “has given rise to a belief, both amongst the Indians and the Whites, that bees are their precursors, and that to whatever part they go the white people will follow. I am of the opinion that they are right, as I think it as impossible to stop the progress of the one as of the other.”[24]
At 10:00 on the morning of April 8, the group saw Fort Osage, which was six miles away. “We had not been long in sight before we saw the flag was hoisted, and at noon we arrived, when we were saluted with a volley as we passed on to the landing place, where we met Mr. Crooks”—and nine other Astorians—“who had come down from the river Nauduet to meet us.” About three hundred men, women, and children of the Osage Nation had also gathered to greet the party. Hunt, Bradbury, and several others passed through them on their way to meet Lieutenant John Brownson, then commanding the fort in the absence of Captain Eli B. Clemson. Bradbury had a letter of introduction to Dr. Murray, the garrison physician, who gave Bradbury “every information relative to the customs and manners of the Osage nation,” as well as an extensive vocabulary of Osage words. “He walked with me down to the boats,” wrote Bradbury, “where we found several squaws assembled, as Dr. Murray assured me, for the same purposes as females of a certain class in the maritime towns of Europe crowd round vessels lately arrived from a long voyage, and it must be admitted with the same success.”[25]
Early that evening, “an old chief came down, and harangued the Indians assembled about the boats, for the purpose of inviting the warriors of the late expedition to a feast prepared for them in the village.” Bradbury was told that a “dance of the scalp” would be performed because the Osage war party had destroyed an Iowa village, killing and scalping two old men and five women and children. “All the rest had fled at their approach; but as rain came on the dance was not performed.” The two men walked into the Indian village, which consisted of “about one hundred lodges of an oblong form, the frame of tiember, and the covering mats.” One of the chiefs invited them to his lodge and served them “square pieces of cake, in taste resembling gingerbread. “Shortly afterwards some young squaws came in, with whom the doctor (who understood the Osage language) began to joke, and in a few minutes they seemed to have overcome all bashfulness, or even modesty. Some of their expressions, as interpreted by me, were of the most obscene nature,” but the chief’s wife “did all in her power to promote this kind of conversation,” and Dr. Murray said that “similar conduct would have been pursued at any other lodge in the village.”[26]
Walking to the lodge of another chief, Bradbury and his host saw the seven scalps, ornamented with raccoons’ tails, placed on the roof. A warrior who had distinguished himself in the campaign against the Iowa “came in, and made a speech, frequently pointing to the scalps on the roof, as they were visible through the hole by which the smoke escaped.” When the speech concluded, Bradbury and Murray shook hands with everyone present. On their return to the boat they met Marie, who had been so distressed about the Osage Indians as Hunt’s party ascended the river. The men shared her concern, and on first meeting Lieutenant Brownson, “it had been debated whether or not it would be prudent to send a file of men to conduct [Marie] from the boat to the fort during our stay.” Now, however, Marie had been welcomed into the Osage community. Whether Dorion had acted as an intermediary is not known, but someone had befriended Marie. “She had been invited up to the village by some of the Osages,” wrote Bradbury. In a turn of events puzzling to Bradbury and the others of European stock, so conscious of national and ethnic—not to mention class—boundaries, neither Marie nor her new Osage friends were concerned that their two nations were at war and that some of the scalps proudly displayed had been taken from Iowa women. “Of course,” noted Bradbury, “according to Indian custom, [Marie] would be as safe with them as in the fort.”[27]
On the morning of April 9, before dawn, Bradbury heard a great howling coming from the village and knew that the Osage were lamenting their warriors—and perhaps horses and dogs—slain in one of the battles with the Iowa and their allies. Making himself as inconspicuous as possible, Bradbury tied a black handkerchief around his head, stuck his tomahawk in his belt, and wrapped himself in a blanket. Then he walked into the village. “The doors of the lodges were closed, but in the greater part of them the women were crying and howling in a tone that seemed to indicate excessive grief. On the outside of the village I heard the men, who, Dr. Murray had informed me, always go out of the lodges to lament.” Bradbury watched one of the men, who, resting his back against the stump of a tree, “continued for about twenty seconds to cry out in a loud and high tone of voice, when he suddenly lowered to a low muttering, mixed with sobs: in a few seconds he again raised to the former pitch.”[28]
That evening, the mourning was replaced with celebration in the dance of the scalp, a ceremony that “consisted in carrying the scalps elevated on sticks through the village, followed by the warriors who had composed the war party, dressed in all their ornaments, and painted as for war.” Marie was present with her friends and was “so delighted with the scalp-dance, and other festivities of the Osage village, that she had . . . a strong inclination to remain there.” The next morning, however, when the boats departed in the midst of another fierce rainstorm, Marie was onboard one of them. “Our number was now augmented to twenty-six by the addition of Mr. Crooks and his party,” wrote Bradbury. “We had not proceeded more than two miles, when our interpreter, Dorion, beat his squaw severely; and on Mr. Hunt inquiring the cause, he told him that she had taken a fancy to remain at the Osages in preference to proceeding with us, and because he had opposed it, she had been sulky every since.” Marie’s sense of foreboding as she came up the river had thus proved accurate—but the harm she suffered had not come from the Osage or any other Indians but from the man Irving called “her liege lord, . . . perhaps, a little inspired by whiskey, [who] had resorted to the Indian”—and white—“remedy of the cudgel,” belaboring “her so soundly, that there is no record of her having shown any refractory symptoms throughout the remainder of the expedition.”[29]
About three weeks after Hunt’s group left for the Pacific, another expedition was preparing to depart. Just as Bradbury had accompanied Hunt and chronicled his voyage, a lawyer and journalist by the name of Henry Marie Brackenridge did the same for the second party. “It was not known at this time what had become of Mr. Henry, who had not been heard of for more than a year,” wrote Brackenridge. “It was moreover considered as a duty to carry relief to their distressed companions, and bring them home. Manuel Lisa was chosen to undertake this arduous task.” There was no doubt, as Brackenridge noted, that Lisa was “possessed of an ardent mind and of a frame capable of sustaining every hardship,” no doubt that he was the complete “master of the secret of doing much in a short space of time,” but he was also despised by many. So it was no surprise that Brackenridge added a postscript to his lavish praise of Lisa, an unintentional touch of humor: “Unfortunately, however, from what cause I know not, the majority of the members of the company have not the confidence in Mr. Lisa which he so justly merits; but on this occasion, he was entrusted with the sole direction of their affairs from necessity, as the most proper person to conduct an expedition which appeared so little short of desperate.”[30]
With some difficulty, a barge of twenty tons was outfitted with a few thousand dollars’ worth of merchandize. “We sat off from the village of St. Charles, on Tuesday, the 2d of April, 1811, with delightful weather,” wrote Brackenridge. “We are in all, twenty-five men, and completely prepared for defence. There is, besides, a swivel on the bow of the boat, which, in case of attack, would make a formidable appearance; we have also two brass blunderbusses in the cabin.” Such precautions were absolutely necessary because of the hostility of the Sioux, “who, of late had committed several murders and robberies on the whites.” To tempt the Indians as little as possible, “the greater part of the merchandise, which consisted of strouding, blankets, lead, tobacco, knifes, guns, beads, &c., was concealed in a false cabin, ingeniously contrived for that purpose.” None of this was surprising or unusual, but Brackenridge then went on to mention something that would make the spring and summer of 1811 so memorable and so volatile: “Mr. Wilson P. Hunt had set off with a large party about twenty-three days before us, on his way to the Columbia, we anxiously hoped to overtake him before he entered the Sioux nation; for this purpose it was resolved to strain every nerve, as upon it, in a great measure depended the safety of our voyage.”[31]
It had come down to this: Lisa, who had undermined and thwarted first Crooks and McClellan and then Hunt at every turn, taking every opportunity to benefit at their expense, now wanted to join with them—for the sake of numbers and also for the sake of being accompanied by the best Sioux interpreter in the business—Dorion. Adding irony to irony, Brackenridge soon learned another “cause of Lisa’s anxiety” to catch Hunt: “Lisa was apprehensive that Hunt would do him some ill office with the Sioux bands; that in order to secure his own passage through these, he would represent the circumstances of their own trader being on his way with goods for them.” This was exactly what Lisa had apparently done to Pryor in 1807 and what he was suspected of doing to Crooks and McClellan in 1809. Pryor’s misfortune on the river was particularly relevant because Lisa had now switched roles in dramatic fashion: before, Pryor wanted to catch Lisa and combine their forces for added strength—now, Lisa wanted to overtake Hunt for the same purpose, believing that “by this augmentation of Hunt’s party, which consisted of eighty men”—a slight exaggeration—“we should be so formidable as to impose respect upon the savages, and compel them to relinquish their designs”; before, Lisa (according to the Mandan woman held as a captive) had told the Arikara that “two boats might be very soon expected,” that the crews of those boats “were to remain, for the purposes of trade at [the Arikara] villages”—now, Lisa had used virtually the same language—was he simply quoting himself?—to describe what he feared Hunt would say to the Sioux. What an amazing turn of events.[32]
Brackenridge, however, added another element that made the chain of circumstance that much more fantastic:
We had on board a Frenchman named Charnoneau, with his wife, an Indian woman of the Snake nation, both of whom had accompanied Lewis and Clark to the Pacific, and were of great service. The woman, a good creature, of a mild and gentle disposition, greatly attached to the whites, whose manners and dress she tries to imitate, but she had become sickly, and longed to revisit her native country; her husband, also, who had spent many years among the Indians, had become weary of civilized life. So true it is, that the attachment to the savage state, or the state of nature, (with which appellation it has commonly been dignified,) is much stronger than to that of civilization, with all its comforts, its refinements, and its security.[33]
Sacagawea and Toussaint Charbonneau, who had come down the river with Pierre Chouteau’s armada in the autumn of 1809 (after Sheheke-shote had been safely returned to his village) and had spent a year and a half in St. Louis, were on their way back to Indian territory. This meant that Sacagawea—the first woman known to have journeyed from the Great Plains to the West Coast of America—and her alter ego Marie—about to become the second—had both been caught up in the Great Race up the Missouri. Not only was Lisa chasing Hunt, the young Shoshone woman was chasing the young Iowa woman, though neither knew it and neither would have cared. Their paths, which had crisscrossed in the past, had finally converged (with one key difference: Sacagawea did not have her son, Baptiste, with her—William Clark was providing for his welfare and his education—while Marie was traveling with both of her boys). If the two iconic women had not met at Fort Mandan or in St. Louis, they would yet have another opportunity, for Lisa would soon start gaining ground on Hunt.[34]
By the end of February, 1811, Tonquin had reached the Sandwich Islands, where twelve Hawaiians had signed on as crew of the ship and another twelve had signed to labor at the trading post to be built at the mouth of the Columbia. They had agreed “to work for the company for three years and to be paid in goods valued at one hundred silver dollars at the end of their term.” Tonquin also had “full water casks and a storeroom bulging with yams, taro, and assorted vegetables. The ship’s deck resembled a farmyard with one hundred squealing pigs, several goats, poultry, and two sheep.” On the first of March, the ship sailed for the coast of North America. When the crew neared that coast three weeks later, the ship’s log noted that they had traveled 21,852 miles. But any sense of joy was lost in the deep resentment that virtually every Astorian nursed toward the captain. They agreed with Alexander Ross: “Captain Thorn was an able and expert seaman; but, unfortunately, his treatment of the people under his command was strongly tinctured with cruelty and despotism. He delighted in ruling with a rod of iron; his officers were treated with harshness, his sailors with cruelty, and every one else was regarded by him with contempt.”[35]
There was no better example of Thorn’s cruelty toward his crew than what he did when Tonquin approached the mouth of the Columbia. After leaving the Sandwich Islands, the voyage had been relatively uneventful until March 16, when, according to Gabriel Franchere, “the wind shifted all of a sudden to the S.S.W., and blew with such violence, that we were forced to strike top-gallant masts and top-sails, and run before the gale with a double reef in our foresail. The rolling of the vessel was greater than in all the gales we had experienced previously.” Ross wrote that “during this storm, almost everything on deck was carried off or dashed to pieces; all our livestock were either killed or washed overboard; and so bad was the weather, first with rain, and then with sleet, hail, frost, and snow which froze on the rigging as it fell, that there was no bending either ropes or sails, and the poor sailors were harassed to death.” In a rare show of caution, Thorn decided to “lay to for two nights successively. At last, on the 22d, in the morning, we saw land. . . . The breakers formed by the bar at the entrance of that river, and which we could distinguish from the ship, left us no room to doubt that we had arrived at last at the end of our journey.”[36]
Although the sight of land “filled every heart with gladness,” the weather was “cloudy and stormy,” the “aspect of the coast . . . wild and dangerous.” The wind blew “in heavy squalls, and the sea ran very high,” but that did not deter Thorn, who had apparently reached the end of his patience. As soon as he was convinced that they had reached the mouth of the Columbia, he ordered Mr. Fox, the first mate, to “go and examine the channel on the bar.” Ross wrote that Thorn assigned “one sailor, a very old Frenchman, and three Canadian lads, unacquainted with sea service—two of them being carters [wagon drivers] from La Chine, and the other a Montreal barber.” Franchere, however, identified only four men who accompanied Fox: Basile Lapensée and his brother Ignace Lapensée—presumably the two young carters—Joseph Nadeau, and John Martin, the old man. “Mr. Fox objected to such hands; but the captain refused to change them, adding that he had none else to spare.” Fox argued that it was impossible to perform the task, “in such weather, and on such a rough sea, even with the best seamen, adding, that the waves were too high for any boat to live in.”[37]
“Mr. Fox,” bellowed the captain, “if you are afraid of water, you should have remained at Boston.” Fox said no more, simply ordered the boat lowered. But, “if the crew was bad, the boat was still worse—being scarcely seaworthy, and very small. While this was going on, the partners who were all partial to Mr. Fox, began to sympathize with him, and to intercede with the captain to defer examining the bar till a favourable change took place in the weather.” Thorn’s response? “He was deaf to entreaties, stamped, and swore that a combination was formed to frustrate all his designs. The partners’ interference, therefore, only riveted him the more in his determination,” and he again ordered Fox to proceed. Ross added that “Mr. Fox was . . . a great favourite among all classes on board; and this circumstance, I fear, proved his ruin, for his uniform kindness and affability to the passengers had from the commencement of the voyage drawn down upon his head the ill-will of the captain.” Proof of Thorn’s ill will was plainly evident in Fox’s “being sent off on the present perilous and forlorn undertaking, with such awkward and inexperienced hands, whose language he did not understand.”[38] (Fox apparently did not speak French, the native language of those accompanying him.)
Seeing that the captain was immovable, “turned to the partners with tears in his eyes and said—‘My uncle was drowned here not many years ago, and now I am going to lay my bones down with his.’ He then shook hands with all around him, and bade them adieu. Stepping into the boat—‘Farewell, my friends!’ said he; ‘we will perhaps meet again in the next world.’”[39]
Although he was convinced he was doomed, Fox had taken “some provisions and firearms, with orders to sound the channel and report themselves on board as soon as possible. The boat was not even supplied with a good sail, or a mast.” The partners could do nothing but watch, although one of them offered what he could—“a pair of bed sheets to serve” as a sail, knowing full well, of course, that even a good sail would have meant little.[40]
Ross offered a fitting benediction to the sad scene:
The moment the boat pushed off, all hands crowded in silence to take a last farewell of her. The weather was boisterous, and the sea rough, so that we often lost sight of the boat before she got 100 yards from the ship; nor had she gone that far before she became utterly unmanageable , sometimes broaching broadside to the foaming surges, and at other times almost whirling round like a top, then tossing on the crest of a huge wave would sink again for a time and disappear altogether. At last she hoisted the flag; the meaning could not be mistaken; we knew it was a signal of distress. At this instant all the people crowded round the captain, and implored him to try and save the boat; in an angry tone he ordered about ship, and we saw the ill-fated boat no more.[41]
1. Irving, Astoria, 141; shortly after arriving in Astoria in 1812, Dorion proved his worth as both a hunter and a canoe maker. For examples, see Robert F. Jones, Annals of Astoria, 98, 102, 104, 106, 110.
2. Irving, Astoria, 140–41.
3. Thomas Jefferson to Meriwether Lewis, January 22, 1804, Jackson, Letters, 1:166; Ambrose, Undaunted Courage, 170; Clark, “Estimate of Eastern Indians,” Moulton, Journals, 3:418. Based on Clark’s assessment, traders going upriver naturally concluded that getting safely past the Lakota nation would be the most difficult aspect of a journey to present North Dakota or Montana. The most serious conflicts on the river, however, came with the Arikara nation, upstream from the Lakota, where several Americans were killed in 1807 and several more in 1823. (See Morris, Fate of the Corps, chapter 3 and chapter 13.) The Lakota proved to be much more peaceful than Clark imagined; not only that, but they gave Lewis and Clark the benefit of the doubt by depicting the meeting with the Americans favorably in their winter counts. Cloud Shield, for example, described a year during this period when “many people camped together and had many flags flying,” while American Horse’s summary states, “The Dakotas had a council with the whites on the Missouri River, below the Cheyenne Agency, near the mouth of Bad Creek” (Greene, The Year the Stars Fell, 138).
4. Clark’s field notes, September 25, 1804, and Clark’s journal entry, September 25, 1804, Moulton, Journals, 3:111 and 3:112, respectively.
5. Irving, Astoria, 142.
6. Bradbury, Travels, 36. In a letter to Meriwether Lewis on August 16, 1809, Thomas Jefferson had written, “This will be handed you [by] Mr. Bradbury, an English botanist, who proposes to take St. Louis in his botanising tour.” Bradbury arrived in St. Louis with the letter in hand on December 31, 1809, but likely had heard by then that Lewis had died in Tennessee in October. In what proved to be his last letter to Lewis, Jefferson had added: “Your friends here are well, & have been long in expectation of seeing you. I shall hope in that case to possess a due portion of you at Monticello” (Jefferson to Lewis, August 16, 1809, Jackson, Letters, 2:458, bracketed insertion included in Jackson’s transcription).
7. Irving, Astoria, 142.
8. Bradbury, Travels, 19.
9. Bradbury, Travels, 38–39; Irving, Astoria, 144.
10. Bradbury, Travels, 39.
11. Ibid., 39–40n10 (Bradbury’s note).
12. Bradbury, Travels, 39–41; Irving, Astoria, 135. Bradbury said the voyageur who searched for Marie was named “St. Paul,” but Kenneth W. Porter does not include that name in his list of Astorians. Furthermore, Porter does not include anyone with the first or last name of Paul. However, there were two Canadian voyageurs with “Saint” in their name—Joseph Saint Amant and Louis Saint Michel. (Porter, “Roll of Overland Astorians,” 111.)
13. Louisiana Gazette, March 14, 1811.
14. Bradbury, Travels, 43; Jones, William Clark, 41. As Gary Moulton notes, “La Charette, on Charette Creek, in Warren County, [Missouri], in 1804 [was] the westernmost white settlement on the Missouri. . . . Daniel Boone moved there from Boone’s settlement sometime after 1804; he died and was buried there, but in 1845 his remains and those of his wife were moved to Kentucky. The village site, near present Marthasville, has been washed away by the Missouri” (Moulton, Journals, 2:252–253n5).
15. Bradbury, Travels, 44.
16. Ibid., 44n18 (Bradbury’s note). In stating that Colter traveled three thousand miles from Three Forks to St. Louis, Bradbury accurately represented William Clark’s estimated mileage—which was 2953 miles (going overland from Three Forks to the Yellowstone River and following it to the Missouri). However, Clark’s figures turned out to be overestimates. For example, Clark calculated the length of the Missouri from its mouth to Three Forks to be 3,096 miles, while the actual distance is 2,341 miles. Therefore, Colter traveled several hundred miles less than three thousand. Even then, the claim (of either Colter or Bradbury) that this trip was completed in thirty days is almost certainly an exaggeration. Lewis and Clark made good time on their return journey, sometimes traveling seventy or eighty miles a day, but it still took them forty days to go from the Mandan villages in present North Dakota to St. Louis, which Clark estimated to be about 1,600 miles. Colter had to go several hundred miles farther than that and apparently went from Three Forks to the Yellowstone River by way of the Gallatin, Lamar, and Clark’s Fork Rivers, adding several days of overland travel to his journey. Colter thus accomplished an amazing feat even if he made the journey in thirty-nine days (the period from April 22, the earliest he could have left, since he carried letters written on April 21, to May 31, the latest he could have arrived if Bradbury’s mention of May is accurate.) (See Moulton, Journals, 8:381 and 3:88-3:93 for Clark’s estimates; the website of the Missouri River Conservation Districts Council for current mileage [accessed on March 24, 2012]; and chapter 4 herein for Colter’s possible route.) As for the second installment of Dr. Thomas’s article, it is presumed but not proved to have appeared in the St. Louis newspaper. As Donald Jackson notes, “Joseph Charless, publisher of the Missouri Gazette . . . ran the first installment [of Thomas’s article] in the issue of November 30, [1809], and probably ran the second and final installment [which included the account of Colter] early in December. But the Gazette is one of the scarcest of American newspapers, and in the most complete file available—at the Missouri Historical Society [now the Missouri History Museum]—part of the December 7 issue and all of the December 14 issue are missing.” (Jackson, “Journey to the Mandans,” 179.) Luckily, Thomas’s first and second installments were reprinted in the Pittsburgh Gazette on July 6 and July 13, 1810, respectively, and Jackson included the second installment in “Journey to the Mandans.”
17. Bradbury, Travels, 44–46; Irving, Astoria, 147. There is good evidence that Colter’s son, Hiram, was born before the Lewis and Clark Expedition because he bought goods at an estate sale in 1825. What became of Hiram’s mother, however, is unknown. Colter had a daughter, Evelina, who married in 1830, birth date unknown. When Colter died in May of 1812, he left a widow who is called both Loucy and Sally in the probate papers. She married a man by the name of James Brown. (Colter-Frick, Courageous Colter, 175, 174, 160, 166.) Irving, Astoria, 147. In July of 1806, near Two Medicine River in present northwest Montana, Meriwether Lewis and his three companions—George Drouillard and Joseph and Reubin Field—had killed two young Blackfoot men who attempted to steal their guns and horses. James Ronda writes that after their safe escape, Lewis and the others “left behind at the Two Medicine the seed of a myth that has long shaped popular understanding of the Blackfeet fight. That myth links the Two Medicine encounter with later Blackfeet-American hostilities . . . and appears to have its genesis in the fertile imagination of Washington Irving” (Ronda, Lewis and Clark among the Indians, 243).
18. Missouri Gazette, Apr. 18, 1811.
19. For more information on Colter’s various routes and Clark’s maps, see chapter 4 herein, Allen, “The Forgotten Explorers”; Allen, Passage Through the Garden; Cohen, Mapping the West; and Kelly, “Evacuation of Three Forks.”
20. Bradbury, Travels, 48–49, bracketed insertions added.
21. Ibid., 63, 50.
22. Ibid., 50, 52.
23. Ibid., 53, 57; William Clark to Jonathan Clark, July 3, 1810, Holmberg, Dear Brother, 245, 247–8n6, underlining in original. Clark’s matter-of-fact tone does not necessarily indicate a lack of sympathy but seems typical of his way of recording such events. On August 27, 1827, he wrote in his Indian Office logbook: “Edmund Clark (my Infant Son) died at 81/2 A.M. (10 mo. 3 days old)” (Cited in Jones, William Clark, 289, parentheses and underlining in original).
24. Bradbury, Travels, 57–59.
25. Ibid., 60–61; Irving, Astoria, 152.
26. Bradbury, Travels, 61, 62.
27. Ibid., 62–63.
28. Ibid., 63–64.
29. Ibid., 66, 67; Irving, Astoria, 152, 153, bracketed insertion added. As for Dorion beating Marie, while Bradbury says that Hunt merely asked Dorion why he had done so, Irving reports that Dorion inflicted his violence “before his neighbors could interfere.” Sacagawea was much luckier: on at least two occasions, William Clark vigorously defended her. The first came on June 19, 1805, when Sacagawea, who had recently been quite ill, ate “a considerable quantity of the white apples . . . together with a considerable quantity of dryed fish” without Clark’s knowledge. She soon “complained very much and her fever again returned. I rebuked Sahrbono severely for suffering her to indulge herself with such food” (Clark’s journal entry, June 19, 1805, Moulton, Journals, 4:309). A few weeks later, Clark wrote: “I checked our interpreter for Strikeing his woman at their Dinner” (Clark’s journal entry, August 14, 1805, Moulton, Journals, 5:93). As far as is known, Charbonneau did not strike her again during the expedition.
30. Brackenridge, Journal of a Voyage, 5, 6. Brackenridge’s claim that Henry had not been heard from in more than a year was overstated because, as noted above, Menard and Henry had parted ten months earlier, in June of 1810.
31. Ibid., 7, 8–9. Hunt had actually left on March 12, exactly three weeks ahead of Lisa, who left on April 2. The newspaper gave notice of Lisa’s departure, just as it had Hunt’s a few weeks earlier: “A few days ago, Mr. Manuel Lisa sailed from here on a voyage to Fort Mandan. Should Mr. Lisa join Mr. Hunt’s party, on the headwaters of the Missouri, they will form an army able to oppose any number of Blackfeet which may attack them. It is thought there will be upwards of 300 Americans on the Columbia River next year” (Louisiana Gazette, April 11, 1811).
32. Ibid., 29; Nathaniel Pryor to William Clark, Oct. 16, 1807, Jackson, Letters, 2:433.
33. Brackenridge, Journal of a Voyage, 10.
34. “On October 30, 1810, Charbonneau purchased from [William] Clark, who was then Indian agent for Louisiana Territory, a tract of land on the Mississippi River, in Saint Ferdinand Township, near St. Louis. In the spring of 1811, Charbonneau sold the land back to Clark for one hundred dollars, a transaction recorded on March 26, 1811” (Howard, Sacajawea, 156–57, bracketed insertion added). Clark had promised to raise Baptiste as his own child (see Clark to Toussaint Charbonneau, August 20, 1806, Jackson, Letters, 1:315), but that’s not exactly what happened. As Landon Jones notes, “Although the boy apparently never lived in Clark’s personal household, he was baptized in St. Louis and matriculated at a parochial school run by a Baptist minister” (Jones, William Clark, 194). As for Lisa’s attempt to catch Hunt, Brackenridge wrote on April 11: “In company with [Toussaint] Charbonneau, the interpreter, I proceeded . . . to the village of Cote sans Dessein. . . . [where Dorion had first heard of the war between the Osage and the Iowa and their allies] To our eager inquiries after Mr. Hunt, we were told, that he passed here about three weeks before. Thus far we have gained about two days upon him” (Brackenridge, Journal of a Voyage, 28, bracketed insertions added). As noted, however, Lisa had left three weeks after Hunt, not three weeks and two days. Hunt had reached the village on March 21, exactly three weeks earlier, so Lisa had kept pace but had not yet gained any ground.
35. Ronda, Empire, 111; Ross, First Settlers, 87. See Ronda, Astoria, 87–115, for a description of the horrific voyage, including a compelling account of how Robert Stuart saved several fellow Canadians (whom Thorn had deliberately left at the Falkland Islands) by pulling a pistol and threatening to kill Thorn.
36. Franchere, Narrative, 55; Ross, First Settlers, 75.
37. Ross, First Settlers, 76; Franchere, Narrative, 55. Franchere’s count of five men—Fox, the Lapensée brothers, Nadeau, and Martin—is assumed to be accurate because both he and Ross report that a total of eight men drowned in the Columbia passage. (See note 38, below.)
38. Ross, First Settlers, 76-78.
39. Ibid., 77.
40. Franchere, Narrative, 55.
41. Ross, First Settlers, 77. What makes this story even more heartbreaking is that two days later, Thorn insisted on sending out another boat, despite rough seas. Five men boarded the boat—Job Aitkin, the rigger; Stephen Weeks, the armorer; a sailmaker named John Coles; and Harry and Peter, two Hawaiians. A second tragedy ensued—only Weeks and one of the Hawaiians survived, meaning that eight men had been lost on the bar (a number confirmed by both Ross and Franchere). “We had left New York, for the most part strangers to one another,” wrote Franchere, “but arrived at the river Columbia we were all friends, and regarded each other almost as brothers. We regretted especially the two brothers Lapensée and Joseph Nadeau: these young men had been in an especial manner recommended by their respectable parents in Canada to the care of Mr. M’Kay; and had acquired by their good conduct the esteem of the captain, of the crew, and of all the passengers. The brothers Lapensée were courageous and willing, never flinching in the hour of danger, and had become as good seamen as any on board. Messrs Fox and Aikin were both highly regarded by all; the loss of Mr. Fox, above all, who was endeared to every one by his gentlemanly behavior and affability, would have been severely regretted at any time, but it was doubly so in the present conjuncture: this gentleman, who had already made a voyage to the Northwest, could have rendered important services to the captain and to the company. The preceding days had been days of apprehension and of uneasiness: this was one of sorrow and mourning” (Franchere, Narrative, 60–61). As noted in the prologue, note 1, Oliver Roy Lapensée, quite possible a brother of Basile and Ignace, drowned in the Athabasca River on the return to Montreal, meaning that the parents may have been informed of the loss of three sons. That task was not left to Alexander McKay (the man who recruited them), however, because he was the one partner who perished in the West.