Day-by-Day / October 3, 1803

October 3, 1803

Spoiled smallpox vaccine

Cincinnati, OH Lewis writes a letter to President Thomas Jefferson. In it, he provides most of the information we have about his days in Cincinnati. He thanks Jefferson for sending a vaccine and asks the President to send a copy of the Louisiana Purchase treaty.

Ivory Vaccination Lancet

small folding knife made from ivory

© 2023 by John W. Fisher.

Smallpox Vaccine

Cincinnati, October 3rd 1803.

Dear Sir,

I would thank you for forward[ing]me some of the Vaxcine matter, as I reason to believe from several experiments made with what I have, that it has lost its virtue.

MERIWETHER LEWIS. Capt.
1st. U.S. Regt. Infty.[1]Donald Jackson, ed. Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with Related Documents: 1783-1854, 2nd ed., (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1978), 130.

The ions, oxides, and salts present in metals could destroy the inoculant material. Hence, the use of ivory lancets like that shown in the figure. The material was sometimes stored and administered from quills or thread.[2]John W. Fisher, 17 August 2023 email; Benjamin Waterhouse, A Prospect of Exterminating the Small Pox, Part II (Cambridge: The University Press, 1802), 16, archive.org/details/2576050R.nlm.nih.gov. … Continue reading

Treaty Requested

Cincinnati, October 3rd 1803.

Dear Sir,

So soon Sire, as you deem it expedient to promulge the late treaty, between the United States and France I would be much obliged by your directing an official copy of it to be furnished me, as I think it probable that the present inhabitants of Louisiana, from such an evidence of their having become the Citizens of the United States, would feel it their interest and would more readily yeald any information of which, they may be possessed relative to the country than they would be disposed to do, while there is any doubt remaining on that subject.

MERIWETHER LEWIS. Capt.
1st. U.S. Regt. Infty.[3]Ibid., 130_31.

Related: The Louisiana Purchase

 

Notes

Notes
↑1 Donald Jackson, ed. Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with Related Documents: 1783-1854, 2nd ed., (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1978), 130.
↑2 John W. Fisher, 17 August 2023 email; Benjamin Waterhouse, A Prospect of Exterminating the Small Pox, Part II (Cambridge: The University Press, 1802), 16, archive.org/details/2576050R.nlm.nih.gov. For Thomas Jefferson’s correspondence with Waterhouse, see also March 18, 1803.
↑3 Ibid., 130_31.

Discover More

  • The Lewis and Clark Expedition: Day by Day by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2018). The story in prose, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals: An American Epic of Discovery (abridged) by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2003). Selected journal excerpts, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals. by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 1983–2001). The complete story in 13 volumes.

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Unless otherwise noted, journal excerpts are from The Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, edited by Gary E. Moulton, 13 vols. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1983-2001).