The expedition’s ascent of the Columbia on 29 March 1806 carried the party from Deer Island to the large Cathlapotle village near the mouth of what Lewis records as the Cah-wah-na-hi-ooks (the modern Lewis River). All four journal-keepers describe the same sequence of events — an early start, a breakfast halt at the head of Deer Island, a meeting with Clannahminamun visitors, the crossing to the north channel, and a three-hour stop at a fourteen-house village — yet the four entries diverge sharply in scope and detail, illuminating the division of labor (and temperament) among the narrators.
Captains’ Ethnography vs. Sergeants’ Brevity
Lewis devotes the bulk of his entry to geography and ethnography. He fixes the upper point of Deer Island as “the lower side or commencement of the Columbian valley,” a framing absent from every other journal that day. He catalogues six tribal groups around Wappetoe Island — Clannahminamun, Clacksstar, Cathlahcumup, Clahinnata, Cathlahnahquiah, and Cathlahcammahtup — and follows with a botanical aside on a wild onion that resembles “the shives of our gardens.” Most distinctive is his close anatomical description of the women’s leather breech clout, which he traces step by step:
the two corners of this at one of the narrow ends are confined in front just above the hips; the other end is then brought between the legs, compressed into a narrow foalding bundel is drawn tight and the corners a little spread in front and tucked at the groin
Clark’s parallel entry shares Lewis’s tribal list almost verbatim — strong evidence the captains conferred or one copied from the other, as is frequently the case in the return journals. But Clark adds operational and commercial detail Lewis omits: the river “is now riseing very fast and retards our progress,” the party was “compelled to keep out at Some distance in the Curent,” and the deer flesh was “too poore for the Men to Subsist on and work as hard as is necessary,” forcing the purchase of twelve dogs. Clark also closes with an ethnographic vignette Lewis lacks entirely — the wappato harvest in which women, “holding by a Small canoe and with their feet loosen the wappato or bulb of the root.”
Ordway’s Middle Register and Gass’s Compression
Ordway occupies a register between the captains and Gass. He preserves details neither captain records: that Clark “bought a Robe which was made of 2 Sea otter Skins from the princepal man,” that the medal was placed on the chief by Clark and “he put it on his wife,” and that the chief received in addition “a blue blanket edged with red & Small also an old flag.” Ordway alone narrates the diplomatic choreography of the chief-making. He also extends the breech-clout observation Lewis gave technically into a comparative geography:
thier women instead of wearing the Straw & bark Short peticoats wear a Soft leather breach cloth all above this Side of the Mountains are dressed in this way & nothing more to cover the most part of them, but those below on the coast wear the Short pticoats.
Gass, by contrast, compresses the entire day into four sentences. He notes the frost, the early start, “some old Indian lodges,” the “large village, where we were received with great kindness,” the purchase of “some dogs and waptos,” and the encampment a mile beyond. He records no tribal name, no chief, no medal, no river, no breech clout — but he is the only narrator to track the sick men, observing that “One of the sick men is quite recovered and the other two are getting better.” Gass’s habitual concern with the health and welfare of the corps continues to distinguish his journal from those of his officers.
Patterns of Convergence and Divergence
The day exemplifies a recurring pattern in the return-journey records. Lewis and Clark share their ethnographic and geographic frameworks — the tribal roster, the river name, the location relative to Wappato Island — almost certainly through direct exchange of notes. Ordway, writing independently, captures the social texture of the visit (gifts, the wife receiving the medal, the sea-otter robe) that the captains either omit or relegate to passing mention. Gass, working from the briefest field notes, retains only the practical skeleton: weather, distance, food, health. Read together, the four entries reconstruct an encounter no single narrator preserves whole — a reminder that the expedition’s documentary record is genuinely polyphonic, and that the Cathlapotle visit, like much of the journey, lives in the interplay among voices.
