On this date in 1805: Sacagawea gives birth to Pompey.

Sacagawea, the shoshone guide who helped Meriwether Lewis and Richard Clark navigate the vast Louisiana Territory, gave birth to a son, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, on this day in 1805. The two explorers would call the infant by the name of Pompey.

Lewis and Clark first met Sacagawea while spending the winter with the Mandan Indians along the Upper Missouri River, near present-day Bismark, North Dakota.  Sacagawea's husband was French-Canadian fur trader Toussaint Charbonneau.  Sacagawea was only ten years old when the Hidatsa tribe kidnapped her.  Charbonneau bought the girl and made her his wife.  After meeting Sacagawea, Lewis and Clark wanted the young girl to come along on their journey and help with any Native Americans they might meet.  "A woman with a party of men is a token of peace," Clark wrote.

Sacagawea and her son made the difficult journey to the Pacific Ocean and back.