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.
Next
Journal Entry
|