From 15th century to 19 century, for about 400 years, while the expedition of Chen Ho of Ming Dynasty came to a screeching halt, the west started an age of discovery, exploration and expedition one after the other. First Diaz found the southern tip of the continent, the cape of good hope. Followed with Columbus expedition to the west and found a new land. Then Vasco da Gama found a new passage to go around the cape of good hope to India. Eventually Balboa led a team of explorers reaching a mountain top of Panama and saw the immense Pacific, called South Sea at that time. He was the first white man to see Pacific from the Europe side. Balboa passed through Panama Isthmus, a short cut to reach Pacific. Since then Spain dominated and monopolized the trade route between Europe and the South/Central America.
Meanwhile other countries like English, France and Holland were scrambled to find new passage through the northwest. First John Cabot sailed for England. He was born in Genoa, same city as Columbus. He sailed with a small ship Mathew with 18 sailors in 1497. He didn't find India or China. Instead he found Newfoundland and the North America. In 1520, Magellan passed the tip of South America, sailed into Pacific and eventually reach Philippine. With this success, many Europeans were eager to do something similar through the northwest. In 1524, John Verrazano sailed for France, went northwest and found Hudson River and Long Island. In 1534, Another French navigator, Jacques Cartier followed the similar route and found Gulf of St. Lawrence, sailed inland to Quebec. However, he failed to find a new passage to China either. For consolation, he claimed what he found the land as New France and gave it to the King of France. In 1607, Hudson sailed for a trade company of England, . He entered Arctic Ocean and got stopped by the frigid ice. The Dutch East Indian Company heard the news and hired Hudson immediately to find another passage to the east in order to compete with Portuguese. Hudson sailed a ship called 'Half Moon' in 1609, he found the Hudson Bay and Hudson River. But China was nowhere to be seen. Spanish was lucky to pick the route to Central America, especially Panama Isthmus, a short cut to Pacific. In North America, the situation is complete different. It is a land mass of 4,000 miles across and most rivers go south that hampers the travel from the east to west. No ship can take advantage for such a long land travel. It was not until 1803, when Thomas Jefferson got a great deal to buy Louisiana Territory from Napoleon. The Louisiana Territory is much larger than the current Louisiana State. It is actually about the same size of the United States at the time of 1800. In other words, the United States suddenly becomes twice in size with half of it without people living there except Indians. The Louisiana Purchase may be the largest peaceful transfer of territory in recorded history. It helped turn the United States into a great power and was an event of far reaching importance.
Thomas Jefferson is a great statesman and a visionary. He is well versed in the new idea of John Locke, Montesquieu and Rousseau. He drafted the Declaration Of Independence and well read in books about exploration. Jefferson had read Captain James Cook's A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean , and Le Page du Pratz's The History of Louisiana, all of which greatly influenced his decision to send an expedition. Jefferson also wished to discover a practical route through the Northwest to the Pacific coast. At that time Alexander Mackenzie's Voyages from Montreal (1801) informed Jefferson (who read the book at Monticello in 1802) of Britain's intent to control the lucrative fur trade of the Columbia River, and convinced him of the importance of securing the territory as soon as possible. He realized the importance of the exploration of this new land just purchased and anxious to find a new passage to the Pacific. With this he can be sure the America can claim the new territory with confidence and the country will span two oceans eventually.
The Lewis and Clark Expedition may not be the first American expedition to cross what is now the western portion of the United States. Robert Gray did two expeditions around 1792, found and named Columbia River. British navigator George Vancouver organized several explorations around the same area between 1792 and 1795. Gray did not publish any journal or details about his findings. Vancouver did use his findings and published the results. This is the reason why we hear the city Vancouver and the region of British Columbia in Canada these days. It is part of the credit of Vancouver to the British Empire. If it were not the expedition of Lewis and Clark, the current Washington and Oregon States might have become part of Canada. This shows how important the vision of Jefferson was at that time. His Louisiana Purchase and his finance to initiate the expedition changes the course of history. With the study of history and hindsight, Thomas Jefferson is almost equivalent to Prince Henry, the Navigator of America.
The Lewis and Clark departed in May 1804, from near St. Louis making their way westward through the continental divide to Columbia River and to the Pacific coast. The perilous journey lasted from May 1804 to September 1806. The primary objective was to explore and map the newly acquired territory, find a practical route across the Western half of the continent, and establish an American presence in this territory before Britain and other European powers tried to claim it. The campaign's secondary objectives were scientific and economic: to study the area's plants, animal life, and geography, and establish trade with local Native American tribes. The journal and record of Lewis and Clark are detail enough to be very valuable in later time.
From 1400 to 1800, for about 400 years, China went from Chen Ho's expedition to a country which almost has nothing to do with the navigation and exploration. Worse off, the court of Ming Dynasty burned and destroyed most valuable records of Chen Ho's expedition which lasted from 1403 to 1433. A whole thirty years of record disappeared from the thin air. To many Chinese, this is really heart broken, especially when they get the chance to read James Cook's A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean. Meanwhile the west tried every way they could to find new passages to the east. The result is that they discovered all the new lands and claimed them for their nations to eventually dominated the world affairs. The Age of the Great Discovery brought new order and established a new political formation of the modern world we live in today.
