John Dame

This New Hampshire-born artillerist was serving under Capt. Amos Stoddard at Fort Kaskaskia in “the Illinois” when he joined the expedition in 1803 at the age of nineteen.^[1]Moulton, ed., Journals, 2:516. From the start, he was assigned to the detail that would take the barge back to St. Louis in the spring of 1805. During his short time with the Corps has a reputation as a quiet and well-disciplined soldier.

Records for Captain Stoddard’s company list John Dame’s date of enlistment as 20 August 1801 for a term of five years. He is described as blue-eyed, fair complexioned, and of average height. His army occupation, that of laborer, hint at his likely contribution to the expedition: poling, rowing, and towing the barge (called the ‘boat’ or ‘barge’ but never the ‘keelboat’) up the Missouri River to the Knife River Villages.^[2]Company Book of Amos Stoddard’s Artillery Company, Louisiana Territory Collection, Military Command Records, Adjutant’s Records, 1803–1805, Missouri State Historical Society Archives, St. … Continue reading

Dame’s sole claim to notice in the captains’ journals was the fact that he shot an American white pelican on 8 August 1804, at what the captains named Pelican Island, near today’s Little Sioux, Iowa.^[3]The island no longer exists because of the Missouri’s changing path. Ibid, 2:463n3.