Object Status:
Extant
Accession Date:
November 5, 1806
Primary Source Reference:
Peale Museum Accessions Book, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, p. 18
Additional Source Text:
"Pr[esented] by Gen. Wilkinson, & brought by [Sam?] Daurr."
Notes:
Carioles were single-person sledges pulled by dogs. Zebulon Montgomery Pike (1779-1813) led two expeditions for Thomas Jefferson through the new Louisiana Territory. In 1805-1806 he explored the Upper Mississippi River and received this cariole as a gift from James McGill, a co-founder of the North West Company, as he prepared to return to St. Louis. In 1806-1807 he was captured by Spanish authorities while exploring the southwestern border. Peale painted Pike's portrait for the Museum in 1808.
The sled pictured here was in the Peale Museum. It is one of the many cultural items that the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography, Harvard University, acquired in 1899 from Moses Kimball's Boston Museum. Kimball and P. T. Barnum jointly purchased many of the Peale collections when they were sold about 1849.
Gen. James Wilkinson (1757-1825), who ordered Pike to undertake the expedition, was the first governor of the Louisiana Territory at the time of this donation. Peale painted Wilkinson's portrait for the Museum in 1797.
