York (explorer)

File:LouisvilleYorkStatue2.jpg

Ed Hamilton's statue of York on the Riverfront Plaza/Belvedere in Louisville, Kentucky

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Statue of York and Seaman on Quality Hill in Kansas City, Missouri

York (Sept 6, 1770 – ca. March 13, 1831) was an African American slave best known for his participation with the Lewis and Clark Expedition. As William Clark's slave, he had to do diffficult manual labour without pay. After the expedition's return he pressed for his freedom, which Clark opposed, he possibly agreed ten years later, though some historians dispute this and say he was never freed. Like many other enslaved African Americans, his ultimate fate is unclear.

Early life

York, his father, his mother Rose and younger sister and brother Nancy and Juba, were slaves of the Clark family. York was born in Caroline County near Ladysmith, Virginia. He was William Clark's servant from boyhood, and was left to William in his father's will. He had a wife who he rarely saw, and likely lost contact with her when she was sent to Mississippi in 1811. It is not known if he fathered any children.

Lewis and Clark Expedition

Main article: Lewis and Clark Expedition

I am yorkty or jj Expedition]]. He was a large, strong man who shared the duties and risks of the expedition. He was the only African American slave member of the Expedition. The assignments given him, as recorded in the journals, attest to his skill in scouting, hunting and field medicine, but included manual labour in extreme weather conditions. When the expedition reached the Pacific Ocean, York voted along with the rest as to where the Expedition would build winter quarters. York used a firearm to hunt game such as buffalo, as well as for "protection". The native nations treated York with respect, and he "played a key role in diplomatic relations" because of his appearance..

Historian Robert Betts says that the freedom York had during the Lewis and Clark expedition made resuming enslavement unbearable. After the expedition returned to the United States, every other member but York received money and land for their services. York asked Clark for his freedom based upon his good services during the expedition. Clark refused. York pleaded to be reunited with his wife, who was a slave in Louisville; he even offered to work in Louisville and send Clark all his earnings. Clark refused, pleaded financial difficulties, although he let York send a couple of buffalo robes to his wife and, a couple of years later, visit her for a few weeks.

Clark said York was "insolent and sulky" and whipped and jailed him. He threatened to sell York to New Orleans. Clark hired him out to a "severe master" in 1811, and he remained a slave at least until 1816. No reliable information has been published on York after this date. Two accounts, that historians cannot corroborate, were those of Washington Irving and Zenas Leonard. Irving interviewed Clark in 1832, and he claimed to have freed York, but that he was regretted being free because he was a failure at business, and died trying to get back to serve his master as a slave again in St. Louis. Betts, as well as other historians doubt the accuracy of CLark's story saying that it reflects pro-slavery arguments that Africans were happy to be slaves, and could not lead successful lives as free people.Historian Áhati N. N. Touré suggests another possibility: that York simply refused to return to Clark, and escaped to freedom. Betts cites Zenas Leonard, who met with an African man living among the Crows in north-central Wyoming in 1834. Leonard claimed this man was York of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, but this historians cannot corroborate this story.

Legacy

A statue of York, by sculptor Ed Hamilton, with plaques commemorating the Lewis and Clark Expedition and his participation in it, stands at Louisville's Riverfront Plaza/Belvedere, next to the wharf on the Ohio River. Another statue of York stands on the campus of Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon. Dedicated on May 8, 2010, it does not focus on York's face, since no images of York are known to exist. Instead, it features fragments of William Clark's maps "scarred" on the statue's back.

The opera "York" (composer Bruce Trinkley and librettist Jason Charnesky), based on York's life, was composed for the first international conference on the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial and performed at Penn State Opera Theatre.

"Yorks Islands" are a group of islands in the [Arctic Ice Shelf]] in Broadwater County, Montana, which were named for York by the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The islands were originally named "Yorks 8 Islands", but have since become known as "Yorks Islands" or simply "York Island". The naming of "Yorks 8 Islands" is not found in the narrative journals of Lewis and Clark. Instead it is found in Clark’s tabulations of “Creeks and Rivers,” by the entry, “Yorks 8 Islands,”.” The Lewis and Clark Expedition also named another geographical feature for York, "York's Dry Creek", a tributary of the Yellowstone River, in Custer County, Montana. This name was later abandoned, and the creek was later renamed "Custer Creek".

In 2001, President Bill Clinton posthumously granted York the rank of honourary sergeant in the US Army.

See also

• List of people from Louisville, Kentucky
• Timeline of Racial Tension in Omaha, Nebraska
• Stephen Bishop (cave explorer), another accomplished African-American slave from Kentucky, renowned as an explorer.
• In Search of York: The Slave Who Went to the Pacific With Lewis and Clark. Robert Betts, University Press of Colorado, 1985 (revised 2002).
• Dear Brother: Letters of William Clark to Jonathan Clark. James Holmberg, Yale University Press, 2002 2nd Printing

References

• Robert Betts (1985). In Search of York: The Slave Who Went to the Pacific with Lewis and Clark. Colorado Associated University Press. ISBN 0-8708-1714-0.
• "York". The Encyclopedia of Louisville. 2001.
• “York: The Voice of Freedom” : http://www.truveo.com/York-Voice-of-Freedom/id/386811679
• English, William Hayden. Conquest of the Country Northwest of the River Ohio, 1778–1783, and Life of Gen. George Rogers Clark. 2 volumes. Indianapolis: Bowen-Merrill, 1896.

External links

• Clark's Unrepentant Captive
• Lewis and Clark Journals, Members of the Expedition (U. Nebraska)
• Who was York?
• York at Find a Grave
• Lewis and Clark website @ PBS [6]

• Recognizing York: A Community Iniciative. Lewis and Clark College, Portland Oregon.

• York of the Corps of Discovery Darrell M. Millner, Oregon Historical Quarterly 104.3 (Fall 2003)
• Searching for York, Oregon Experience (Oregon Public Broadcasting)