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The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey Review

In 1912, the Republican President Howard Taft, who had succeeded Theodore Roosevelt's presidency, ran for a second term against the Democrat Woodrow Wilson. Roosevelt, hoping for a return to office after a four year respite, and up to then a Republican, ran under his own ticket, the Progressive, or Bull Moose, Party. When the tally was in, Roosevelt had received more votes than Taft, but Wilson won the election. Just as in 1884, when Roosevelt had gone to the Dakota Badlands after the death of his mother and wife (they both died on the same day), and just as in 1909, when he had gone to Africa after conclusion of his seven years as President, now after his defeat at the polls in 1913, Roosevelt went to South America. This book is about that trip.

The trip was poorly planned and prepared for and the men that went with Roosevelt were not all up to the rigor the expedition would come to demand of them. In fact, the trip became something else entirely from what it had been planned to be, and most of the original company of men who traveled with Roosevelt to South America didn't accompany him on the impromptu, alternate expedition. The River of Doubt (so named because its character and length were unknown) held no place in the initial itinerary and in the end it became the expedition's sole purpose. This river, a thousand-mile long tributary of the Amazon river was uncharted, unexplored, and turbid with danger deep within the South American frontier of the Amazon jungle. Even getting to the river cost the men over a month of agony and hardship. The South American trip appears to have been a mismanaged bungle from the start, and the unanticipated redirection of the expedition to the scientific charting of a untried river through dangerous unexplored jungle was foolhardy. Theodore Roosevelt, however, was up for it.

"Tell Osborn", Roosevelt wrote in a letter to Frank Chapman before the intentions of the original expedition had changed, "I have already lived and enjoyed as much of life as any nine other men I know; and I have had my full share, and if it is necessary for me to leave my bones in South America, I am quite ready to do so." (62)

The expedition was lead by the Brazilian explorer Colonel Cândido Mariano da Silva Rondon who had discovered and named the river without exploring it five years earlier, and he was intent now on a complete survey of the river, no matter how slow the pace of exploration. Roosevelt's twenty-four-year-old son Kermit, who was building bridges with the Anglo Brazilian Iron Company in Brazil, accompanied his father, and out of the original company that had left North America, only one other, naturalist George Cherrie, traveled with the Roosevelts down the River of Doubt. All other members of the twenty-two man expedition were either part of Rondon's contingent or "camaradas", the working crew, rough men who paddled the dugout canoes, portaged them for days when necessary (their weight was "up to twenty-five-hundred pounds apiece"; p. 135), and with machetes hacked into the dense jungle a sufficient clearing for each night's camp.

This was not a relaxing, sunny excursion down a lazy river. The men were low on provisions, they lost canoes and with them more provisions, a camarada was drowned (Kermit nearly drowned in the same accident), they were fearful of attack by a hostile indigenous tribe (the Cinta Larga: Rondon's dog was killed by them), there were poisonous snakes (Roosevelt only avoided being poisoned because the leather of his boot deflected a coral snake's fangs), there were swarming pestilential insects, rapids and waterfalls demanded frequent portaging of the heavy dugout canoes, and it rained and rained and it rained.

It got worse. Roosevelt injured his leg while helping recover a nearly lost canoe and then, weakened by infection, was hit and debilitated by malaria. "No man has any business to go on such a trip as ours unless he will refuse to jeopardize the welfare of his associates by any delay caused by weakness or ailment of his," he wrote [writes Candice Millard]. "It is his duty to go forward, if necessary on all fours, until he drops." (265)

"So determined was Roosevelt not to endanger the life of anyone else in his expedition that he had made a secret provision for a quick death in the Amazon, should it become necessary. Before he even left New York, he had packed in his personal baggage, tucked in among his extra socks and eight pairs of eyeglasses, a small vial that contained a lethal dose of morphine." (266)

They had reached an apparent impasse in the river and it seemed they would have to abandon the canoes in order to survive and go on. Roosevelt, sick with malaria and hobbled by his infected leg, made a decision. He called George Cherrie and Kermit to his tent. "Boys," he said. "I realize that some of us are not going to finish this journey. Cherrie, I want you and Kermit to go on. You can get out. I will stop here." (267) Kermit, resolved to save his father's life, devised a way to transport the canoes over the impasse.

Theodore Roosevelt's account of this journey is in his 1914 book "Through the Brazilian Wilderness". Kermit Roosevelt's book, from 1921, is "The Long Trail". Theodore Roosevelt died in 1919. His son Kermit, never having achieved the greatness of his early promise, committed suicide in 1943.

The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey Feature

ISBN13: 9780767913737
Condition: New
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The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey Overview

At once an incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, The River of Doubt is the true story of Theodore Roosevelt’s harrowing exploration of one of the most dangerous rivers on earth.

The River of Doubt—it is a black, uncharted tributary of the Amazon that snakes through one of the most treacherous jungles in the world. Indians armed with poison-tipped arrows haunt its shadows; piranhas glide through its waters; boulder-strewn rapids turn the river into a roiling cauldron.

After his humiliating election defeat in 1912, Roosevelt set his sights on the most punishing physical challenge he could find, the first descent of an unmapped, rapids-choked tributary of the Amazon. Together with his son Kermit and Brazil’s most famous explorer, Cândido Mariano da Silva Rondon, Roosevelt accomplished a feat so great that many at the time refused to believe it. In the process, he changed the map of the western hemisphere forever.

Along the way, Roosevelt and his men faced an unbelievable series of hardships, losing their canoes and supplies to punishing whitewater rapids, and enduring starvation, Indian attack, disease, drowning, and a murder within their own ranks. Three men died, and Roosevelt was brought to the brink of suicide. The River of Doubt brings alive these extraordinary events in a powerful nonfiction narrative thriller that happens to feature one of the most famous Americans who ever lived.

From the soaring beauty of the Amazon rain forest to the darkest night of Theodore Roosevelt’s life, here is Candice Millard’s dazzling debut.

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Customer Reviews

Fascsinating study of Roosevelt.. and of the Amazon - Michael Sandman - Brookline, MA United States
Theodore Roosevelt was a larger than life character. He overcame childhood illness, led a regiment in the Spanish-American War, became America's youngest president and brought a strongly progressive point of view to the White House. And on top of that he was a genuine early 20th century explorer.

River of Doubt chronicles Roosevelt's expedition down the river now named after him in Brazil, but it does far more than that. The author puts Roosevelt's rather impulsive decision to make the trip into the context of his earlier loss in the presidential election of 1912, when he tried to launch the Progressive Party. Roosevelt was an early "environmentalist" and is the president who gave up the modern national park system, and he had close ties to the National Geographic Society and the American Museum of Natural History. The book explains the friendships and other linkages between Roosevelt and the sponsors of the trip and it puts trips of exploration into the context of early 20th century American society.

The main line of the story follows Roosevelt and his party, which included his son Kermit, down the unexplored river as they struggle with the rapids, the climate and their thoroughly inadequate equipment. It's a magnificent character study of both Roosevelts and of the Brazilian colonel and supporter of Indian rights who shared command of the expedition. Along the way the book provides excellent vignettes of the others who started out with Roosevelt and it gives us a window into their thinking about race and the rights of the Amazon tribes.

Besides giving us a good story and a superb slice of biography, the author takes the time to describe the hazards, the botany and the beauty of the Amazon She does this by stepping away from the story of the expedition from time to time to explain such topics as the workings of the forest floor, the history of Brazil, the geology of the region and the culture of the Amazon Indians. These tangents are not distracting. They're woven into the story line so well that they break up what would otherwise might be a rather monotonous retelling of the difficulties the expedition had.

I do have one criticism of the writing. The author's favorite adjective is "dangerous" and she uses it about twice as much as necessary in her effort to be sure we understand the hazards Roosevelt and his companions faced. By the middle of the book, the repetitive bits about how dangerous it all was started to feel like overkill. But apart from that, this is a highly informative, well written and eminently readable book that goes far beyond simply telling the story of an exploration down a jungle river.

DOubted they would make it! - Robert R. Kujala -
Theodore Roosevelt lost the election of 1912 and decided to ease his pain as he always had: physical challenge. Roosevelt initially would go down a previously charted river but at the last minute change his plans and decided to chart a river that had never been navigated. Much of the journey was hampered by insects, rain, lack of food, and the Jungle itself. I am sure that none of the adventures knew the price the jungle would exact from the men as they began their journey. The River of Doubt chronicles the journey, teaches the reader about the jungle, and paints stories of the key players. I have read the Lost City of Z as well and in 2010 I have a hard time understanding why these men would want to map a river. The jungle is a place of ruthless and efficient death. Forget, native attacks. Mosquitoes, eye lickers, piranhas, parasites that swim up your urine stream, poisonous snakes, and much more await the poor fellow who thinks the jungle would be a fun place to visit. Roosevelt his son and many and the rest of the expedition had the wrong equipment and were perpetually low on food. Roosevelt and the expedition make the journey but it is safe to say that it killed him in the end. Roosevelt never fully recovered form the infections that he suffered while on the expedition and died shortly after returning to America. Tragically, his son Kermit did not fulfill his promise and eventually met with a tragic fate. Overall, it covers much of the same jungle hardship motif that the Lost City of Z did but I enjoyed it all the same!

I've never been a fan of non-fiction... - C. Yelland - Oakland, CA
...and I'm in love with this book. I'm not even finished with it, and can say with confidence that it's easily one of the most interesting, engaging novels that I've read in years. What an amazing story.

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Sep 09, 2010 23:45:06

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Thursday, September 9, 2010