Sacagawea Hero

Around 1800, a group of Shoshone Indians was leaving their home to go to the Rocky Moutains which is Idaho and Montana today. Along with the Indians was a 12 year old girl named Sacagawea. She is one of the most famous Indian women who has ever lived. Many young Native American women have heard of her and would like to make an impression as much as she has. Some people may not even know who she is but most Americans know exactly who she is. Sacagawea is a hero and will live forever in our minds.
The Shoshone Indians and Sacagawea were traveling eastward down the great plains, where large herds of buffalo lived. Once the Shoshone Indians had arrived they set up camp and after a while the Shoshone were driven out from the Plains by enemy tribes who were armed with guns. The Hidatsa warriors attacked the Shoshone Indians and while the men fought off the attackers, the women and children ran to find places to hide. The Hidatsa Indians were part of the several dozen Plains Tribes which their homeland was stretched across Montana, North and South Dakota, western Minnesota, Nebraska, and Wyoming. “While Sacagawea was wading across a river toward some woods, she was pulled onto a horse behind an enemy warrior.”
Sacagawea was taken as a little

girl and while she was with the Hidatsa she was growing up. She knew her language and culture but since she was taken by the Hidatsa Indians, Sacagawea needed to learn the Hidatsa language and their customs. She had also learned to cook and make robes out of buffalo hides for the others in the tribe. Other women of the Hidatsa tribe didn’t want to do some of the jobs and so they put it off to Sacagawea to do. She was treated as slave with the Hidatsa tribe. At the same time that Sacagawea was taken, some of her Shoshone friends were captured. All of them were homesick and they often talked of it among themselves. One night, one of Sacagawea’s friends had escaped and the Hidatsa’s went and hunted for her but when they returned they could not find her.
November of 1804, a party of American Soldiers arrived near to the Hidatsa village. The leaders of the expedition were Captain Meriwether Lewis and Captain William Clark. In spring of 1805, Lewis and Clark hired Sacagawea’s husband, Toussaint Charbonneau. Her husband was hired to be their interpreter while traveling throughout their journey. Lewis and Clark told Toussaint Charbonneau to pick one of his wives that was a Shoshone to go with them. They believed that a Shoshone could help them purchase the horses they needed from Shoshone tribes, the wife he chose was Sacagawea.
In the spring of 1805, Sacagawea and her husband left Fort Mandan with Lewis and Clark along with 30 or more men.

Sacagawea was around 17 when she had her first child named, Jean-Baptiste, who was born in February of that year. Sacagawea’s baby boy rode on her back in a cradle board, this allowed Sacagawea to continue working while knowing her baby boy was safe. Some important packages that were on the boat she was on started floating away. Sacagawea was sitting in the back of the boat when these started to float away, she immediately reached out and grabbed the parcels from floating away. The Americans were relieved that she grabbed the parcels from floating away. She proven herself to be a valuable member of the

expedition.
Along the way their was up and downs for the expedition, nearly drowning, bad weather, Sacagawea sees where she got kidnapped, and buying horses from Sacagawea’s family. When Sacagawea had come to her family the rivers were becoming too shallow to travel any further. Sacagawea played an important part in helping the Americans communicate with the other Indians. In the spring of 1806, the journey was headed back home to their native land where Lewis and Clark had found Sacagawea.
Lewis and Clark had broke off from each other and Clark took Sacagawea and her husband with him. Once they met back up with Lewis, they learned that Lewis’s group had been in a fight with Blackfoot Native Americans. It was a success for their expedition except for the encounter with the Blackfoot Indians. Many of the Americans were surprised to see the explorers return, thinking that they had all died from the long, dangerous journey.
In 1812, just right before Sacagawea had passed away, she gave birth to a daughter named Lisette. Within a year, Clark became legal guardian to both Lisette and Baptiste. After this nobody knows where Sacagawea went. Some believe she died from an illness near South Dakota. Others believe she may have lived a long life, all the way until she is 100. Many do not know exactly how she spelled her name, but some believe it is Sacajawea or Sacagawea. Her name means “Bird Women” from the Hidatsa language or “Boat Launcher” from the Shoshone language. Lewis described Sacagawea as “deserved a greater reward for her attention and services on that route than we had in our power to giver her.”