Chapter 21
The Vote
Station Camp, near present-day McGowan, Washington
Yes. On 24 November 1805 the captains asked every member of the Corps where to spend the winter and wrote down each choice, including those of York, a man enslaved by Clark, and Sacagawea. Neither of them could have voted anywhere in the United States at the time.
22 November 1805
Winter is coming, and Station Camp is a terrible place to spend it. It faces the ocean storms. There is little game nearby. On 22 November the worst storm yet blows in, throwing waves out of the river and almost over the camp. Clark writes: “O! how horriable is the day.”
The captains have to decide where to build a fort for the winter, and they have several choices. They could stay on this side of the river. They could cross to the south side, where the Clatsop people say there are plenty of elk. Or they could go back up the river to the Sandy River or the falls, where it is drier, and where they might find food more easily.
There is one more thing to think about. American trading ships visit the mouth of the Columbia. If one comes, the captains could send letters and journals home by sea, and buy new supplies. So it might be worth staying near the coast.
24 November 1805
On 24 November the captains do something they have never done before. They ask everyone.
One by one, Clark writes down each person’s choice. Sergeant Ordway: cross and examine. Sergeant Pryor: the same. Sergeant Gass: the same. John Shields: go back up to the Sandy River. George Drouillard: look on the other side. The list goes on, man after man.
Near the bottom, two names are written that no one expected to see on a list like this. One is York. The other is written as “Janey,” Clark’s nickname for Sacagawea. Her vote is for “a place where there is plenty of Potas,” meaning wapato, a starchy root that grows in the marshes. Charbonneau’s name is there with just a dash beside it. He does not vote.
Most of the Corps votes to cross to the south side and look for a good spot there. So that is what they do.
25–27 November 1805
On 25 November the weather calms enough for the canoes to cross the wide estuary to the south shore. It takes them days of paddling and waiting out more storms.
Lewis goes ahead with a few men to look for a place to build. He comes back with good news: a spot on a small river a few miles from the ocean, on a rise above the water, in a thick forest full of elk. The Clatsop people who live nearby are friendly. And the ocean, where they can boil seawater for salt, is only a short walk away.