After all, Lewis and Clark’s story has never been just the triumphant tale of two white men, no matter what the white historians might need to believe. Sacagawea was not the primary hero of this story either, no matter what the Native American historians and I might want to believe. The story of Lewis and Clark is also the story of the approximately 45 nameless and faceless first- and second-generation European Americans who joined the journey, then left or completed it, often without monetary or historical compensation. Considering the time and place, I imagine those 45 were illiterate, low-skilled laborers subject to managerial whims and 19th century downsizing. And it is most certainly the story of the black slave York, who also cast votes during this allegedly democratic adventure. It’s even the story of Seaman, the domesticated Newfoundland dog who must have been a welcome and friendly presence and who survived the risk of becoming supper during one lean time or another. The Lewis and Clark Expedition was exactly the kind of multicultural, trigenerational, bigendered, animal-friendly, government-supported, partly French-Canadian project that should rightly be celebrated by liberals and castigated by conservatives.
Excerpted from What Sacagawea Means to Me by Sherman Alexie for Time (2002).
The whole essay is well-worth reading.
The members of the Corps of Discovery were all (except for Sacagawea) fairly paid for their participation. Each also received a bonus – double pay and a parcel of land in the West. The men were specifically chosen for the particular strengths and skills they could bring to the group. Many were in the U.S. army before joining the Corps. As I understand it, Lewis and Clark were fair and respectful leaders.
Except towards York where, as Stephen Ambrose put it, “William Clark was a slave holder. York was not his servant, he was his slave.”
Or as Evelyn Boswell of Montana State University puts it in ‘Lewis and Clark Expedition was High Point for Clark?s Slave’, “…and yet, when the expedition was over, York received no pay. Unlike other members of the expedition, he received no land. Clark refused to set him free after the expedition and described York as insolent and sulky for demanding it. After York married, Clark refused to let him move to Louisville, Ky. to live with his wife.”