12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Highly readable and well edited, February 27, 2007
By His Own Hand? is a valuable addition to the Lewis and Clark literature. The centerpieces of this slim volume are two extended essays, one by James Holmberg of the Filson Historical Society in Louisville, the other by John D.W. Guice, professor of history emeritus at the University of Southern Mississippi.
In "The Case for Suicide," Jim Holmberg does an excellent job of setting out the evidence that Meriwether Lewis committed suicide in the early morning hours of October 11, 1809. The strength of Holmberg's essay is the overwhelming support of documentary evidence that the people closest to Lewis, including William Clark and Thomas Jefferson, believed he was in a suicidal frame of mind. Holmberg also points out that the supposed tradition of murder did not begin until the 1840s, many decades after Lewis died, when the residents of the area formed Lewis County and began to embrace the legacy of their most famous, if deceased, resident. William Clark's son, Meriwether Lewis Clark, may have also played a role in attempting to rescue his namesake from the stigma of suicide.
By contrast, those who believe Lewis was murdered have never been able to muster much evidence against any of the many suspects and rely heavily on the dubious supposition that Lewis simply wasn't the type to commit suicide. There are big holes in all the murder theories. Fictional accounts such as Frances Hunter's "To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis and Clark" can fill in such gaps, but no documentary evidence exists that can do so in real life.
Yet Guice's essay, "Why Not Murder?" is more valuable than the confused tales of murder in the night might suggest. Guice points out that, starting with Thomas Jefferson, there has been a long history of retrofitting Lewis's life and actions to point to a suicidal nature. Scholars often point to Lewis's 31st birthday journal entry. Written literally as the Expedition was poised to become the first Americans to cross the Continental Divide, Lewis seems to lament the fact that he's never accomplished a doggone thing in his life. But is this really evidence that Lewis was self-destructive or a raging depressive? And how about the missing journals, or Lewis's failures in politics after the Expedition? Might there be explanations other than mental illness?
Guice does a good job of showing that when interpreted through the assumption of suicide, Lewis's foibles seem much more ominous than they would otherwise. He also points out that the suicide tradition is based largely on hearsay, and calls for an exhumation of Lewis's body to search for forensic evidence that might settle the question once and for all. He notes that over 200 Lewis relatives signed a petition asking the National Park Service for permission to examine the remains, but the NPS denied the request.
I also appreciated Guice's defense of Vardis Fisher, whose Suicide or Murder? (1962) doesn't always get the respect it deserves. Fisher did yeoman's work in compiling the stories about Lewis's death, and his work on the subject remains the most complete on the subject.
There are some good primary source documents included in By His Own Hand?, and an excellent round-up of the arguments by Jay Buckley of Brigham Young University. This anthology is highly readable and well-edited and will be enjoyed with anyone with an interest in Lewis's sad fate.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
True crime?, December 17, 2006
This review is from: By His Own Hand?: The Mysterious Death of Meriwether Lewis (Hardcover)
You talk about true crime, this puts them all to shame. Or was it a crime? For almost two centuries scholars, criminologists, medical professionals and a host of other sleuths have tried to determine what caused the death of Meriwether Lewis of the famed Lewis and Clark Expedition. Was it a suicide, a homicide, or an accident? The shooting on October 11, 1809, in an Inn along the Natchez Trace in Tennessee has created much controversy, speculation, legends, and myths and yet the mystery has not been solved. Or has it? This book is the first to analyze the evidence and, within the full historical context, consider the murder-versus-suicide debate. Four historians outline the facts and present the evidentiary problems; make a case for suicide...and murder; assess the strengths and weaknesses of both arguments; and present a document section from which the reader can examine the available key evidence. What ultimately caused the death of Meriwether Lewis? YOU decide.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Dissecting the suicide argument and outlining inconsistencies in the theory., December 13, 2006
This review is from: By His Own Hand?: The Mysterious Death of Meriwether Lewis (Hardcover)
BY HIS OWN HAND? THE MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF MERIWETHER LEWIS surveys the evidence in the strange death of explorer Lewis, who was found dead from two gunshot wounds while staying at an inn in Tennessee. Who fired these shots may never be fully known, but BY HIS OWN HAND takes a healthy stab at a case with no eyewitnesses. Contributors here are all historians of the West and conduct investigations making the case for different results, with editor Guice dissecting the suicide argument and outlining inconsistencies in the theory.
Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch
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