Corps Harmony

A Most Perfect Harmony

The truth about ourselves often comes in unremarkable and unexpected ways. A casual phrase, a quick word, a hasty “hot damn” can often reveal more than a carefully constructed sentence or paragraph. So it was in early August, 1805. Thrashing about in the brush, Sgt. Patrick Gass lost Meriwether Lewis‘s favorite tomahawk. It might have prompted an angry word or a cold glare. Lewis was surely capable of such fury. But instead, the captain put the following lines in his journal: “Accedents will happen in the best families.”^[2]Reuben G. Thwaites, ed., The Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 8 vols. (New York, 1904-5), 2:299-300 He was right on both counts. Accidents do happen and the members of the expedition had become the best of families. Lewis had acknowledged that fact some months before. On 7 April 1805, the day the Corps of Northwestern Discovery pulled out of Fort Mandan, Lewis described his men as enjoying “a most perfect harmony.”^[3]Gary E. Moulton, ed., The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 4 vols. to date (Lincoln, 1983 —), 4:10. Hereafter cited as JLCE.

But it had not always been so. The members of the expedition began their journey as a wild bunch of hard drinking, brawling, and insubordinate rowdies. It is easy for us to forget that at their beginnings the explorers were not clean-shaven, keen-eyed eagle scouts. They did not leave Wood River with the “right stuff.” They were not the John Glenns and Neil Armstrongs of their day. But somehow this passel of rough and tumble galoots became the best of families willing to share the risks and hazards of a common life in pursuit of an important goal. How did all that happen? What were the experiences that, at least for a time, transformed ordinary men into an extraordinary band of brothers?

To see what they became we must understand who they were. What we know about the lives of those who ventured up the Missouri “Under a Jentle Brease” makes for thin reading. There are just hints and scraps about men like John Thompson, Moses Reed, and Silas Goodrich. They have their moments in time and then, for the most part, they are lost to us. Because we know so little, we fall back on convenient stereotypes. Here is George Drouillard the hunter, Patrick Gass the carpenter, John Shields the blacksmith, and George Shannon the forever lost. But none of these cardboard cutouts satisfies, and we long to know these men as flesh and blood.

Three Member Types

We might get to know them better by dividing them into three distinct groups. First, there were the frontier soldiers. In the years after the American Revolution soldiering in the ranks was not an especially honorable profession. The young American republic promised opportunity in the civilian world. Soldiers were viewed with suspicion. In the Jefferson years the small frontier army was a refuge for failures, misfits, and trouble-makers. Officers often found their men to be raucous, bad-smelling, foul-mouthed troopers. For every John Ordway—a man of superior ability—there were dozens ready to drink and brawl at a moments notice. Zebulon Montgomery Pike recognized as much when he described the soldiers of his Mississippi Expedition as a “Dam’d set of Rascels.”^[4]Donald Jackson, ed., The Journals of Zebulon Montgomery Pike with Letters and Related Documents, 2 vols. (Norman, 1966), 2:114.

William Clark, always an astute judge of character, knew as much about the troops that came to him from several frontier companies. He had enough military experience to guess that officers might easily be tempted to “volunteer” their most troublesome men for a distant mission. Clark said as much when he noted that the men detailed from Capt. John Campbell’s company of the Second Infantry Regiment were not quite the quality he had hoped for.^[5]JLCE, 2:139. Campbell had pawned off on the expedition some of his outfit’s notorious drinkers, including Privates Thomas Howard and Hugh Hall. Soldiers like John Boley, John Newman, and John Potts were a rough lot. Clark once called boozer and hog thief John Collins a “blackgard.”^[6]Ibid., 2:148. Perhaps their officers and home companies breathed a sigh of relief to see such men off post and headed west.

French boatmen, the engagés, made up the third of the expedition’s social groups. In the mythology of the West, French Canadian voyageurs represent all that is daring, bold and colorful. Singing “A La Claire Fontaine” at the top of their voices, the voyageurs paddled the lakes and rivers in relentless pursuit of beaver. But the jaunty, devil-may-care voyageurs of Montreal and the Great Lakes were not the same as those Lewis and Clark hired at Laclede’s Landing. The French boatmen of St. Louis, known as the men of the southern trade, were quite a different breed. Alexander Henry the Younger, an experienced fur trader and Lewis and Clark contemporary, described the southern men in quite unflattering terms. They were, he wrote, “insolent and intriguing fellows” driven by greed. Henry blasted them as “undisciplined, impertinent, ill-behaved vagabonds.”^[7]Elliott Coues, ed., New Light on the Early History of the Greater Northwest: The Manuscript Journals of Alexander Henry the Younger and David Thompson, 3 vols. in 2 (1897; reprint, Minneapolis, … Continue reading The expedition got a taste of such behavior when the boatmen bitterly complained about hard work and short rations.^[8]JLCE, 2:306. La Liberté‘s decision to leave the expedition was just a visible statement of what some of his comrades may have been thinking.

Wood River Problems

Hard-bitten soldiers, scrappy frontiersmen, and unpredictable boatmen—this was hardly a crew to inspire confidence. Lewis and Clark expected trouble, but they hoped that a winter at Camp Dubois might iron out the difficulties. On at least one score the captains were right. Life at Wood River was an endless round of drinking, fighting, and short-term desertion. Insubordination was everywhere. One corporal was busted to buck private for fighting and another man was sent packing for theft. There were surreptitious trips to taverns and probably some womanizing. Clark and top sergeant John Ordway did their best, but those efforts were often in vain.

Two incidents reveal just how deep the troubles ran in expedition life. On the frontier, Christmas and New Year’s were important holidays. They were times to break out of the winter doldrums. Feasting, dancing, and drinking were at the center of those festivals. Christmas 1803 at Camp Dubois showed the rank and file at their worst. The day began at dawn with a traditional gunfire salute. From then on it was all downhill. Too much whiskey and too much frolic led to swinging fists.^[9]Ibid., 2:141. In the modern vocabulary of MTV, these men were determined to “fight for the right to party.” A year later Sgt. Ordway would describe Fort Mandan’s Christmas as all “peace and tranquillity” but at Dubois it was anything but peace and quiet.

But no single event more fully reveals the expedition’s early tensions than the near-mutiny in February 1804. Late in that month both captains were away from camp on business in St. Louis. Sgt. Ordway, an experienced professional soldier, was left in command. Once Lewis and Clark were gone all hell broke loose. Reuben Field refused to pull guard duty. His insubordination was aided and abetted by John Shields. Shields “excited disorder and faction among the party.” But it was more than just backtalk. When Ordway attempted to quiet an ugly situation, Shields threatened to kill the sergeant. Others joined the rebellion, including John Colter, Peter Weiser, Boley, and the recently-demoted John Robertson. These men had been secretly visiting a local tavern while claiming to be out hunting.^[10]Ibid., 2:178, 194. When the captains announced sentences for some of those involved, they kept loaded pistols nearby. Perhaps it was a measure of how little had been resolved.^[11]Ibid., 2:183.

St. Charles Revelry

On 14 May 1804, Sgt. Ordway recorded the expedition’s departure from Dubois, saying that the party had thirty-eight “good hands.”^[12]Milo M. Quaife, ed., The Journals of Lewis and Sergeant John Ordway (Madison, 1916), 79. He must have been kidding! The Dubois troubles snapped at the expedition’s heels. No sooner had the Corps reached St. Charles than the lure of town and tavern proved as powerful as ever. Privates William Werner and Hugh Hall took off without permission for a night on the town. Collins went further. He attended a St. Charles dance, behaved in “an unbecoming manner,” and then spoke with considerable scorn about orders not to leave camp.^[13]JLCE, 2:234-237.

And the troubles did not slacken as the expedition moved upriver. Clark boasted that his men were “ever ready to inconture any fatigue for the promotion of the enterprise.”^[14]Ibid., 2:300. It was an idle claim and just two weeks later Collins and Hall were again before a court martial, once more accused of drinking on duty.^[15]Ibid., 2:329-330. The current of discontent kept rolling, and on 12 July 1804 Alexander Willard was sentenced to one hundred lashes “on his bear back” for sleeping on guard duty.^[16]Ibid., 2:369-370. Trouble reached flood stage in late summer and early fall. The stories of Moses Reed’s desertion and Newman’s “mutinous expression” are familiar ones.^[17]Ibid., 2:488-489; 3:169. The tales are worth remembering if only to recall that they were both the severest and last personnel troubles the expedition experienced. We know they were the last. Lewis and Clark, not blessed with the fortuneteller’s art, probably thought the worst was yet to come.

Fort Mandan Routines

Those nagging fears were not realized. At Fort Mandan the expedition settled in and settled down. With the minor exception of Thomas Howard’s brush with post rules, there were no more angry eruptions. During the Mandan winter the Corps of Northwestern Discovery found its self and became a family. It was a family that could grouse and complain—as every family must—but it was a community now willing to submerge individual desires for the good of the whole. How did that happen? How did these prickly characters create and then enjoy “a perfect harmony?”

At least part of the explanation rests with the actions of Lewis and Clark themselves. Their years of military service had taught them the value of order and discipline. From the beginning they envisioned the expedition not as some wandering band of trappers but as an infantry company with all the regulations dictated by the Articles of War. Drills, parades, inspections, and courts martial—all these were efforts to impose a sense of unity from above. That effort had some success. Young adventurers like Colter and Shannon were no longer about to leave camp without permission. But discipline from above could not build a sense of common purpose and shared destiny. Lewis and Clark wanted men who were reliable, not resentful. The journey called for men willing to take responsibility for their own lives as well as the lives of others. The Articles of War, no matter how scrupulously enforced, could not produce that kind of man and that sort of community.

Military regulations might make for proper mess organization. Those rules could not foster a sense of mutual trust. That would demand a set of shared experiences. The captains seemed to understand that. As much as possible, sergeants and enlisted men were brought into the active chain of command. Disciplinary proceedings that involved sentences short of death were administered by the soldiers themselves. When the expedition needed a new sergeant to replace the deceased Charles Floyd, the captains did not make the choice themselves. Instead they fell back on the militia tradition and held an election for the post.^[18]Ibid., 2:500-501. That precedent continued and at important places throughout the journey Lewis and Clark took time to involve their men in the decision-making process.

But shared experiences meant more than voting for a new NCO or selecting a site for Fort Clatsop. What really mattered were those moments when all had to pull together for the common good. It was the feeling of community that came out of surviving a terrible storm, pushing over a treacherous place on the Missouri, and just squeaking through a confrontation with the Teton Sioux. By the time the expedition reached the Mandans, it had its own supply of stories to draw upon. The stories we tell about each other remind us who we are. Now in firelight and shadow there were stories to share—stories about prairie dogs, buffalo, and the charms of Arikara women. You can almost hear the voices. Remember that sudden July storm that nearly capsized the barge (called the ‘boat’ or ‘barge’ but never the ‘keelboat’), remember Sgt. Floyd’s death, and remember how good that Arikara corn tasted.

The Northern Winter

Military discipline and the expedition’s own folklore were beginning to tame rowdy spirits. But it was really the winter at Fort Mandan that made the difference. What happened that winter is a testimony to the power of routine, to the way shared work binds people one to the other. There was a rhythm of life at the fort that gave all who were there a sense of common identity. Building the fort demanded cooperative effort. Men who had once snarled at each other now put arms and shoulders together lifting and setting heavy sixteen-foot eave beams. Soldiers and hunters who never gave a thought to the comfort of someone else now dug latrines to preserve the health of all. Clark recognized how hard all were laboring, noting that on one cold night the men worked until one in the morning.^[19]Quaife, 163; JLCE, 3:261. Toil—the joining of hands in the common task-bonded the explorers together. Cooking, cleaning, and rough fun were equally important in fostering that sense of harmony. What holds any day together are its predictable rituals of eating, washing, and household chores. Fort Mandan had those rituals and they gave the post a feeling of home. And just how much at home men of the expedition felt can be described the Fort Mandan rooms as “warm and comfortable.”^[20]Quaife, 171. The fort was a home and its inhabitants were becoming a family.

What a family does for fun says much about that family. Life at Fort Mandan was not all hard work and daily chores. There was plenty of time for good times. We should remember that the fort’s walls rang with the sounds of light-hearted music. Pierre Cruzatte‘s fiddle scratched out ancient French airs. Perhaps the walls also heard a Shoshone lullaby or an English ballad. A brass sounding hornsounding horn and a tambourine rounded out Mandan’s ensemble. Dancing was a common frontier pleasure. Francois Rivet danced on his hands while his comrades pranced and whirled many a fancy set and reel. In a feat not generally recognized, the expedition became the first federally-funded transcontinental dance troupe. And there were games. Quick fingers and nimble minds enjoyed backgammon. Lewis called it “the good old game.”^[21]JLCE, 3:265. There were also games played by native neighbors. On a cold December evening John Ordway and two friends watched as some Mandan men played the popular hoop and pole game. The sport basically involved throwing a short spear or shooting an arrow at a hoop or ring. Scoring depended on the accuracy of the strike toward the ring. Because the throwing sticks looked like billiard cues, later white observers insisted that the earthlodge people played pool. Shades of Minnesota Fats! Ordway was interested enough to want to play the game, but his efforts were thwarted when he could not understand the scoring system.^[22]Quaife, 172.

The expedition family always took note of holidays. Birthdays, the Fourth of July, Christmas, and New Year’s never went uncelebrated. At Camp Dubois the December and January festivals had been occasions for rowdy drinking and fighting. Fort Mandan’s Christmas showed the change. There was dancing, a bit of hunting, and a merry disposition all around. Sgt. Ordway caught the mood in a memorable phrase—”All in peace and quietness.”^[23]Ibid., 174; JLCE, 3:261. There was a bit more unbuttoned merrymaking when the party celebrated New Year’s 1805. Both French and English traditions tended to put more emphasis on New Year’s than Christmas. On January 1, after firing two swivel guns to mark the occasion, the captains allowed sixteen men “with their Musick ” to visit the Mandan village of Mitutanka “for the purpose of Dancing.” The merry men of the expedition had told Clark that their visit was made at “the perticular request of the Chiefs of that Village.” Led by John Ordway, the party left the fort carrying a fiddle, a tambourine, and a brass horn. At the entrance to Mitutanka the Americans fired their weapons and played a brisk tune. Welcomed into the village, they marched to the central plaza, fired another round, and began to dance. The Mandan onlookers were especially charmed by Rivet’s ability to dance upside down on his hands. All joined in a circle around the Frenchman, dancing and singing. After some time all the revelers were invited into the lodges for food and gifts of buffalo robes. Late in the afternoon the eating and dancing finally played out and most of the men went back to Fort Mandan. But some few did stay in Mitutanka overnight to enjoy other kinds of Mandan hospitality.^[24]Quaife, 174; JLCE, 3:266-267. It is a testimony to the good cheer of that day that the following day Lewis took a group to the village for an encore performance.

That delightful New Year’s celebration, bringing together explorers and Indians, represents what I think was the fundamental fact of life at Fort Mandan. The expedition was a community living alongside other communities. The Lewis-and-Clark tribe now joined other tribal peoples struggling to survive on the northern plains. Fort Mandan was never an isolated frontier outpost, caught in the grip of a Dakota winter and cut off from the simple pleasures of human companionship. Long before Lewis and Clark came to the Upper Missouri, Mandan and Hidatsa villagers had brightened their winters with a steady round of visits to the lodges of friends and neighbors. Life in the winter camps could be harsh and hungry, but there were also times for storytelling and gossip. Once the fort was built, the Americans simply became part of the social web. Nothing seemed more natural than the desire of explorer and Indian alike to see each other at home and share some food and friendship.

The Fort Mandan “Tribe”

The days of Fort Mandan added up to five months. And on most of those days Indians and whites met for all sorts of dealings. Business, diplomacy, hunting, sex, and simple curiosity made for daily encounters. Lewis and Clark’s hospitality was well-known; Indians often came early in the day, slept overnight inside the fort if invited, and left the next morning. Indian visitors brought to Fort Mandan’s rooms a sense of friendship and good company. The arrival of native neighbors usually meant sharing food and enjoying a dance or some music. There must have been time to appreciate a fine bow, a good gun, or a skillfully decorated pair of moccasins. The sheer numbers of Indian tourists sometimes tested everyone’s patience. Lewis called his neighbors “good company” but in the same breath complained that they sometimes overstayed their welcome. Sgt. Ordway peevishly recalled that on one day in mid-December he had fourteen Indians all eating in his squad room at the same time. It was enough to stretch the seating capacity of any small town Dakota cafe. Frayed nerves and misunderstandings were inevitable. When an Indian guest did something to annoy Private Joseph Whitehouse, the soldier struck him on the hand with a spoon.^[25]Quaife, 172, 174; JLCE, 2:261, 288, 315. See also James P. Ronda, Lewis and Clark among the Indians (Lincoln, 1984), pp. 98-107.

All these comings and goings had a profound effect on the expedition. It would not be wide of the mark to say that the earthlodge people civilized some of their more obstreperous white neighbors. That happened in two ways. From the earliest contacts between Europeans and native Americans, the white strangers used Indians as a kind of foil for themselves. We know, said the French or English, who you Indians are and thus we know ourselves. The fancy anthropological term is counter cultural image but the idea is a simple one. I know my own self because I am either like or unlike you. Being surrounded by other tribes, the Lewis-and-Clark tribe formed its own distinct identity. To put it another way, at Fort Mandan the expedition found an in-group personality. Second and equally important, the villagers provided a good example of a life that was remarkably harmonious. The explorers could not have remained unaffected by the good company around them. The Fort Mandan experience gave the expedition what it needed most—a sense of unity and common purpose for the journey ahead.

So much western history is written like a John Wayne movie or a Louis L’Amour novel. Powerful individuals, so we are told, tamed a wild and savage land. But what happened to the men of the Lewis and Clark Expedition gives the lie to such a distorted vision. The explorers began their journey as individuals, boozing and brawling, threatening and storming. Along the way they learned a fundamental lesson—a lesson the earthlodge people learned generations before. It was a lesson about cooperation and community. Once learned, it was not soon forgotten. Lewis was right. At Mandan, the expedition had come to know a perfect harmony.