If Vancouver had discovered the Columbia prior to Gray, it is impossible to say what complications and results would have arisen in connection with the extension and development of the United States. It is therefore a source of endless gratification that Captain Robert Gray, by his courage, enterprise, and seamanship, in discovering and entering the Columbia, ultimately secured to the United States this fertile territory, almost twice as extensive in area as Great Britian.
With its six hundred and sixty thousand of inhabitants, its great cities, its enormous accumulations of wealth, the young empire added to the United States through Robert Gray is fast shaping into substance the golden visions of the enthusiastic Kendrick.
V.
CAPTAIN MERIWETHER LEWIS AND LIEUT. WILLIAM CLARK.
First Trans-Continental Explorers of the United States.
The burning genius and intense patriotism of Thomas Jefferson found their most brilliant setting in his draft of the most famous paper in the world, the Declaration of Independence. If Jefferson thus struck the keynote of freedom for America, he was not content with a free people restricted in their habitat to the eastern half of the continent, and in his ripest life gave no more conspicuous evidence of his foresight and statesmanship than in the inauguration of a policy which comprehended in its scope the exploration and settlement of the entire trans-Mississippi region. He not only urged and completed the purchase of Louisiana, but sought the extent of its natural resources, appreciated the undeveloped wealth of the great West, and drafted a scheme of land divisions and settlement which foreshadowed the beneficial homestead legislation of later years.
Jefferson was for years interested in the exploration of the western parts of North America, which were absolutely unknown save the coast-line of the Pacific. In 1784, while in Paris, he met John Ledyard, who had made an unsuccessful effort to organize a company for the fur trade on the western coast of America. Ledyard, by Jefferson’s advice and intercession, attempted to cross by land to Kamschatka, and thence to the west coast of America, and across country to the Missouri River. Ledyard’s arrest in Siberia and expulsion from the country by the Russian Government ended this plan. In 1802 Jefferson initiated, through the American Philosophical Society, a subscription for the exploration of the western parts of North America, by ascending the Missouri River, crossing the Rocky Mountains, and descending the nearest river to the Pacific Ocean. Although only two persons were to go, Meriwether Lewis urgently sought the appointment, and with M. André Michaux the voyage was commenced; but his companion being recalled by the French minister at Washington, the journey was abandoned.
On January 18, 1803, Jefferson, then President, recommended in a confidential message to Congress modifications of the act regarding trade with Indians, and with the view of extending its provisions to the Indians on the Missouri, recommended the exploration of the Missouri River to its source, the crossing of the Rocky Mountains, and descent to the Pacific Ocean by the best water communication. Congress approved the plan and voted money for its accomplishment. Captain Meriwether Lewis, of the United States Army, who had been for nearly two years private secretary to the President, renewed his solicitations for command, which was given him.