Mapping America’s Future： Lewis & Clark and the Louisiana Purchase ｜ The American Story ｜ Ep 11
Episode Stats
Harmful content
Toxicity
11
sentences flagged
Hate speech
27
sentences flagged
Summary
This episode is brought to you by Gimlet Media s The American Story, adapted from the book of the same title by David Barton and Tim Barton. In 1791, in the jungles of Haiti, a group of runaway slaves rose up against their white masters.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
When you travel well, your KLM Royal Dutch Airlines ticket takes you to more than just your destination.
00:00:06.260
It takes you to winding streets, spontaneous detours,
00:00:10.360
and the realisation that neither of you is actually good with directions.
00:00:15.680
And when the final shortcut taken isn't exactly short,
00:00:20.400
our crew is here to give you a trip home that goes just as planned.
00:00:25.660
KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. When you travel, travel well.
00:00:30.000
It is a sweltering August 9th in 1791, deep in the mountains of Saint-Domingue.
0.87
00:00:44.200
The air is humming with the sound of cicadas and frogs and something else.
00:00:50.100
Whispers, hurried footsteps, the rustle of bodies moving through tall grass.
00:00:55.860
Tension coils in the atmosphere, just like it does right before a violent storm.
00:01:01.760
A small clearing opens up among the thick trees.
00:01:09.380
Dozens of men and women gather in a tight circle,
00:01:12.140
their faces streaked with sweat, eyes wide with fear and anticipation.
00:01:17.500
They're runaway slaves, and they have nothing to lose.
00:01:21.440
At the center stands a man, a priest of African voodoo tradition, a leader of this insurgency.
00:01:29.280
He chants incantations that echo through the trees.
0.86
00:01:32.760
Beside him, a priestess dances with hypnotic repetition.
00:01:37.000
Drums quicken, the rhythm builds, a black pig is dragged forward, a knife flashes, blood
00:01:42.980
spills out into the dirt as an offering to the spirits.
00:01:51.440
One by one, the participants take a drink and make a vow of vengeance against their white oppressors.
0.58
00:02:04.000
As later recorded by a French doctor, one of these runaway slaves recalled the words that were spoken that night.
00:02:14.060
Tomorrow night, all the whites are to be exterminated.
1.00
00:02:21.440
The conspiracy extends everywhere, leaving the wights no refuge or hope of salvation.
0.68
00:02:31.680
And if some elude our blades, they will not escape the fire that is going to reduce the plane to ashes.
00:02:39.940
Just days later, the spark turns into an inferno.
00:02:49.900
night skies glow orange, armed bands surge from the hills, masters are dragged from beds,
00:02:56.140
whole families are slaughtered. Over the next month, 800 plantations burn to the ground.
00:03:03.100
More than a thousand French slaveholders and their families meet gruesome ends.
00:03:08.220
Hacked with machetes, impaled, sawed in half, the slaves rise up in a brutal frenzy of retribution
00:03:15.740
and blood. The most profitable colony on earth collapses in blood and smoke. This is the beginning
00:03:25.900
of the Haitian Revolution. It is the first and only successful slave revolt in history.
00:03:37.960
This bloody uprising on a Caribbean island doesn't just reshape Haiti somehow, improbably,
0.59
00:03:43.860
this night in the jungle, this blood oath, this explosion of violence and terror sets off a chain
00:03:50.860
reaction that leads to the greatest real estate bargain in world history. It's a land deal. It
00:03:57.640
will double the size of the United States and forever change the nation. A deal that sets the
00:04:03.460
stage for a new century of scientific discovery, commerce, innovation, heroes, villains, trauma,
00:04:10.600
and triumph, a deal that complicates the fragile American experiment in self-government.
00:04:20.020
This is the American story, The Beginnings, adapted from the book of the same title
00:04:26.560
by David Barton and Tim Barton. Episode 11, Lewis and Clark and the Louisiana Purchase.
00:04:34.500
In 1762, France claimed an enormous swath of North America
00:04:42.860
and named it Louisiana, in honor of King Louis XIV.
00:04:49.760
It was an inland empire, about four times larger than France itself.
00:04:54.500
It stretched from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains,
00:04:58.120
from the Gulf of Mexico to the Cold Plains of the North.
00:05:02.280
Then, France lost the French and Indian War to the British.
00:05:06.440
France quietly handed Louisiana to its ally, Spain, to try to keep it out of British hands.
00:05:13.560
In the treaty that followed the war, Britain stripped France of all of its other mainland
00:05:17.880
possessions in North America. But France did not walk away empty-handed. They got to keep
00:05:23.640
their sugar islands in the Caribbean, colonies that were so profitable that they made the vast
00:05:29.160
forests and rivers of Louisiana seem like a bad investment by comparison. Britain basically
00:05:35.400
shrugged at Spain owning the Louisiana territory. Spain was a power in steep decline and really
00:05:41.940
wasn't considered a threat. For decades, Louisiana remained mostly wilderness. The one town that
00:05:48.380
mattered was New Orleans, a humid port at the mouth of the Mississippi River, a home to about
00:05:54.260
5,000 people, most of them French-speaking. It was the hub on the river highway that carried the
00:06:00.540
crops of America's western farmers to the sea. For years, under Spanish rule, Americans had
00:06:07.480
access to the Mississippi River. A 1795 treaty guaranteed the U.S. right to ship on the river
00:06:14.340
and store goods in New Orleans. But then the French Revolution rippled across the Atlantic.
00:06:20.440
The old alliance between the U.S. and France shattered.
00:06:23.960
When John Adams became president, the U.S. stopped paying its Revolutionary War debt to France,
00:06:29.760
arguing that the money had been owed to a king who no longer had a head.
00:06:37.400
Naval skirmishes followed and an undeclared conflict erupted known as the Quasi-War.
00:06:47.120
a general with volcanic ambition and a talent for moving history just by a sheer force of will.
00:06:53.640
His name was Napoleon Bonaparte. He ended the Quasi-War because he had a more pressing enemy,
00:07:00.780
Britain, as usual. He also had larger ambitions in Europe. Glancing toward the Caribbean,
0.59
00:07:07.120
he saw a way to fuel those ambitions, rebooting an old sugar empire.
00:07:11.540
Haiti was the crown jewel of the New World. By the 1790s, it produced more wealth than all of
00:07:18.720
Europe's other American and Caribbean colonies combined. The wealth was created at the brutal
00:07:25.240
expense of 500,000 slaves working 8,000 plantations to produce 60% of Europe's coffee
00:07:33.240
and 40% of its sugar. More than twice as many Africans were shipped to Haiti
00:07:45.720
From the chaos emerged a former slave named Toussaint L'Ouverture.
00:07:54.180
He had once owned a small plantation and a handful of slaves himself,
00:07:57.820
but he became the central military and political force of the revolution.
00:08:02.100
The French would later call him Napoleon Noir, the Black Napoleon.
00:08:08.700
By the time Thomas Jefferson took office as the third president of the U.S. in 1801,
00:08:14.260
Toussaint had effectively taken control of Haiti.
00:08:18.200
Jefferson, who loved science, geography, and had an insatiable curiosity,
00:08:23.080
had dreamt of a great farming republic stretching west.
00:08:27.140
He believed America's future lay well beyond the Appalachian Mountains.
00:08:31.420
But when he learned that Napoleon had made peace with Britain in 1801
00:08:35.120
and was now free to focus on the Caribbean, a chill ran through his administration
00:08:39.560
because Napoleon did two things almost simultaneously.
00:08:42.460
First, he secretly signed a treaty with Spain to take back Louisiana.
00:08:47.740
Second, he assembled the largest overseas expedition France had ever launched.
00:08:53.620
40,000 troops, 74 ships, and all placed under the command of his brother-in-law,
00:09:02.600
Napoleon sent them to Haiti to first crush Toussaint, restore slavery, and rebuild the sugar machine.
00:09:09.860
Well, General Leclerc also carried sealed orders.
0.78
00:09:13.400
Once Haiti was secure, he was to sail on to New Orleans and re-establish French control over Louisiana.
00:09:20.640
For Jefferson, this was the nightmare scenario.
00:09:24.480
Spain had been weak and predictable, but France was neither of those things.
00:09:28.180
Whoever controlled New Orleans controlled the Mississippi River, which meant control over the economic lifeline of the American West.
00:09:36.920
Jefferson appointed a quiet, persistent diplomat named Robert Livingston as ambassador to France.
00:09:43.160
Now, Livingston and Jefferson were both on the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence.
00:09:48.900
But now, Jefferson gave him a single urgent mission, purchase New Orleans.
00:09:53.740
He authorized $2 million for the deal, nothing more, no territory, just the city.
00:10:03.080
Every eye in the U.S. is now fixed on this affair of Louisiana.
00:10:08.600
Perhaps nothing since the Revolutionary War has produced more uneasy sensations through the body of the nation.
00:10:16.840
While Livingston got to work pressing the French to sell New Orleans, events in Haiti turned savage.
00:10:23.080
Toussaint withdrew his army into the mountains and he avoided any pitched battle.
00:10:27.340
He let Yellow Fever become his ally, and half of the first wave of the French troops died of the disease without ever firing a shot.
00:10:35.820
In the summer of 1802, the desperate French invited Toussaint to negotiate.
00:10:40.300
It was a trap. When he showed up at the appointed time and place, he was shackled and rushed aboard a ship bound for France.
00:10:48.120
Isolated in a cold prison cell in the Jura Mountains, he died 10 months later.
00:10:55.820
General Leclerc, trying to finish the job, wrote to Napoleon.
1.00
00:10:59.000
We must destroy all the mountain Negroes, men and women.
1.00
00:11:03.320
Only keep the children under 12 years old.
1.00
00:11:06.340
A month later, Leclerc himself died of yellow fever.
00:11:13.220
The French imported bloodhounds trained to hunt humans.
00:11:16.680
entire villages were exterminated. But still, the rebels fought on. By 1803, over 30,000 French
00:11:24.800
soldiers and 350,000 Haitians were dead. On New Year's Day, 1804, Toussaint's second-in-command
00:11:32.820
declared independence and ordered the massacre of most remaining whites in Haiti. Napoleon later
00:11:40.280
admitted, The Saint-Domingue business was a great piece of folly on my part. It was the greatest
1.00
00:11:45.940
error that in all my government I ever committed. I ought to have treated with the black leaders
1.00
00:11:52.020
as I would have done the authorities in the province. But even as Haiti slipped from his
0.57
00:11:57.520
grasp, Napoleon still intended to hold Louisiana. He began to assemble a second force in Holland,
00:12:04.660
a hundred ships, 10,000 troops. They were meant to cross the Atlantic and occupy New Orleans.
00:12:11.660
Meanwhile, Jefferson's Secretary of State, James Madison, dined with a French ambassador in Washington and delivered a warning.
00:12:18.920
Louisiana was too vast, too expensive, too restless.
00:12:23.180
Even if France took it, it would one day break away just as the American colonies had broken from Britain.
00:12:30.240
While Napoleon's advisors dismissed the warning, honor demand that they keep the colony.
00:12:43.320
Then severe winter ice locked the fleet in Dutch ports.
00:12:48.540
Finally, in April 1803, the ships were deemed ready.
00:12:52.720
And then a courier arrived with urgent orders from Paris.
00:13:02.620
Napoleon's finance minister offered only a shrug, saying,
00:13:11.300
Lightning, it turned out, that was about to strike in an entirely different direction.
00:13:19.560
Before you knew what a stock was, you traded snacks, cards, turns.
00:13:28.320
With no minimums, no monthly fees, and 100 free trades,
00:14:10.340
The cotton, the milling, the cotton, the sewing, all American.
00:14:17.140
You can buy cheaper and you'll get cheaper quality.
00:14:19.780
Or you can buy quality that will last for generations.
00:14:28.980
Save 20% when you use my name at American-Giant.com slash Glenn.
00:14:34.520
Hey, if you're enjoying this and you want to keep going,
00:14:36.580
you don't have to wait a week for the next episode.
00:14:38.380
Torch insiders already have access to episodes 1 through 15 of The American Story right now, ad-free.
00:14:46.040
Just go to glenbeck.com slash torch or torch250.com and unlock the full experience today.
00:14:55.220
In March 1803, as Napoleon's frozen fleet waited in Holland and Robert Livingston waited in Paris,
00:15:03.180
he sent James Monroe across the Atlantic. Monroe was not just another diplomat. He was the former
00:15:09.660
ambassador to France, a Revolutionary War veteran, a man with credibility in both Europe and the
00:15:15.240
American West. This time, Jefferson expanded the mission. Monroe was now authorized to spend up to
00:15:21.960
$10 million for New Orleans, as well as West Florida. And if the negotiations failed, Monroe
00:15:28.640
Monroe was instructed to go straight to London and explore an alliance with Britain.
00:15:34.000
It was a quiet, aggressive ultimatum, sell to us or we will turn to your greatest enemy.
00:15:44.680
Weeks later, while Monroe was still at sea, Napoleon attended Easter Mass in Paris.
00:15:50.600
After the service, he summoned two of his most trusted advisors.
00:15:54.600
The French disaster in Haiti had changed the strategic map.
00:15:58.100
The British Navy ruled the oceans, another war with Britain was coming and Louisiana
00:16:02.340
suddenly looked like a liability, a drain on Napoleon's military resources.
00:16:11.760
I wish, if there is still time, to take from them any idea that they may have of ever possessing
00:16:23.720
They ask of me one town in Louisiana, but I already consider the colony as entirely lost.
00:16:30.240
And it appears to me that in the hands of this growing power, it will be more useful to the policy and even to the commerce of France than if I should attempt to keep it.
00:16:41.360
Well, his finance minister agreed, better to sell the land than lose it to the British.
00:16:45.640
The minister of the Navy objected, to abandon the colony, he said, would be contrary to the honor of France.
00:16:52.660
Well, the next morning, Napoleon ended the debate when he said,
00:16:55.780
I renounce Louisiana. It is not only New Orleans that I cede. It is the whole colony without
00:17:01.940
reserve. I know the price of what I abandon. I renounce it with the greatest regret. To attempt
00:17:08.720
obstinately to retain it would be folly. Across the city, Robert Livingston was summoned to the
00:17:15.540
office of Charles de Talleyrand. De Talleyrand was Napoleon's foreign minister. Crafty, notoriously
00:17:22.320
corrupt. He was famous for getting rich off bribes from foreign governments, which he liked to call
00:17:27.440
commissions. Livingston once again made his well-worn pitch. The United States wished to buy
00:17:33.440
New Orleans. Well, de Talleyrand barely let him finish. He blindsided Livingston with an unexpected
00:17:39.280
question. What if, instead of just New Orleans, the United States bought the entire Louisiana
00:17:45.940
territory? All of it? Well, the very next day, James Monroe arrived in Paris. He listened in
00:17:53.380
disbelief as Livingston told him about the sudden offer. They'd been authorized to buy a city. They
00:17:58.880
were now being offered half a continent? Napoleon's finance minister urged speed. Napoleon's mood
00:18:05.940
changed like the weather, and the deal had to be signed before another storm of ambition rolled in.
00:18:11.160
Livingston wrote urgently to the Secretary of State, James Madison,
00:18:14.940
The field open to us is infinitely larger than our instructions contemplated.
00:18:19.800
We shall do all we can to cheapen the purchase, but my present sentiment is that we shall buy.
00:18:25.640
Every moment is precious. But in 1803, under the best conditions, it took a letter a minimum
00:18:30.980
of a month to get across the Atlantic. So from the time Livingston wrote his letter,
00:18:35.440
it would take at least two months likely much longer to receive a reply meanwhile inside
00:18:41.520
napoleon's palace his family erupted his brother stormed into his bath chamber his younger brother
00:18:48.240
quickly followed and they railed against the sale both threatened to go public and rally
00:18:52.880
opinion against it how could france just give away an empire napoleon exploded out of his luxurious
00:18:58.880
bathtub in rage soaking his brothers his mind was made up negotiations raced forward the terms
00:19:05.360
were staggering. The United States would pay $15 million for the land, which included assuming $4
00:19:12.260
million that France had previously agreed to pay for the damages to the American shipping
00:19:16.560
during the quasi-war. In return, America would receive 828,000 square miles, nearly 530 million
00:19:26.140
acres, at about 3 cents an acre. In modern terms, that's about 41 cents per acre. It was the largest
00:19:34.880
single land transfer in world history. But the only catch was the treaty required ratification
00:19:41.740
in the U.S. Senate by October. Well, back in Washington, Jefferson received official word
00:19:47.740
from Livingston about the deal on July 3rd, 1803. But his first reaction was not celebration. It was
00:19:53.980
dread. Because the Constitution didn't say the president could buy foreign empires, doubling the
00:19:59.900
size of a nation without permission from the states was a little problematic. James Madison,
00:20:04.880
one of the primary architects of the Constitution himself, argued that while the document did not
00:20:09.440
explicitly grant the power, it also didn't forbid it. Ironically, it was the same type of implied
00:20:16.100
powers argument that Alexander Hamilton made about the creation of the National Bank,
00:20:20.500
which Jefferson and Madison so strongly opposed. Jefferson was unconvinced. He drafted a
00:20:27.660
constitutional amendment. He worried about state rights. He worried about precedent. He worried
00:20:32.460
about the New England states already suspicious of western expansion and how they might fracture
00:20:37.500
over this. Then a letter arrived from Livingston in August. He warned that Napoleon might be
00:20:43.600
getting cold feet. He was about to crown himself emperor and giving away continents was not a very
00:20:49.360
emperor-like thing to do. Time was running out. Jefferson. He abandoned the amendment idea.
00:20:57.660
The process would take too long and likely kill the deal.
00:21:01.320
Instead, he got busy persuading two-thirds of the Senate to approve the deal and the House to fund it.
00:21:07.960
In the House, John Randolph of Virginia tried blocking the funding, but his motion failed by two votes.
00:21:14.020
Finally, in the Senate, the treaty passed 24 to 7.
00:21:17.780
James Monroe, acting on his own initiative, had already arranged financing for the $2 million down payment through the banks in Britain and Holland.
00:21:25.040
It was an efficient move, even if he wasn't legally authorized to do it yet.
00:21:32.680
The Louisiana Territory, which included all or part of 15 present-day states,
00:21:42.040
In November, the French flag in New Orleans came down and the stars and stripes were raised in its place.
00:21:48.540
Robert Livingston, exhausted but exhilarated, wrote,
00:21:51.900
We have lived long, but this is the noblest work of our whole lives.
00:21:57.460
The treaty which we have just signed has not been obtained by art or dictated by force.
00:22:03.340
Equally advantageous to the two contracting parties, it will change vast solitudes into
00:22:10.940
From this day, the United States take their place among powers of the first rank.
00:22:16.020
Napoleon never fully explained why he sold the territory, but he did say this.
00:22:20.860
This accession of territory strengthens forever the power of the United States.
00:22:26.320
And I have just given to England a maritime rival that will sooner or later humble their pride.
0.70
00:22:32.680
For Napoleon, ultimately, it was still all about sticking it to England.
00:22:37.460
A British historian would later call it, quote,
00:22:39.820
Bonaparte's greatest single failure of imagination.
00:22:44.140
Thomas Jefferson had seen great potential for his nation in the western half of the continent.
00:22:48.740
In fact, in early 1803, when he asked Congress to pay to send James Monroe to France,
00:22:54.420
he also requested $2,500 for an ambitious scientific exploration of the territory.
00:23:00.900
And he asked his 29-year-old secretary to lead the effort,
00:23:14.700
Now at Shell, Scene Plus members can fill up on points at the pump,
00:23:47.740
But it's hard to pursue happiness when pain is a part of everyday life.
00:23:51.420
Relief Factor was created to help people address inflammation,
00:23:54.500
which is one of the most common causes of ongoing aches and pains from aging,
00:24:02.820
No prescription, no masking of symptoms, just real relief so you can keep moving forward.
00:24:08.880
My hands were so bad I couldn't even butt my own shirt.
00:24:14.000
I'm not listening to wine anymore unless you try everything.
00:24:16.960
I did. It helped me get my life back. As America celebrates her 250 years of independence,
00:24:22.600
give yourself the chance to reclaim yours. To commemorate, Relief Factor is offering a special
00:24:26.660
patriotic price at $17.76, so you can pursue your happiness being pain-free. $17.76, three-week
00:24:33.620
quick starts, ready for you right now. Relief Factor, because freedom just feels better without
00:24:37.540
pain. Visit relieffactor.com, relieffactor.com, 800, the number four, relief. When Thomas Jefferson
00:24:44.400
took office in 1801 the united states was in practice a thin coastal nation most of the
00:24:50.960
population lived within 50 miles of the atlantic ocean beyond the appalachian mountains the
00:24:56.320
continent faded into rumor rivers without names mysterious native tribes animals that existed
00:25:02.560
only in travelers tales but jefferson had been thinking about that interior his entire life
00:25:09.280
in his first inaugural address the first to be delivered in washington dc at the capitol
00:25:13.920
building. He had spoken of a rising nation spread over a wide and fruitful land, advancing rapidly
00:25:21.360
to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye. Jefferson was basically a science geek and the
00:25:27.520
Louisiana Purchase doubled the scientific data set of his era. He had to know what was out there
00:25:33.640
and for that task he turned to Meriwether Lewis. Lewis had grown up in the same Virginia countryside
00:25:39.600
as Jefferson. Their families had known each other for decades, and when Jefferson became president,
00:25:44.520
he brought the young army officer into the White House as his personal secretary.
00:25:49.240
Lewis was intense, solitary, sharp, and restless. He could drink too much. He could sink into dark
00:25:55.980
moods that Jefferson called depressions of the mind. But when it came to endurance, precision,
00:26:01.320
and loyalty, Jefferson trusted him without hesitation. As his co-leader, Lewis turned to
00:26:08.560
his former commander and close friend from his army days, William Clark. Clark was 33,
00:26:15.340
four years older than Lewis, and different in temperament. He was steadier, more laid-back.
00:26:20.780
He was from Kentucky, raised on rivers and forests, and he was an exceptional mapmaker
00:26:25.540
and boatman. In the spring of 1803, Lewis went to Philadelphia to study with the leading
00:26:31.020
scientists of the day. He trained like an astronaut, preparing to go to the moon. He
00:26:36.140
studied astronomy, botany, anatomy, math, and medicine. On this mission, he would have to be
00:26:41.900
a scientist, a doctor, cartographer, journalist, and military leader. He assembled a giant inventory
00:26:48.960
of supplies and gifts for the Native Americans that they would encounter, including silver
00:26:53.320
peace medals stamped with Jefferson's profile. These were not just trinkets. For Indians,
00:26:59.820
gift exchange was a vital sign of friendship. President Jefferson's written instructions were
00:27:05.620
explicit. In all your intercourse with the natives, treat them in the most friendly and conciliatory
00:27:11.820
manner which their own conduct will admit. Make them acquainted with the position, extent, character,
00:27:18.760
peaceable and commercial dispositions of the U.S., of our wish to be neighborly, friendly and useful
00:27:25.140
to them, and of our dispositions to a commercial intercourse with them. This was an ambitious
00:27:35.620
The Corps of Volunteers for Northwest Discovery was comprised of 45 men,
00:27:40.880
including a man named York, who was William Clark's slave.
00:27:45.240
On May 14, 1804, the expedition finally pushed off and began forcing its way up the Missouri River.
00:27:54.880
The current was strong, the banks choked with mud and willows,
00:27:57.780
the heat was oppressive, the mosquitoes, the gnats swarmed in clouds,
00:28:02.580
The men rowed, they polled, they sailed when the wind allowed, and often hauled the heavy keelboat upstream by rope wading in waist-deep water, their boots sinking into silk with every step.
00:28:20.120
In late July, they camped near the mouth of the Platte River and held their first formal council with Native Americans, the Otto and Missouri tribes.
00:28:28.260
At every meeting with Indians on the journey, Lewis and Clark delivered a standard speech promising military protection and trade advantages in return for peace.
00:28:40.900
22-year-old Sergeant Charles Floyd fell violently ill.
00:28:45.080
He suffered for days, likely from a ruptured appendix.
00:28:48.980
In late August 1804, he died, somehow the only member of the expedition who didn't survive the journey.
00:28:57.300
As summer faded, the world around them transformed.
00:29:06.220
They saw prairie dogs and antelope for the very first time.
00:29:10.200
Buffalo appeared in numbers that seemed impossible.
00:29:20.640
Most tribes had never seen a black man before, and they were fascinated.
00:29:26.340
The Indians are much astonished at my black servant and call him the big medicine.
00:29:31.700
York told them that before I caught him, he was wild and lived upon people,
00:29:39.660
All flocked around him and examined him from top to toe.
00:29:43.060
He carried on the joke and made himself more terrible than we wished him to do.
00:29:48.520
Diplomacy, however, could turn lethal in an instant.
00:29:52.460
When the Corps reached the territory of Lakota Sioux, the mood darkened.
00:29:57.620
The Lakota demanded payment for passage on the river.
00:30:04.520
Sioux warriors notched arrows, and the Corps soldiers leveled their rifles.
00:30:09.100
A leader named Black Buffalo intervened, calming the moment by requesting that the women and children be allowed to see the curious items on the keelboat.
00:30:18.500
Clark was rattled and wrote in his journal that night,
00:30:20.880
Their treatment of me was very rough, and I think justified roughness on my part.
00:30:26.500
Well, the tension with the Lakota Sioux lingered on for several days, three more days to be exact.
0.55
00:30:34.540
Lewis and Clark reluctantly gave in and were finally allowed to continue upriver.
00:30:39.500
By late October, the expedition reached the villages of the Mandan and Hidatsa, near present-day Bismarck, North Dakota.
00:30:46.660
These were no tiny villages. Their combined population was over 4,400, more than four times
00:30:53.280
the size of St. Louis at the time. Across the river from the Indian villages, the men built
00:30:58.420
Fort Mandon and prepared for winter. A French-Canadian fur trader named Toussaint Charbonneau,
00:31:04.940
who lived in the Indian villages, offered Louis and Clark his skills as an interpreter.
00:31:09.660
He spoke French and some Hidatsa. His 16-year-old pregnant wife spoke Hidatsa and Shoshone.
00:31:16.660
Her name was Sacajawea, which meant bird woman.
00:31:24.460
She had also been taken during a raid by the Hadassah tribe when she was around 12 years old.
00:31:29.620
While living at the Knife River Indian villages, Sacajawea married Charbonneau.
00:31:34.820
She may not have had much choice in the matter.
00:31:37.300
Charbonneau may have won her in a game or even bought her from the tribe that kidnapped her.
00:31:42.120
He was at least 30 years older than her and already had another Indian wife.
00:31:48.420
Lewis wasn't really impressed with the often unpredictable and unreliable Charbonneau,
00:31:57.820
Sacagawea's baby, named Jean Baptiste, was born on February 1805,
00:32:03.880
after a labor that Lewis described as, quote, tedious and the pain violent.
00:32:07.840
He also noted that she was given a mixture of water and pulverized rattle of a rattlesnake to help speed the delivery.
00:32:16.120
The baby was affectionately nicknamed Pompey by Clark.
00:32:22.180
For the next year and a half, Sacagawea carried Pompey tied to her back.
00:32:27.240
The expedition now had a woman and an infant among them, an unspoken signal of peace to every tribe they would meet.
00:32:35.060
Clark recorded one instance of a tribe hiding in fear of the approaching Americans.
00:32:40.400
As soon as they saw Sacajawea, they pointed to her and informed those still indoors,
00:32:45.240
who immediately all came out and appeared to assume new life.
00:32:49.060
The sight of this Indian woman confirmed those people of our friendly intentions,
00:32:53.740
as no woman ever accompanies a war party of Indians in this quarter.
00:32:58.040
When spring returned and the Missouri River was no longer choked with ice,
00:33:01.560
the Corps prepared a shipment that was to be sent back to President Jefferson.
00:33:06.620
They included maps, written reports, items made by Native Americans,
00:33:11.360
the skins and skeletons of previously unknown animals,
00:33:15.140
soil samples, mineral seeds, and cages containing a live prairie dog,
00:33:23.140
The large keelboat and a dozen men were dispatched downriver in April 1805.
00:33:28.620
The shipment arrived at the White House in Washington, D.C. four months later.
00:33:32.760
Jefferson was like a child on Christmas morning as he sorted through all the treasures.
00:33:37.500
The same day the shipment was sent downriver, the permanent party of the expedition left
00:33:42.660
Fort Mandon in two preogues and six new dugout canoes, each about 30 feet long and three
00:33:52.420
The Corps of Discovery, now numbering 33, headed westward into uncharted territory.
00:33:58.540
Proceeding into present-day Montana, the explorers were amazed by the rolling, treeless grasslands of the Great Plains, the often violent weather, and the ever-present wildlife.
00:34:11.080
We can scarcely cast our eyes in any direction without perceiving deer, elk, buffalo, or antelopes.
00:34:18.360
During this leg of the journey, the Corps never ran out of meat.
00:34:21.240
then on june 1805 in a journey where unforeseen problems were the norm they encountered perhaps
00:34:30.660
their biggest one yet in north central montana they reached a fork in the missouri river
00:34:36.780
that indians had not mentioned well which way was the real missouri lewis and clark stood on
00:34:44.420
the riverbank and stared into the branching future if they chose the wrong path they could
00:34:49.960
lose weeks or months. Winter in the mountains could mean disaster. Lewis wrote,
00:34:55.380
To ascend the wrong stream would not only lose us the whole of this season,
00:35:00.020
but would probably so dishearten the party that it might defeat the expedition altogether.
00:35:19.960
lost in sweat. Carbs to help fuel your working muscles and fluids to help you hydrate. Scientifically
00:35:28.180
formulated so you never stop competing. Rehydrate. Replenish. Refuel. Gatorade. Is it in you?
00:35:37.520
Personal safety is about so much more than just protection. It is about confidence,
00:35:42.920
empowerment, and peace of mind. Berna is the world's leader in less lethal personal defense.
00:35:47.660
And right now, Berna is offering $100 off the very powerful and proven Berna LE Gen 2 Launcher.
00:35:57.520
It was engineered for police, and it is relied upon by law enforcement globally every single day.
00:36:02.720
It's now available for the public to buy, giving families across America a very powerful way to protect yourself without using lethal force.
00:36:10.940
It fires powerful kinetic rounds and chemical irritant projectiles with an effective range of up to 60 feet,
00:36:16.420
designed to help deter and de-escalate any threat.
00:36:23.920
It's a Berna, and it will ship directly to your door.
00:36:26.220
Berna will give you the confidence to feel prepared,
00:36:29.480
and the peace of mind that comes from having a less lethal option ready when it matters most.
00:36:34.040
Visit Berna, B-Y-R-N-A dot com, and secure yours now.
00:36:39.220
For more of the history that inspired this podcast series,
00:36:42.440
be sure to read The American Story, The Beginnings.
00:36:46.420
by David Barton and Tim Barton, available now at wallbuilders.com.
00:36:54.900
Before Lewis and Clark decided which fork of the Missouri River to take, they did investigate.
00:37:01.320
Lewis led a party along the South Fork. Clark took the North. It took more than a week,
00:37:06.760
and it required everything they had learned so far about rivers and the landscape and geography
00:37:11.520
and land measurements to decide. When they returned, Lewis and Clark finally chose the South
00:37:16.920
Fork as the true Missouri. The rest of the men in the expedition disagreed, but they had followed
00:37:22.680
their captains for thousands of miles. They weren't going to stop now. There was no margin for error in
00:37:28.100
the wilderness. There was no backup plan. There was no rescue. Lewis and Clark stuck with their
00:37:33.740
decision to go with the South Fork. Luckily, they turned out to be right.
00:37:39.980
On June 13th, over two months since shoving off from their Fort Maiden winter camp, the
00:37:45.520
roar hit them at first. It was a thunderous growl across the plains. The Great Falls of
00:37:52.520
Missouri, a 10-mile gauntlet dropping more than 400 feet in five massive cascades. The
00:38:00.520
The Corps unloaded everything and began a brutal overland portage around the falls.
00:38:05.200
Lewis had envisioned a quicker detour, but instead that was 18 miles long and it took
00:38:13.140
Storms then hammered them, rain and hail turned the ground amok, mosquitoes swarmed and grizzly
00:38:21.480
Clark later called it the most difficult stretch of the whole journey.
00:38:26.300
In late July, Sacajawea saw something on the horizon,
00:38:32.920
She told them they were nearing the home of her people,
00:38:38.420
The Indian woman recognized the point of a high plain
00:38:41.360
to our right, which she informed us was not very distant
00:38:46.680
on a river beyond the mountains, which runs to the west.
00:38:50.260
This hill, she says, her nation calls the beaver's head.
00:38:55.260
she assures us that we shall either find her people on this river
00:38:58.440
or on the river immediately west of its source,
00:39:02.020
which from its present size cannot be very distant.
1.00
00:39:07.460
Desperate to find the Shoshone and the horses they might be able to provide,
1.00
00:39:11.860
Lewis decided to scout ahead with three men.
1.00
00:39:15.000
On August 12th, Lewis climbed to the Continental Divide at Lemhi Pass.
00:39:20.820
From the summit, he expected to see what Thomas Jefferson had dreamt of,
00:39:24.560
plains and great rivers running down towards the Pacific, proof of a water route across the
00:39:30.740
continent. But when Lewis reached the peak and looked west, he saw the truth. There was no water
00:39:36.860
highway. There were only more jagged mountains stacked to infinity. Reality crashed in. Their
00:39:44.620
journey was not going to get any easier. A few days later, Lewis encountered a Shoshone village
1.00
00:39:50.580
and tried to negotiate for the horses they needed.
00:39:55.900
and Sacajawea was brought forward to translate.
00:40:20.580
Sacagawea recognized others that she had grown up with and embraced them,
00:40:25.060
motioning towards the men of the Corps that this was her family.
00:40:28.580
The Shoshone provided horses, a guide, and vital information on trails and other tribes ahead.
00:40:34.900
Winter loomed with snow already dusting the mountain peaks, but Lewis and Clark
0.88
00:40:39.300
gambled on pushing through the Bitter Roots range of the Rockies.
00:40:44.820
Chief Kameoway told them of a trail used by another tribe that crossed the Bitter Roots,
00:40:49.460
But the Corps failed to locate it at first, and that was a mistake that cost them days
00:40:58.440
Temperatures plunged below freezing, the snowy trail turned steep and rocky, and their food
00:41:06.140
The absence of wild game forced them to kill and eat three of their horses just to survive.
00:41:11.460
The crossing lasted 11 miserable days, the men staggering on the edge of collapse.
00:41:17.340
But once out of the bitter roots, the Corps built new canoes.
00:41:21.100
Food was still scarce, but Lewis and Clark were able to purchase roots, fish, and dogs
00:41:30.120
It's offensive to modern sensibilities, but this was all about survival.
00:41:38.640
In 1805, they put five new canoes into the Clearwater River, and for the first time since
00:41:43.840
leaving St. Louis, they paddled downstream, down the Clearwater, down the Snake River to the
00:41:50.160
Columbia, the river they knew would reach the Pacific. By the end of October, they had made
00:41:56.880
their way around the falls of Columbia and sighted Mount Hood. In November, they finally saw the
00:42:03.000
Pacific Ocean in the distance. Clark estimated they had traveled 4,162 miles from the mouth of
00:42:11.000
Missouri River. The Corps took a vote on where to set up winter quarters. In a sign of their vital
00:42:16.360
contribution to the expedition, Sacajawea and York were allowed to vote. By Christmas, they had
00:42:22.840
nearly finished their winter quarters on the south side of the Columbia River near present-day
00:42:27.160
Astoria, Oregon. They named it Fort Clatsop, after the local tribe. The winter was cold and rainy and
00:42:35.720
miserable. They updated their journals, traded with local tribes for food, and prepared for the
00:42:40.840
return journey they built a salt works extracting salt from ocean water for flavoring and curing
00:42:47.080
meat they also hunted scoring 131 elk and 20 deer they made over 300 pair of moccasins
00:42:57.000
in late march 1806 lewis and clark presented fort clapsut to a local chief then the corps
00:43:02.600
began its trek home in june after re-crossing the bitter roots the corps split up to maximize
00:43:09.240
their discoveries. Lewis took part of the men north, while Clark led a party down the Yellowstone
00:43:14.680
River. East of present-day Billings, Montana, Clark climbed a massive gray rock and named it
00:43:21.240
Pompey's Tower, after Sacagawea's toddler. Clark carved his own name into the rock.
00:43:27.620
The etching remains there still today. Meanwhile, further north, Lewis and his men shared a campsite
00:43:33.600
with eight Blackfeet warriors that they had encountered. The night passed, peaceably enough,
00:43:38.260
But in the morning, Lewis woke to a scuffle, and one of his men shouted,
0.99
00:43:44.520
In the melee, one of Lewis' men stabbed the Blackfoot to death.
1.00
00:43:49.000
Lewis shot another warrior in the stomach as the man tried to steal his horse.
00:43:56.040
He overshot me, but being bareheaded, I felt the wind of his bullet very distinctly.
00:44:02.100
Certain they would be pursued, Lewis and his men raced southeast toward the Missouri River,
00:44:07.240
covering a hundred miles in a little over 24 hours. In August their entire expedition reunited
00:44:13.880
in North Dakota where the Yellowstone flowed in the Missouri. Now traveling with the current it
00:44:19.160
must have felt like they were flying as they were able to cover up to 70 miles every day.
00:44:24.200
Later that month they reached the Mandan villages where they had to say goodbye to Charbonneau,
00:44:28.920
Sacagawea and young Jean Baptiste who was now a year and a half old. Clark later wrote to Charbonneau
00:44:35.800
Your woman who accompanied you that long, dangerous, and fatiguing route to the Pacific Ocean and back
00:44:41.600
deserved a greater reward for her attention and services on that route
00:44:45.660
than we had in our power to give her at the Mandans.
00:44:49.300
Finally, on September 23, 1806, the Corps of Discovery reached St. Louis.
00:44:56.780
Jefferson thought they might be gone for about a year,
00:44:59.800
but it took them two years, four months, and nine days.
00:45:03.980
Jefferson had not heard from the men since their shipment of samples to him
00:45:11.180
I received, my dear sir, with unspeakable joy, your letter of September 23rd,
00:45:17.440
announcing the return of yourself, Captain Clark, and your party in good health to St. Louis.
00:45:26.760
and the length of time without hearing of you, had begun to be felt awfully.
00:45:31.620
Lewis and Clark received commissions from Jefferson.
00:45:34.660
Lewis is governor of Upper Louisiana and Clark as brigadier general of the militia and Indian agent for the vast territory.
00:45:42.860
Each member of the Corps of Discovery, except York, received double pay and 320 acres of land.
00:45:52.840
He was finally freed by Clark sometime after 1815.
00:45:56.120
Clark gave York a wagon and a team of horses, with which York created a hauling business.
00:46:03.240
Sacagawea, she died in 1812. William Clark and his wife adopted Sacagawea's son,
00:46:10.300
Jean-Baptiste, and his younger sister, Lisette. In 1809, three years after the end of the expedition,
00:46:18.140
Meriwether Lewis was on his way to Washington, D.C. when he stopped to spend a night at a tavern
00:46:23.300
in Tennessee. He was found dead the following morning, apparently of a self-inflicted gunshot
00:46:29.660
wound. Some have suspected foul play in his death, but most historians think Lewis most likely
00:46:36.880
committed suicide. Lewis and Clark, their voyage of discovery, turned out to be one of Thomas
00:46:43.760
Jefferson's most enduring legacies. The discoveries made by the explorers on their 8,000-mile round
00:46:50.040
trip changed the vision of America. The West was no longer an idea. It was real.
00:46:57.360
It was an optimistic start to a new century for the young nation that had now doubled in land
00:47:02.940
size. Yet massive challenges were on the horizon, including war once again with an old mighty foe,
00:47:13.160
coming up on the american story the beginnings the spark turns into an inferno
00:47:23.220
sugar fields become walls of flames night skies glow orange armed bands surge from the hills
00:47:32.760
masters are dragged from beds whole families are slaughtered over the next month 800 plantations
00:47:40.180
burn to the ground. More than a thousand French slaveholders and their families meet gruesome
00:47:46.080
ends. Hacked with machetes, impaled, sawed in half, the slaves rise up in a brutal frenzy
00:47:53.420
of retribution and blood. The most profitable colony on Earth collapses in blood and smoke.
00:48:03.560
This is the beginning of the Haitian Revolution.
0.73
00:48:07.240
It is the first and only successful slave revolt in history.
00:48:20.000
Just a reminder, I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast
00:48:24.220
and pass this on to a friend so it can be discovered by other people.
00:48:33.560
A safer Ontario means more police and prosecutors
00:48:49.500
It means building new jails to keep criminals behind bars.
00:48:53.000
And it means there's no need to worry when I play at the park.
00:48:56.080
We're making every corner of Ontario safer to make all of Ontario safer.