Lewis And Clark Medicines
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I. Thomas Jefferson, United States President, Purchases the Louisiana Territory
Jefferson appoints Captain Meriwether Lewis to command an exploration of this territory.
Lewis asks William Clark to share the duties of command with him.
Jefferson sends a letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush wanting medical advice on what the explorers might need or encounter medically.
Neither Clark nor Lewis wanted anything to do with having a doctor along on the journey.
Jefferson believed this was alright because Clark and Lewis had great medical history, and were trained very well for the journey considering the times.
II. Doctor Benjamin Rush sends a letter containing a small amount of information to Jefferson, which was in turn passed on to the explorers.
Rush stated that proper rest was the most important part to survive the journey.
Staying ahead of sickness would be beneficial.
Flannel shirts should be worn in wet conditions.
Small amounts of sweating would help.
Purging pills (laxative) were used for a large variety of problems.
Sparing rations would lessen fatigue
Alcohol was discouraged, except after a long cold night.
Sugar & water would provide a wholesome drink with breakfast.
Washing feet in cold water every morning would prevent frostbite later in the day
Sleeping horizontally would be most beneficial.
III. Lewis and Clark Do Not Follow the Doctors Orders
They never washed their feet in cold water.
Sparing rations to prevent fatigue seemed to not appeal to the explorers, because they never followed this suggestion.
They never drank the sugar water stated in the doctors letter.
IV. Lewis and Clarks Budget – $2,500
$90.69 was spent on strictly medicines only:
1,300 doses of physic
1,100 doses of emetic
3,500 doses of diaphoretic(used to cause sweating)
15 pounds of febrifuge
Various other medicines were used for:
Blistering
Salivation
Increased kidney output
Lewis and Clark seemed set for their journey medically.
V. The Famous Journey Begins
Started from St. Charles, Missouri
May 21, 1804
Forty men
Three small sailing vessels
One fifty-pound keelboat
Two small water craft called pirogues
VI. First Danger Occurs
One of the crew members was bitten by a snake
Occurred near Atchison, Kansas
Creek where it happened is named Independence Creek to this day, because of the incident.
Treated the wound with gunpowder and bark
This was a common practice out in the wilderness, mainly because it was one of the few things they had.
Other common remedies included:
Garlic
Onions
Radishes
Freshly chewed tobacco
Wide range of other plants
Chugging whiskey
Most of these probably did more damage than help.
Physicians actually used most of these methods, but they did not use the gunpowder method.
The bark used by Lewis and Clark was most likely cinchona bark.
This is believed because they had 15 pounds along.
In those days “bark” most definitely meant cinchona.
VII. Heat Strikes
July 7, 1804
Somewhere along the wide part of the Missouri
Another crew member suffered from what is believed to be a sun stroke
The crew drained some blood and gave the man “niter”
Draining blood was very dangerous
It killed more people than it cured, luckily this man survived
This was believed for centuries to be beneficial in a wide range of occupations
Apothecary
Bath keeper
Barber
This is how they get the blood red stripe on their pole
“Niter” is potassium nitrate, better known as saltpeter
The effects include
Increased urine discharge
Induced sweating
VIII. Tragedy
Charles Floyd had stated in his journal that he was not feeling well
A couple days later, he was feeling better and thought nothing of it
Three weeks later Floyd was started to feel bad again, this time worse than the first time
The next day Floyd died
He had a ruptured appendix