Journals of Lewis and Clark: Dates November 1805 - Part Six
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Journals of Lewis and Clark
Dates: November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805

 

This article provides interesting facts about their historic journey taken from the Journals of Lewis and Clark dates November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805.

Lewis and cClark Expedition: Jounal Dates November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805

The Journals of Lewis and Clark: Dates November 1805
 

The Journals of Lewis and Clark: Dates November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805
The following excerpts are taken from entries of the Journals of Lewis and Clark. Dates: November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805

November 17, 1805
Sunday 17. A fair cool morning and easterly wind. The tide rises at this place eight feet six inches in height, and rolls over the beach in great waves.

About one o'clock Captain Lewis returned, after having coasted down Haley's bay to cape Disappointment, and some distance to the north along the sea coast. He was followed by several Chinnooks, among whom were the principal chief and his family. They made us a present of a boiled root, very much like the common liquorice in taste and size, and called culwhamo: in return we gave double the value of their present, and now learnt the danger of accepting any thing from them, since no return, even if ten times the value of their gift, can satisfy them. We were chiefly occupied in hunting, and were able to procure three deer, four brant and two ducks, and also saw some signs of elk. Captain Clarke now prepared for an excursion down the bay, and accordingly started,

November 18, 1805
Monday 18, at daylight, accompanied by eleven men. He proceeded along the beach one mile to a point of rocks about forty feet high, where the hills retire, leaving a wide beach, and a number of ponds covered with water-fowl, between which and the mountain is a narrow bottom of alder and small balsam trees. Seven miles from the rocks is the entrance of a creek, or rather drain from the ponds and hills, where is a cabin of Chinnooks. The cabin contained some children, and four women, one of whom was in a most miserable state, covered with ulcers, proceeding as we imagine, from the venereal disease, with which several of the Chinnooks we have seen appear to be afflicted. We were taken across in a canoe by two squaws, to each of whom we gave a fishhook, and then coasting along the bay, passed at two miles the low bluff of a small hill, below which are the ruins of some old huts, and close to it the remains of a whale. The country is low, open and marshy; interspersed with some high pine and a thick undergrowth. Five miles from the creek, we came to a stream forty yards wide at low water, which we called Chinnook river. The hills up this river and towards the bay are not high, but very thickly covered with large pine of several species: in many places pine trees, three or four feet in thickness, are seen growing on the bodies of large trees, which though fallen and covered with moss, were in part sound. Here we dined on some brant and plover, killed as we came along, and after crossing in a boat lying in the sand near some old houses, proceeded along a bluff of yellow clay and soft stone to a little bay or harbor, into which a drain from some ponds empties: at this harbor the land is low, but as we went on it rose to hills of eighty or ninety feet above the water. At the distance of one mile is a second bay, and a mile beyond it, a small rocky island in a deep bend, which seems to afford a very good harbor, and where the natives inform us European vessels anchor for the purpose of trading. We went on round another bay, in which is a second small island of rocks, and crossed a small stream, which rises in a pond near the sea coast, and after running through a low isthmus empties into the bay. This narrow low ground, about two or three hundred yards wide, separates from the main hills a kind of peninsula, the extremity of which is two miles from the anchoring place; and this spot, which was called cape Disappointment, is an elevated, circular knob, rising with a steep ascent one hundred and fifty or one hundred and sixty feet above the water, formed like the whole shore of the bay, as well as of the seacoast, and covered with thick timber on the inner side, but open and grassy in the exposure next the sea. From this cape a high point of land bears south 20° west, about twenty-five miles distant. In the range between these two eminences, is the opposite point of the bay, a very low ground, which has been variously called cape Rond by Lapeyrouse, and point Adams by Vancouver. The water for a great distance off the mouth of the river, appears very shallow, and within the mouth nearest to point Adams, is a large sandbar, almost covered at high tide. We could not ascertain the direction of the deepest channel, for the waves break with tremendous force the whole distance across the bay, but the Indians point nearer to the opposite side as the best passage. After remaining for some time on this elevation, we descended across the low isthmus, and reached the ocean at the foot of a high hill, about a mile in circumference, and projecting into the sea. We crossed this hill, which is open and has a growth of high coarse grass, and encamped on the north side of it, having made nineteen miles. Besides the pounded fish and brant, we had for supper a flounder, which we picked up on the beach.

November 19, 1805
Tuesday 19. In the night it began to rain, and continued till eleven o'clock. Two hunters were sent on to kill something for breakfast, and the rest of the party after drying their blankets soon followed. At three miles we overtook the hunters, and breakfasted on a small deer, which they had been fortunate enough to kill. This, like all those we have seen on this coast, are much darker than our common deer. Their bodies too, are deeper, their legs shorter, and their eyes larger. The branches of the horns are similar, but the upper part of the tail is black, from the root to the end, and they do not leap, but jump like a sheep frightened. We then continued over rugged hills and steep hollows, near the sea, on a course about north 20° west, in a direct line from the cape, till at the distance of five miles, we reached a point of high land, below which a sandy beach extends, in a direction north 10° west, to another high point about twenty miles distant. This eminence we distinguished by the name of point Lewis. It is there that the highlands, which at the commencement of the sandy beach, recede towards Chinnook river, again approach the ocean. The intermediate country is low, with many small ponds, crowded with birds, and watered by the Chinnook, on the borders of which resides the nation of the same name. We went four miles along the sandy beach to a small pine tree, on which captain Clarke marked his name, with the year and day, and then returned to the foot of the hills, passing on the shore a sturgeon ten feet long, and several joints of the back bone of a whale, both which seem to have been thrown ashore and foundered. After dining on the remains of the small deer, we crossed in a southeastern direction to the bay, where we arrived at the distance of two miles, then continued along the bay, crossed Chinnook river, and encamped on its upper side, in a sandy bottom.

November 20, 1805
Wednesday 20. It rained in the course of the night. A hunter dispatched early to kill some food, returned with eight ducks, on which we breakfasted, and then followed the course of the bay to the creek or outlet of the ponds. It was now high tide, the stream three hundred yards wide, and no person in the cabin to take us across. We therefore made a small raft, on which one of the men passed and brought a canoe to carry us over. As we went along the beach we were overtaken by several Indians, who gave us dried sturgeon and wappatoo roots, and soon met several parties of Chinnooks returning from the camp. When we arrived there we found many Chinnooks, and two of them being chiefs, we went through the ceremony of giving to each a medal, and to the most distinguished a flag. Their names were Comcommoly and Chillahlawil. One of the Indians had a robe made of two sea-otter skins, the fur of which was the most beautiful we had ever seen; the owner resisted every temptation to part with it, but at length could not resist the offer of a belt of blue beads which Charbonneau's wife wore round her waist. During our absence the camp had been visited by many Indians, and the men who had been employed in hunting killed several deer, and a variety of wild fowls.

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Journals of Lewis and Clark - Dates: November 17, 1805 - November 20, 1805

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