Humans and bears - Wild encounters

[brotherbear]

California's Day of the Grizzly by William B. Secrest.

Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, The Journals of Lewis and Clark, Elliot Coues ( ed. ), 1893:

Captain Lewis, who was on shore with one hunter, met about eight o'clock two white bears. Of the strength and ferocity of this animal the Indians had given us dreadful accounts. They never attack him but in parties of six or eight persons, and even then are often defeated with loss of one or more of their party. Having no weapons but bows and arrows, and the bad guns with which the traders supply them, they are obliged to approach very near the bear; as no wound except through the head or heart is mortal, they frequently fall a sacrifice if they miss their aim... On approaching these two, Captain Lewis and the hunter fired, and each wounded a bear. One of them made his escape; the other turned upon Captain Lewis and pursued him 70 or 80 yards, but being badly wounded the bear could not run so fast to prevent him from reloading his piece, which he again aimed at him, and a third shot from the hunter brought him to the ground. Reply