In 1803 President Thomas Jefferson sent his friend James Monroe to Paris to try to buy the port of New Orleans in the French-owned Louisiana Territory. Yet when the French response came, it would bewilder both men.
Shortly after negotiations had begun, an impatient French official asked Monroe, “How much will you give for the whole of Louisiana?” France needed money for its war with Great Britain. An agreement between France and the United States was soon reached. For just $15 million, about three cents an acre, the United States would procure this huge piece of land.
Once the Louisiana Purchase had been made, Jefferson asked Meriwether Lewis to lead an expedition to explore the territory. The President also hoped that Lewis would find a safe water route to the Pacific. To ready himself for the journey, Lewis engaged in a spirited study of scientific techniques. He also asked his friend William Clark to join him on the trip. On May 14, 1804, Lewis and Clark and a group of 42 men, calling itself the “Corps of Discovery,” left from St. Louis.
As the men followed the Missouri River and struggled to cross the Rockies, much happened to dishearten them. They suffered from all the hazards associated with crossing a rugged and often hostile wilderness. For all their troubles, however, they never found a fully navigable water route to the Pacific Ocean.
Yet the strenuous journey was far from fruitless. After eighteen months, Lewis and Clark reached the Pacific Ocean. Along the way, they had mapped more than 3,000 miles. They had learned about new plants and animals. With the help of Sacajawea, a Shoshone woman, they had met many Native American groups. In the words of Thomas Jefferson, the Lewis and Clark expedition had shown that the United States was “a
rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land.”