December 1, 1806

Along the Middle Fork Holston River

Traveling with Meriwether Lewis to Washington City is a Mandan delegation from the Knife River Villages—Chief Sheheke, his wife Yellow Corn, and their son. Speaking Mandan and French was interpreter René Jusseaume who brought one of his wives and two children. Expedition private François Labiche was included to translate between French and English. Finally, records indicate expedition sergeant John Ordway was serving as Lewis’s assistant. During this time, William Clark remained at his home at the Falls of the Ohio.

The Old Stone Tavern near present Atkins, Virginia, sits on property purchased by Frederick Cullop between 1806 and 1808. Cullop had settled along the Middle Fork Holston River by 1797, and it is possible that the Cullops served Lewis and the Mandan delegates 1806. It is likely that travelers passing through this area were served from log structures that included personal dwellings.

Constructed of local limestone, the Old Stone Tavern was built by 1815 and meant to serve the heavy migration traffic bound for the Cumberland Gap, Tennessee, Carolinas, and Georgia. Its style is consistent with many early taverns along the Great Wagon Road—following the stone vernacular tradition of rural Pennsylvania. That architectural style emphasized informal construction by migrating German and Scottish craftsmen and use of local quarried materials. Walls were typically 18 to 24 inches thick to insulate against cold and heat.^[1]“Old Stone Tavern”, Virgina Department of Historic Resources (13 March 2026), www.dhr.virginia.gov/historic-registers/086-0002/, accessed 9 October 2026; “Old Stone Tavern”, … Continue reading

Pike’s Misfortune

The storm still continuing with violence, we remained encamped; the snow by night one foot deep; our horses being obliged to scrape it away, to obtain their miserable pittance, and to increase their misfortunes, the poor animals were attacked by magpies, who attracted by the scent of their sore backs, alighted on them, and defiance of their wincing and kicking, picked many places quite raw; the difficulty of procuring food rendered those birds so bold as to light on our mens arms and eat meat out of their hands.
—Zebulon M. Pike^[2]Donald Jackson, The Journals of Zebulon Montgomery Pike (Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1966), 1:352–53.

Related: Birds of the Expedition | Soundscapes along the Trail