Severe Discipline

August 24th, 1804


They mean business on this expedition. It’s no journey for the weak, timid or lazy. When Reed left without telling anyone, Lewis had a group of soldiers go get him. When they found Reed he was whipped hard. He ran between two lines of men, and they whipped his back. It was called: “running the gauntlet.” This was an example to the rest of us, not to run away. It was brutal seeing this type of discipline. You could see the blood dripping from his wounds. He was shrieking in pain. It was a type of torture that no one would want to endure. He was to say good bye to the journey and the team he had run away from in the first place. Others were punished and whipped for getting drunk, sleeping on the job, and stealing whiskey. They made their point and none of us were ever going to think about running away after this.