(1786/88-1812/84)
Shoshone (Snake) interpreter of the Lewis and Clark Expedition
Sacagawea (Sacajawea, Sakakawea) was born in a Northern Shoshone village in the vicinity of the Lemhi River valley in what is today Idaho; it is likely that she was a member of the Agaiduka or Salmon Eater band of the Shoshone tribe. Around 1800, while her tribe was engaged in a hunting or war expedition east of their home territory in the Three Forks area of the Missouri River (Montana), she was captured, most likely by the Hidatsas from the Knife River village of Metaharta (North Dakota). Sacagawea was twelve to fourteen years old at the time of her capture. By 1804 she had become the property of Toussaint Charbonneau, a French-Canadian trader and trapper.
In the winter of 1804-1805, Captains Meriwether Lewis and William Clark wintered at Fort Mandan on the Missouri River in what is today North Dakota, where they encountered Charbonneau and Sacagawea. Before leaving Fort Mandan in April 1805 to continue their westward journey, Lewis and Clark hired Charbonneau as an interpreter, requesting that he bring one of his Shoshone wives with him. Charbonneau brought Sacagawea, who had given birth to their son, Jean Baptiste, on February 11, 1805, at the fort; the infant became the youngest member of the expedition.
While much popular literature portrays Sacagawea as the pilot of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, her role as expedition guide has been greatly exaggerated. She was unfamiliar with most of the terrain through which the expedition traveled, and so could not have led the expedition to the Pacific Ocean. Sacagawea's geographical knowledge was limited to the region near her homeland in the Three Forks area of the upper Missouri River; here she recognized landmarks and provided some direction to Lewis and Clark.
While it is not likely that Sacagawea acted as the expedition's guide, her services certainly contributed to the success of the expedition. She acted as an interpreter (her most important role), collected wild foods, boosted morale, and on occasion pointed out landmarks and possible routes (such as the Bozeman Pass on the return trip). She even saved valuable instruments and records from being lost overboard when the expedition was traveling on the Missouri River. William Clark was impressed by Sacagawea's service and strength, and nicknamed her Janey in his expedition journals. He became attached to Sacagawea's son, Jean Baptiste, and assumed responsibility for the education of the boy, whom he fondly nicknamed Pomp. Clark's journal also indicates that the presence of a woman with an infant served as a sign that the intentions of the expedition were peaceful.
Much of the success of the expedition hinged on Sacagawea's presence as an emissary and liaison. In August 1805, west of the Continental Divide in present-day Lemhi County, Idaho, she was unexpectedly reunited with her brother Cameahwait, who had become Shoshone band chief during her many years of absence. He provided the expedition with horses and guides for the journey across the Bitterroot Mountains and through the Salmon River country to the navigable waters of the Clearwater and Columbia Rivers.
Sacagawea, Charbonneau, and their son left Lewis and Clark at Fort Mandan, their starting point, on August 17, 1806. Charbonneau was paid $500.33. Because Sacagawea was an unofficial member of the expedition, she received no monetary compensation. Little is known of her life after the expedition. Historical records, however, suggest that Charbonneau, Sacagawea, and Jean Baptiste went east to St. Louis, Missouri, around 1810 to accept Clark's offer of 320 acres of land and additional pay, and to finance the education of their son. But city life did not agree with Charbonneau, and he and Sacagawea left St. Louis to return to the upper Missouri country to work for the famous Missouri Fur Company trader Manuel Lisa. Jean Baptiste most likely remained behind in St. Louis to begin his education under the patronage of William Clark.
Most historians believe that Sacagawea died at Fort Manuel (Manuel Lisa's post) on the Missouri River in what is today South Dakota on December 20, 1812; they base their conclusions on three recorded accounts that suggest this as the date of her death. One account is that of Henry Brackenridge (author, statesman, and lawyer) of Pittsburgh, who records in his journal on April 2, 1811, that a wife of Charbonneau who had accompanied Lewis and Clark to the Pacific was on board a trading boat with him in the vicinity of Fort Manuel. His journal entry indicates that she was ill and wanted to return to her people. Over a year later, on December 20, 1812, John Luttig, head clerk of the Fort Manuel trading post, wrote in his journal: "This Evening the Wife of Charbonneau a Snake Squaw, died of a putrid fever she was a good and the best Woman in the fort, aged about 25 years she left a fine infant girl." Finally, somewhere between 1825 and 1828, Clark wrote "dead" next to Sacagawea's name (listed as "Secar ja we au") on the cover of his cash or accounting book, along with the known whereabouts of the other members of the expedition.
An alternative version of Sacagawea's later life, however, persists. Shoshone, Comanche, Mandan/Hidatsa, Gros Ventre, and other oral traditions maintain that Sacagawea lived to be an old woman (ninety-six to ninety-eight years old) and died on April 9, 1884. According to these oral traditions, Sacagawea (Bird Woman in Hidatsa; Boat Pusher in Shoshone), also known as Porivo (Chief Woman), Wadze Wipe (Lost Woman), and Bo-i-naiv (Grass Woman), left Charbonneau (perhaps around 1810) and wandered from tribe to tribe in the area that is now the states of Kansas and Oklahoma, finally settling with the Comanches, among whom she married and had children. Upon the death of her Comanche husband, Jerk Meat, she traveled up the Missouri River in search of her own people. Reunited with her son, Jean Baptiste (now Baptiste), and an adopted nephew, Bazil, she helped her Wind River Shoshone people in their transition to life on their newly created reservation. Venerated by her tribe, she was buried on the tribe's Wyoming reservation in 1884. Tribal historians argue that Charbonneau had at least two Shoshone wives and that Brackenridge and Luttig (who never named Sacagawea) misidentified the correct wife; they also contend that Clark's information about Sacagawea's whereabouts as recorded on the cover of his account book was inaccurate. The works of Charles Eastman (Sioux) and Grace Hebard, while somewhat inconsistent and subjective, provide evidence to support this position.
Sacagawea has become an appealing figure in the history of the American West, and she continues to capture the romantic imagination of both Indian and non-Indian Americans. It has been said that there are more monuments, memorials, rivers, lakes, and mountain areas named after her than after any other American woman. Novelists, poets, historians, anthropologists, and feminists have resurrected, re-created, and immortalized the mystique of Sacagawea. Controversies and romance aside, however, Sacagawea emerges as a courageous, determined, and admirable Indian woman, and the ongoing disputes have served to keep the memory of this extraordinary woman alive.
Irving W. Anderson, The American West "A Charbonneau Family Portrait," 17, no. 2 (1980): 4-13; Harold Howard, Sacajawea (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971).
Sally McBeth
University of Northern Colorado
