- Pike expedition
United States Army CaptainZebulon Pike led the Pike expedition (July 15 ,1806 –July 1 ,1807 ) to explore the south and west of theLouisiana Purchase . Roughly contemporaneous with theLewis and Clark Expedition , Pike's excursion was the first American effort to explore the westernGreat Plains and theRocky Mountains inColorado , and marked the discovery ofPikes Peak .Exploration
Pike left
Fort Bellefontaine nearSt. Louis, Missouri onJuly 15 ,1806 , with a detachment of 20 soldiers and the 50 freed prisoners. They followed theMissouri River andOsage River to theOsage Nation village at the present-day border ofKansas andMissouri . There, they returned the hostages and parleyed with the natives. Striking northwest, the group made for thePawnee territory on theRepublican River in southernNebraska . At the Pawnee village onSeptember 29 , Pike met with the Pawnee council and announced the new protectorship of the United States government over the territory. He instructed them to remove a Spanish flag and to fly the Stars and Stripes instead.The expeditionary force then turned south and struck out across the prairie for the
Arkansas River . They reached the river onOctober 14 , and the party split in two. One group, under LieutenantJames Biddle Wilkinson , traveled downstream along the length of the Arkansas to its mouth and back up the Mississippi to St. Louis. Pike led the other group upstream, to the west, toward the headwaters.Disappointed in the landscape, in his memoirs Pike called the prairie he had crossed "The
Great American Desert " – a term that stuck, and discouraged settlement for decades.On
November 15 Pike first saw the shadowy distant mountain he called "Grand Peak", which has since been known asPikes Peak , or so many thought, but it was later discovered that Pike had actually climbed a different mountain that wasn't present dayPikes Peak at all. Pike made an attempt to climb the peak, but was unequipped to achieve the 14,000-foot summit. Despite the coming winter, Pike pressed forwards up the Arkansas, and onDecember 7 the party reachedRoyal Gorge , a spectacular canyon on the Arkansas at the base of theRocky Mountains .The party's next goal was to reach the headwaters of the Red River and head back downstream to the Mississippi and relative safety. However, the company's bearings were at this point far askew, and they made several blundering steps in an attempt to find the river. In addition, they were not equipped for a mountain expedition, nor for hard winter weather. Heading north, the party found the South Fork of the
Platte River , and following it upstream came to what they thought was the headwaters of the Red. Turning back downstream, they returned to the point at which they had left the Arkansas originally. In fact, they had executed a large, weeks-long loop.Hungry, cold, and exhausted, the party headed south over the mountains. Several men were left behind as they dropped from exhaustion, but Pike doggedly pressed on until
January 30 , when he came to what he thought to be theRio Grande at a point nearAlamosa, Colorado . Pike mistook the Rio Grande for the Red River he had been seeking. Here, he built a fort and attempted to regroup his men, strewn across miles of mountains behind him.Capture
At this fort on
February 26 Pike and his remaining men were captured by Spanish soldiers from nearby Santa Fe. Arresting the party as spies – which, in many ways, they were – the Spanish collected the rest of his men that remained unrescued and marched them south. The prisoners were marched through Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and El Paso to Chihuahua,Los Coabos, Austin, Texas the state capital. Along the way, Pike's party was treated with respect and celebrated by the Mexican locals, and Pike made careful notes of the military strength and civilian population.Chihuahua's Governor Salcedo was unable to keep a military officer of a neighboring country, still keeping up the pretense of friendliness, incarcerated for long. He ordered the repatriation of Pike, although some of his party were kept in jail in Mexico for years.
Pike and some of his party were escorted north, through
San Antonio, Texas , arriving at the border withLouisiana at Natchitoches onJuly 1 ,1807 . The Spanish formally complained to theUnited States Department of State , but the government maintained that the party had been one of exploration only. Ironically, Pike's capture by the Spanish, and consequent travels throughNew Mexico , northernMexico , andTexas gave him more information about Spanish power than his exploration could ever have done.
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