Distinctly Montana Magazine

D I S T I N C T L Y M O N T A N A M A G A Z I N E • S U M M E R 2 0 2 2 48 needed to carry on. Clark records that "I purchased 11 horses & exchanged 7 for which we gave a few articles of merchan- dise. those people possess ellegant horses." This was a dif- ficult, lengthy process, as no one in the Corps spoke Salish. Ordway notes, "these natives have the Stranges language of any we have ever yet seen." Clark adds that dialog was "with much difficulty as what we Said had to pass through Several languajes before it got to theirs[.]" If that's all posterity had to go by, this part of the Lewis and Clark story might end there. However, the Salish being a culture of oral history, stories of that encounter have been handed down through the in- tervening generations from Salish ancestors. Some stories were recorded at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. Some were recorded more recently. The Sal- ish Pend d'Orielle Culture Committee have gathered and published these stories in a book titled The Salish People and the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Taken altogether, they paint a somewhat different story, adding color, context, and a few surprises to the 200-year-old tale. Many elders were interviewed for this collection and, while some of the details and focus of the stories vary a little, a general sense of what happened from the Salish perspective emerges. The Salish had been camped at the Great Clearing preparing for their annual trek to the east of the mountains for buffalo meat. On that day (Sept 4), Chief Three Eagles had been out with a "security detail," looking for any sign of a hostile tribe who might be trying to steal their horses. In a meadow along what is now known as Camp Creek (for obvious reasons), he saw the Corps emerge from the timber, having picked their way down the drainage from the ridge- line of Lost Trail Pass, which U.S. Highway 93 follows today. The Corps presented a bizarre sight to the Chief, so utterly different from anything he had seen before. They were men of an ashen complexion (except for the black man) and short hair, and had no blankets. Interpreting based on his culture, the Chief thought that their numbers meant these were the last remnants of a tribe that had been attacked and nearly wiped out by another hostile tribe. Their paleness meant they were in feeble physical health, probably near starvation and cold, a suspicion seemingly confirmed by a lack of blankets, perhaps because this other tribe stole them all. Their short hair meant they were in mourning from losing the battle. Then there was York, Clark's slave and a constant source of View of the Great Clearing today (top), with the Google Earth image of The Great Clearing and Camp Creek showing where the Salish met with Lewis and Clark.

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