Documentary History of the Cession of Louisiana to the United States Till it Became an American Province

the Gadsden purchase of 1853, for a consideration of

$6,000,000.

ALASKA PURCHASED FROM RUSSIA.

By the treaty of March 30, 1867, negotiated by William H. Seward, Russia, for a consideration of $7,200,000, ceded Alaska to the United States, including the Pribyloff Islands, with their valuable seal fisheries.

HAWAII TRANSFER.

At Honolulu, August 12, 1898, the formal transfer of the Hawaiian Islands was made to the United States by Sanford B. Dole, President of the Provisional Government of Hawaii. Mr. Sewell, United States Minister, accepted the cession of the islands in behalf of the United States with solemn formality. There are eight principal islands in the group; area, 6,740 square miles; 109,020 population of mixed The group is in midocean, between the western coast of the United States and the eastern coast of Asia, 2,089 nautical miles from San Francisco.

races.

SPANISH CESSIONS TO THE UNITED STATES.

At the treaty of peace that closed the Spanish War of 1898, held at Paris, Spain on her part ceded to the United States the Island of Porto Rico in the West Indies, the Island of Guam of the Ladrone group in the Pacific Ocean, and the archipelago known as the Philippine Islands. The treaty was signed by the Commissioners of their respective countries December 10, 1898, and ratified at Washington, January 4, 1899, the United States on her part agreeing to pay to Spain $20,000,000 within three months after the ratification of the treaty.

MERIWETHER LEWIS

Captain Meriwether Lewis was murdered and robbed while on his way to Washington, D. C., by Joshua Grinder, October 11, 1809, in what is now the county of Lewis, Tenn.

It was rumored at this time that he committed suicide, but doubtless this originated in the east, where he was known to be of a hypochondriac disposition, but which affliction had entirely disappeared with his active, out-of-door life in the

west. It was a theory, groundless and cruel, that even the perpetrators of the crime did not stay to urge in their own defense. In erecting the only monument* in this broad land that stands to the memory of the great explorer, the state of Tennessee recognized the value of local evidence over groundless theory.

*Since the above was written news has come to the writer that the people of Portland, Ore., are about to erect a memorial monument to Lewis and Clarke, Theodore Roosevelt, president of the United States, assisting in laying the corner stone. (67)

The monument was built at the cost of $500, appropriated by the general assembly of Tennessee in 1848. Its base is of uncut sandstone, surmounted by a plinth of Tennessee marble, on which were cut the inscriptions. Above this rises the marble shaft, about twelve feet in height, roughly broken at the top, emblematic of the violent and untimely end of a glorious career. Five years before erecting the monument the general assembly passed an act creating the county of Lewis. The introductory clause of the act read as follows: "In honor of Captain Meriwether Lewis, who has rendered distinguished services to his country, and whose remains lie buried and neglected within its limits." The new county was carved out of four others cornering near the grave, in nearly a circle with it as a pivotal point.

Of him Thomas Jefferson said: "His courage was undaunted; his firmness and perseverance yielded to nothing but impossibilities. A rigid disciplinarian, yet tender as a father to those committed to his charge. Honest, disinterested, liberal, with a sound understanding and a scrupulous fidelity to truth.”—VERNE S. PEASE, in The Southern Magazine, February, 1894.