On July 28th 1954, a United States commemorative stamp made its first appearance at Sioux City, Iowa, honouring Capt. Meriwether Lewis and Second Lieutenant William Clark, both of the U.S. Army, who led a party of about 29 men on an expedition to explore the unknown territory West of the Mississippi River, in 1804. The expedition made the first crossing of North America from East to West. To the reader of today it must' seem strange that the United States was first crossed by boat.
When Thomas Jefferson became President, the country to the West of the Mississippi was a vast wilder¬ness. Parts of it had been visited at times by fur traders and trappers, and Indians were known to be living in some areas. Jefferson decided to send out an exploring party to make a crossing of the territory. Reports had suggested that there was a great river across the unknown wastes rising from the mountains in the far West, while the Columbia River on the other side of the mountains made its way to the Pacific.
Consequently, Jefferson thought it worthwhile to send an expedition along these two rivers to the Pacific. In January 1803, the U.S. Congress voted $2,500 for the venture, and after his appointment as leader of the expedition Lewis spent many weeks studying map-making. It would seem that the expedition should have been led by a naval captain rather than an army man. However, both Lewis and Clark had considerable service in the NorthWest, were firm friends, and proved to be the right men for the task.
Besides the two leaders, it is generally believed, although reports vary, that the remainder of the party comprised 14 American soldiers, nine volunteers, two boatmen, an interpreter, who acted also as a hunter, and the negro slave of Clark, a man named York. The wife of Charbonneau, the interpreter, an Indian woman named Sacagawea, also accompanied the expedition as it was thought her knowledge of some of the territory to be crossed might be of benefit to the party.
The expedition set out on May 14, 1804, in three fiat-bottomed boats from the East bank of the Missis¬sippi River, near the confluence of the Missouri. Two of the boats were pirogues (long canoes) and the other was a keel boat. The U.S. Post Office Department Information Service, in its Press Bulletin of June 22, 1954, says: "The keel boat shown in the middle foreground (of the stamp design) was drawn from the description as given in the book 'Lewis and Clark', by John Bakeless. In his book he states: " ..... All this was carried in three vessels: a 22-oar keel boat (or bateau) handled by the soldiers of the permanent exploring party; a large pirogue in which the hardy French rivermen commanded by their `patroon', La Jeunesse, strained at the oars, and another pirogue of six oars, rowed by soldiers, not part of the Corps of Discovery, who were to be sent home in the spring.
The keel boat was the kind of craft which both of the officers and many of the soldiers had used on the Ohio-55 ft. long, drawing 3 ft. of water, and carrying one square sail. She was decked over for 10 ft. in the bow, with a cabin aft. Along the gunwales, amidships, lockers were placed so that their lids could be raised to give additional protection in case of attack"
There is an illustration in the book with the caption, "Missouri River Boatmen", by Charles Bodmer, and it seems probable that this has also been used in the drawing of the keel boat on the U.S. stamp. Bodner accompanied Prince Maximilian Alexander Philipp von Wied-Neuweid on his travels in the interior of North America about 1834, and the picture is one of the craft used by the Prince. It shows a keel boat, with a very large rudder of the type found in Dutch craft and which would prove very useful.
Keel boats were the precursors of river steamers and advanced the course of civilization westwards. They were adaptable craft and made headway with a sail, tow ropes, oars and poles. The illustration on the postage stamp portrays the landing of Lewis and Clark on the banks of the Missouri River before moving into the expedition's winter quarters. The main figures, Lewis in the foreground and Clark directly behind him, are drawn from the Lewis and Clark Monument, in Charlottesville, Virginia. Behind the two figures stand the Shoshone Indian girl Sacagawea, taken from the statue of Sacagawea, in the State Capitol grounds at Bismarck, North Dakota. The Indian girl, is honoured chiefly on the stamp for her aid in securing the friendship of the Shoshone Indians and in guiding the expedition over the Great Divide. When Sacakawea reached the Great Divide she was reunited with the Shoshones from whom she had been kidnapped previously. It was through her efforts that Lewis and Clark were able to get ponies from the Shoshones to continue their overland journey. Behind Sacagawea is shown the figure of her husband, the French Canadian trapper and interpreter, Charbonneau, who bought the girl as a slave from her captors and married her.
The winter quarters were made with a friendly tribe of Indians, the Mandans, who boasted that they had never shed whiteman's blood. The Indians lived on the banks of the Missouri in North Dakota; the expedition remained with them from October 1804 to April 1805, when the journey was resumed. During this stay canoes were built for the journey up the Missouri. A month was spent on the river before they sighted the mountain barrier, and it took another month to portage their boats 16 miles around the Great Falls of the Missouri.
Carts were made to carry the boats, with wheels cut from tree trunks. In July they came to the junction of three rivers, which they named Jefferson,' Madison and Gallatin. Travelling along the Jefferson River, they met a party of Shoshones, the chief was Sacagawea's brother, who was naturally delighted to see his sister again. He was happy to place the whole resources of his tribe at the expedition's disposal, and guides and horses provided for the dangerous journey through the mountains. They took a month to struggle over the Continental Divide to the Bitter Root River. Then the Bitter Root Mountains had to be traversed to reach Clearwater. From Clearwater they paddled downriver in homemade boats to the Columbia River and then on to their journey's end, the Pacific.
On November 7, 1805, Clark wrote in his journal: "Great joy in camp. We are in view of the ocean". On March 23, of the following year, the party started the return journey overland, splitting into two groups further to explore the territory. They eventually reached St. Louis on September 23, 1806 and the occasion was one of great rejoicing for President Jefferson had long despaired of their return from the 8,000-mile journey through unknown country. Only one man was lost, Sergeant Charles Floyd, who died at the spot where Sioux City now stands in Iowa. He was buried there and a monument has been erected to his memory. By way of a tribute to him, the commemorative stamp was first issued in Sioux City. Only one man deserted despite the severe hardships the party had to endure at times. In fact the only point which Lewis and Clark ever disagreed on was whether dog meat was good for man if he was hungry enough to eat it.
The Lewis and Clark expedition was one of the great missions of history. After two years and four months in the wilderness their report filled seven printed volumes. The maps they made were astonishingly accurate. Their data on plants and trees in the territory opened a whole new field to botanists. The report of the Indians is referred to by anthropologists even today, while Lewis and Clark's handling of the tribes is one of the best examples of expert diplomacy in American history. And by reaching the Columbia River and following it to the sea the expedition completely clinched the Americans' later claim to the rich North-West. Success achieved largely through the simple American keel boat and the canoe.
SG1065 Seas Breezes 2/55