Chapter XIX —­ With Faces turned Homeward

The officers of the expedition had decided to begin their homeward march on the first of April; but a natural impatience induced them to start a little earlier, and, as a matter of record, it may be said that they evacuated Fort Clatsop on the 23d of March, 1806.  An examination of their stock of ammunition showed that they had on hand a supply of powder amply sufficient for their needs when travelling the three thousand miles of wilderness in which their sole reliance for food must be the game to be killed.  The powder was kept in leaden canisters, and these, when empty, were used for making balls for muskets and rifles.  Three bushels of salt were collected for their use on the homeward journey.

What they needed now most of all was an assortment of small wares and trinkets with which to trade with the Indians among whom they must spend so many months before reaching civilization again.  They had ample letters of credit from the Government at Washington, and if they had met with white traders on the seacoast, they could have bought anything that money would buy.  They had spent nearly all their stock in coming across the continent.  This is Captain Lewis’s summary of the goods on hand just before leaving Fort Clatsop:—­

“All the small merchandise we possess might be tied up in a couple of handkerchiefs.  The rest of our stock in trade consists of six blue robes, one scarlet ditto, five robes which we made out of our large United States flag, a few old clothes trimmed with ribbons, and one artillerist’s uniform coat and hat, which probably Captain Clark will never wear again.  We have to depend entirely upon this meagre outfit for the purchase of such horses and provisions as it will be in our power to obtain—­a scant dependence, indeed, for such a journey as is before us.”

One of their last acts was to draw up a full list of the members of the party, and, making several copies of it, to leave these among the friendly Indians with instructions to give a paper to the first white men who should arrive in the country.  On the back of the paper was traced the track by which the explorers had come and that by which they expected to return.  This is a copy of one of these important documents:—­

“The object of this list is, that through the medium of some civilized person who may see the same, it may be made known to the informed world, that the party consisting of the persons whose names are hereunto annexed, and who were sent out by the government of the U’States in May, 1804, to explore the interior of the Continent of North America, did penetrate the same by way of the Missouri and Columbia Rivers, to the discharge of the latter into the Pacific Ocean, where they arrived on the 14th of November, 1805, and from whence they departed the 23d day of March, 1806, on their return to the United States by the same rout they had come out.”