When a man left St. Louis in 1802, he was on his own. He left civilization to enter the world of the redskin. Tom Hendon's father had left the village of St. Louis in search of fur, and hadn't been heard from for two years. Everybody but Tom believed that James Hendon had died long ago—killed, probably, by Indians.

But Tom would not give up hope. So when he heard that an exploring expedition was about to set out through the area where his father had last been seen, Tom ran away to join the expedition.

This was the famous Lewis and Clark Corps of Western Discovery, commissioned to investigate the new territory President Thomas Jefferson had acquired for the United States. Captain William Clark and his co-chief, Captain Meriwether Lewis, allowed Tom to join the expedition as a recorder of the events of the journey.

Tom proved to be more than a recorder of history. Besides fighting grizzly bears and hostile Indians, he and the others made history as they explored the upper reaches of the Missouri River and searched for water routes to Canada and the Pacific.

In presenting an accurate account of the Lewis and Clark expedition, James Munves has written a tremendously exciting story of the adventures of that brave band of men.

From the dust jacket