Lynch‘s Holy Expedition to the Dead Sea

And the Surrounding Area

Jaxon B. Autry

December 2001

General Introduction

On November 26, 1847 Lieutenant William Francis Lynch set sail with a party of thirteen American men on an official expedition to the River Jordan, the Dead Sea and the surrounding areas, including Jerusalem. Like other explorers before him, Lynch’s expedition to the Holy Land was driven by the region’s religious significance even though he headed an expedition funded by the U.S. government. As a devout Christian, Lynch had particular interest in the area that was the foundation for so much of the Christian faith. It was no coincidence that the area that Lynch explored was the basis on which almost every story in the New Testament and Old Testament of the Christian Bible was based. In the Old Testament the region was referred to as the “land of milk and honey” or “Canaan” and was promised to Abraham’s decedents as an everlasting covenant between God and Abraham. In the Bible, the land of Canaan, was an early name for what is often called Israel or Palestine, an area that extended along the coast of the eastern Mediterranean with the River Jordan acting as its eastern most border. According to the New Testament of the Christian Bible, almost 2000 years after God’s promise to Abraham, a direct descendant of Abraham, Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem, a village about six miles south of Jerusalem. In the Christian religion, Jesus was believed to be the son of God and the savior of all Christians. His ministry and life took place in the area known as Palestine. According to the Bible, Jerusalem was the place that Jesus taught his first lesson, was crucified on the cross and appeared to His disciples after His resurrection. Therefore it makes sense that William Francis Lynch, a devout Christian in nineteenth century America would use the expedition as a way to prove his strong Christian convictions. Biography of William Francis Lynch William Francis Lynch was born April 1, 1801 in Norfolk Virginia. He describes his early childhood in, Naval Life, Observations Afloat and on Shore the Midshipman, as “ A motherless child, with a father who, though not devoid of affection, was engrossed by the care of his property.”[1] Perhaps due to his father’s love of material possessions Lynch was drawn to the Christian faith, which preaches against the love of material items. For example, Luke 12:15 of the Christian Bible states, "Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.” Spurred on by his Christian faith, Lynch left home and “embraced the roving stirring, homeless, comfortless, but attractive life of a sailor.”[2]

At the age of 16, in the year 1817, Lynch was appointed midshipman of the Congress, a Naval vessel under Commander Anderson. During his tour of duty with the Congress he was involved in an expedition to establish relations and explore the areas of Brazil, Manila, Java, Rio De Janeiro and China. Several key experiences impacted Lynch during his time on the Congress. It was during this expedition that he showed interest in recording scientific and biological data from each place that the ship visited. This basic knowledge served him well throughout his illustrious naval career and especially on his voyage to Jerusalem, where he took extensive biological data from the areas that he visited. It was also during this voyage on the Congress that Lynch expressed his deeply embedded Christian convictions. “The unbeliever may ascribe to chance this great disparity of condition; but the Christian, with the eye of faith, recognizes the hand, and in submissive piety, bows to the dispensations of Providence. He feels, he knows, for the records of a Savior’s life confirm it, that each state has its trials and its solace.” [3] He was also introduced to the catastrophic affects of diseases like cholera and small pox, which reinforce his religious convictions. He witnessed one of his shipmates battle the dreaded disease while docked outside of Rio De Janeiro. “Impelled by the fear of death, he called upon God to forgive and spare him, promising if his prayers were heard, to lead a different life.”[4] The violent and sometimes short life of a sailor had left their impressions, reaffirming Lynch’s Christian convictions.

In the spring of 1826, Lynch and the Congress, after achieving their objective, arrived in New York. During his time off, Lynch took a trip to Maryland and experienced a somewhat prophetic depiction of the Judgment Day via a dream. The dream involved Lynch sitting at the feet of Jesus. He witnessed the entire Judgment of human beings from the time of Adam and Eve throughout the history of the world. [5] It is quite possible that this vision along with experiences upon the Congress, played a large role in Lynch’s decision to evaluate the biblically significant area around Jerusalem, where many Christian’s believed the final judgment would take place.

After returning from Maryland, Lynch was quickly assigned to the schooner called the Shark. Focused primarily on the illegal slave trade, the Shark incarcerated several slave ships around the West African Coast. During his adventures on the Shark, Lynch learned several important observational techniques, such as sounding, or measuring the various depths of the ocean with a weighted string and gauging the temperature and currents of the sea. Lynch extensively used these various procedures during his Naval career and especially on his expedition to the Dead Sea. After two years on the Shark, Lynch returned to the United States. On May 17, 1829 the Shark returned to the United States, and William Francis Lynch was promoted to the status of Captain in the U.S. Navy.

Between 1829 and 1846 Lynch’s expedition would undergo a variety of complications. In 1836, because of an unspecified illness that involved extensive treatments Lynch was kept out of Naval action for two years. Four years later in 1840, reports show that the Secretary of the Navy James K. Paulding ordered Lynch out of Washington after Lynch had approached him with several proposed reforms for the Navy. Six years later, on December 30, 1846, Maryland State Archives show that William F. Lynch filed for divorce from his wife Virginia Lynch, the daughter of Commodore John Shaw.[6]

However, after ten years of disappointment and despair, Lynch’s luck changed. He once again sustained the health necessary to serve the U.S. Navy in the Gulf of Mexico during the Mexican American War in 1847. While there he joined a small number of naval men (1100) that were involved in the war. On May 8, 1847 after the town and castle of Vera Cruz surrendered, Lynch sent off an application to John Y. Mason, head of the Department of the Navy, for permission to organize an expedition to the Dead Sea.

On July 31, 1847, his application was approved, and he was ordered to commence the necessary preparations for the expedition for which he would become most well-known.[7] On October 2, 1847 Lynch received orders from Mason to take command of the U.S. Storeship “Supply”, which was formerly called the “Crusader”. November 1, 1847 Lynch received orders to Smyrna. On Nov 26, 1847, Lynch left New York Bay for Smyrna. On April 1, 1848, Lynch’s 47th birthday, the expedition disembarked from “De Acre” to the River Jordan, dragging overland three specially made boats, two of which were made of iron and the third made of wood. The boats were part of Lynch’s dream to navigate down the Biblically significant Jordan River and into the Dead Sea. His dream reached culmination on April 10th when the three boats, the Fanny Skinner, Fanny Mason, and the Uncle Sam started down the River Jordan. Finally on April 19, 1848, Lynch and his crew arrived at their destination, the Dead Sea, where they spent three weeks sketching, taking specimens, looking for biblical evidence and sounding the Dead Sea.

On May 18^th, Lynch arrived at the holy city of Jerusalem. He introduced the city by quoting from a diary kept by the youngest member of the party. While in Jerusalem, the expedition party visited several biblically significant areas (see “Itinerary”). On Monday, May 22, Lynch and the party left Jerusalem and on June the 10 arrived in Nazareth, the place of the young adulthood of Jesus. After revisiting the source of the Jordan, Lynch and his party arrived in Malta where they set sail on the Supply, for home. The party arrived in New York in early December of 1848.

Shortly after returning to New York, Lynch was promoted to Commander in the United States Navy. He shortly thereafter wrote several books. In 1849, Lynch’s Narrative of the US Expedition to the River Jordan and the Dead Sea was published. In 1851, he published, Naval Live, Observations Afloat and on Shore, which told of his adventures while in the Navy before 1848. In 1852, Lynch’s report entitled, The Official Report of the US Expedition to Explore the Dead Sea and River Jordan was published by the U.S. Navy.

On October 25, 1852, Lynch received orders from Secretary of the Navy, J.C. Dobbin to embark upon an expedition to the West African Coast, the primary objective being to discover and describe commerce in the region. However, once again Lynch had difficulty separating his religious convictions from the objective of the mission. “ Now, however, that the horrible slave trade is, or seems to be extirpated from these latitudes, the present population will, day by day, yield their prejudices and propensities to the influences of Christianity and civilization.”[8] Lynch went on to explain how the African people needed more than anything to find the saving graces of Christianity. He returned to America on October 17, 1853. His adventures on the trip are documented in his Report In Relation To the Coast of Africa, submitted to the U.S. Navy on October 17, 1853.

On April 21, 1861 with the initial signs of a Civil War, Lynch a devoted Southerner, resigned as Commander in the U.S. Navy and quickly joined the Confederate forces in Virginia. He commanded the Aquia Creek Batteries on the Potomac, May 30 and June 1, 1861, when Union gunboats attacked the Confederate naval forces.[9]

. Lynch next commanded nine small gunboats that opposed the Union expedition against Roanoke Island, on Feb. 6, 1862. Lynch and the Confederate forces retreated to Elizabeth City, where on the 10th Union forces smashed them.

However, Lynch escaped and assumed the role of commander in charge of the Confederate naval forces at Vicksburg from March to October 1862.

One of his fellow officers in this battle mentioned Lynch’s popularity and the successes of his book, Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Jordan. Captain. W. H. Parker described Lynch in his book, Recollections of a Naval Officer, as, “ a cultivated man and a most agreeable talker, who had made some reputation in the navy by his book upon the Dead Sea exploration.”[10] Parker goes on to describe Lynch, as a commander who showed more regard for his men than any that Parker had served under.

Next, from 1862-1864 Lynch commanded the North Carolina and the ironclad, Raleigh. Lynch’s career as a writer and explorer led to further opportunities in the winter of 1864. Because of his popularity as a writer, the Confederate Navy Department and Hon. A.H. Stephens, asked Lynch to write a report on the battles and combats from a Confederate stand point. [11]

Finally in 1864, Lynch commanded the forces at Ft. Fisher, in Wilmington, N.C. It was at that point the only Confederate port unaffected by the Union blockade. However, by 1865 the Union forces had captured the fort, cutting off the South entirely from the imports it needed to survive.

William Francis Lynch died six months after the Civil War ended, on October 17, 1865 at the age of 64. He was survived by the two children who he had with Virginia Shaw.

Brief History of the Text

In 1849, Lea and Blanchard published Lynch’s popular version of his expedition to the Holy Land entitled, Narrative of the United States Expedition to the River Jordan and the Dead Sea. Lynch explained his objectives for the Narrative in his preface stating “I had an abiding faith in the ultimate issue, which cheered me on; for I felt that a liberal and enlightened community would not long condemn an attempt to explore a distant river, and its wondrous reservoir, the first, teeming with sacred associations, and the last, enveloped in a mystery, which had defied all previous attempts to penetrate it.” In the introduction, Lynch confessed that the proposed narrative by another member of the party, later done by Montague, sped up his rendition of the book. “ Feeling that what may be said on the subject had better be rendered imperfectly by myself than by another, I have been necessarily hurried.”[12]

The book was apparently popular in the United States, being printed and reprinted by Lea and Blanchard of Philadelphia in 1850, 1852, 1853, 1854 and 1858. Lynch’s diary also had appeal overseas where it was published in London England in 1849, 1850 and 1852. It was also translated into German in 1850 by Dykshe Buschkhardly and republished in Germany in 1854. The text was also translated into Hebrew in 1984 and published in the Tallavid.

Most recently in 1991, Book Lab Incorporated of Austin Texas reproduced the Narrative, nearly 150 years after the Lynch’s original Narrative was published.

In 1860, Lynch used the information from his diary to publish Commerce and the Holy Land, which speculated that a trade route could be opened up by way of canal from the Mediterranean to the River Jordan

Lynch’s narrative of the expedition provides the reader with extensive information, focusing primarily on the important Christian background of the areas that the party visited. Interestingly, Lynch included over 500 pages of information in his narrative in contrast with his original report to the Navy that included only 88 pages of documentation. Included in the narrative are 25 sketches of various places that the expedition visited and two composite maps of the River Jordan and one of the Dead Sea.

Finally, the narrative also included an in-depth analysis of the Dead Sea water content and depth. The narrative also provided a vast array of biological data and experiments performed primarily by James C. Booth and Alexander Muckle.

In addition to Lynch’s Narrative, The Naval Observatory published William F. Lynch’s, Official Report of the United States Expedition to Explore the Dead Sea and the River Jordan in 1852, printed by Murphy and Babtwire. Although Lynch’s expedition to Jerusalem was not the first account of the Holy land by an American, it provided the most extensive scientific data collected to that point in American history.

Itinerary for William Lynch’s voyage to Jerusalem, the River Jordan and the Dead Sea.

Lynch’s trip to the Holy Land commenced on November 1, 1847, when Lynch received orders from the Navy to travel to Smyrna. Lynch picked out “13 young, muscular, native-born Americans, of sober habits, from each of whom I exacted a pledge to abstain from all intoxicating drinks.”[13] This was not surprising since members of the Christian faith avidly promoted sobriety of their members. In Ephesians 5:18 of the Christian Bible, Paul tells the people at Ephesus “And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit.”

On Friday, November 26, 1847, Lynch left New York en route for Port Mahon. It became evident early on that Lynch was influenced a great deal by his religious convictions. He evaluated the role of Friday the day that the expedition began, “I took this as an auspicious omen, although we sailed on Friday, the dreaded day of seamen. Why superstition should select this day as an unlucky one, I cannot conceive. On the sixth day, Friday, God created man and blessed him; and on Friday, the Redeemer died for man’s salvation.”[14] Lynch was already tying religious significance to the expedition.

On January 28, the expedition reached Port Mahoron. On February 4, 1848, the party left for Smyrna where they arrived 13 days later on Thursday, February 17, 1848. From Smyrna on February 18, 1848, Lynch alone embarked upon the Austrian steamer, “Prince Metternich” for Constantinople. Feb 26th, Lynch met with the sultan of Constantinople and later received permission by way of a firman, or an administrative order, from the Minister at the Ottoman Porte authorizing the expedition to pass through the Turkish dominions in Syria to the Dead Sea. After receiving his requested firman Lynch boarded the French steamer, “Hellespont” to rejoin the rest of his party in Smyrna.

On Friday, March 10, 1848 the expedition left Smyrna for the coast of Syria and effectively arrived in Syria two days later on March 12. The party then headed for Beirut where they arrive March 25, 1848. Upon arriving in Beirut, Lynch met with the Pasha, or governor of the area. One major difficulty arose when the Pasha announced his uncertainty about his jurisdiction over the Eastern side of the Jordan. However, Lynch knowing that the Eastern side of the Jordan was also the eastern border of the Holy land became adamant that the expedition receive jurisdiction to explore the area. After great debate, the matter was finally resolved and Lynch received his firman to the Jordan including the Eastern side.

On April 4, 1848 Lynch and the expedition including sixteen horses, eleven camels, four of which were required for pulling the metal boats, and one mule left De Acre for the Sea of Galilee. On April 10, the “Fanny Mason” and the “Fanny Skinner,” the two small boats that had been dragged overland, pushed off from the Sea of Galilee and entered the Jordan River along with the “Uncle Sam” a wooden boat that had been purchased along the way. The river contingent was accompanied by land troops following as close to the river as possible.

During the voyage down the Jordan, Lynch made several observations that revealed his religious motivation. He first searched for evidence of the “Mahaniam” the place where the Biblical character Jacob met the angels of God after he took his brother Esau’s birthright. [15] He also speculated about the exact location where Jacob, and the later Israelites crossed the Jordan.[16] He even described the mountainous landscape while floating down the river in religious terms! “the laminations of their strata resembling the leaves of some gigantic volume, wherein is written by the hand of God, the history of the changes he has wrought.”[17] Finally Lynch and the expedition embarked upon “El Meshra” thought to be the place where the Israelites passed over the Jordan River with the Ark of the Covenant, and where Jesus was baptized by his cousin John the Baptist. While there Lynch took time to bathe in the sacred water hole and then thanked the Lord Almighty for his safe passage.[18] It becomes evident from scenes like this that Lynch had more on his mind than just measuring and collecting information on the Dead Sea. He was on a mission to discover and evaluate the Holy Land and it’s religiously significant areas.

On April 18, Lynch and the party embarked upon the Dead Sea. The night of the 18^th Lynch and the party spent the night on the Dead Sea. On that first night Lynch could barely contain his religious fervor and evaluated the biblical significance of the area, including the caves where Lot and his daughters stayed. On the 21, Lynch evaluated the Pistachia Terebinthus; the terebinth of the bible. It is under the terebinth-tree that Abraham pitched his tent at Mamre.[19] On April 23, Lynch and the expedition celebrated Easter Sunday, in God’s holy land, putting off all work until the following day.

On Tuesday April 25, the party began an extensive expedition around the Southern Sea and searched for evidence of the famous, “Pillar of Salt” and the Sodom and Gomorrah of the Bible. On the night of the 25^th, Lynch mentioned the religious initiative behind much of the expedition: “Notwithstanding the oppressive heat, there was a pleasure in our strange sensations, lying in the open air, upon the pebbly beach of this desolate and unknown sea, perhaps near the sites of Sodom and Gomorrah.”[20] The next day Lynch and the party found and sketched an enormous pillar of salt on the Southeastern shore of the Dead Sea near Usdum (Sketch pg. 308)

Finally, on March 6th , Lynch and the crew disassembled the two metallic boats and sent them to Jerusalem. After twenty-two days the expedition left the Dead Sea on Monday, May 15 and headed for Jerusalem. On, May 17, the expedition reached the holy city of Jerusalem. Interestingly, Lynch used the account of the youngest member of the party to describe what he saw when he entered the Holy City. He described the various holy places that the men visited, including most notably the Mount of Olives (Jesus ascended to Heaven after his resurrection), Garden of Gethsemane (Jesus Prayed before he was crucified) (sketch, pg. 417), and the Via Dolorosa (The Savior fell from the burden of the cross).

Monday May 22, after 5 days in Jerusalem, Lynch and the party left for Jaffa, arriving on the 4^th of June. Two days later on June 6, they left Jaffa for Nazareth, the city of Jesus’ childhood and young adulthood. Lynch once again described the elation that he felt from visiting such a sacred site. “The feelings are inexpressible which overpower one in passing to and fro amid scenes which, for the greater portion of his mortal existence, were frequented by our Savior.”[21]

On Monday, June 12, Lynch and the expedition party left Nazareth and went to the source of the Jordan. The party stayed in this area until the 19 of June, when Lynch determined to remain no longer and ordered the party to depart for Beirut.

At 11 a.m. on June the 30th, the party could see Beirut, but almost every man was too sick to get out of his saddle. Fortunately they met Dr. De Forest an evangelical missionary who prescribed some medication for the party. Finally, the crew reached Beirut but many of the men were still too weak to dismount. Several of the men including Lynch received immediate medical attention.

On July 30 the party left Beirut after physicians told them that the sick had a better chance of recovering at Malta.

Therefore, the crew left on a French Brig and arrived in Malta 38 days later. Finally, on September 12, the Supply arrived and the party left for the United States where they arrived in early December, 1848.

Introduction to the diary and the historical context.

In early December 1848, William Francis Lynch’s expedition to the River Jordan, the Dead Sea and the surrounding areas returned to the United States. Secretary of the Navy, John Y. Mason, had approved the expedition more than a year earlier on July 31, 1847. Lynch’s request came at an opportune time in American history when westward expansion, manifest destiny, and exploration for the sake of commerce and science were popular. During the 1840s, the United States Navy had approved several earlier exploratory missions to the North Pacific and the South Atlantic.

Supporting Lynch’s original request was his close friend Matthew Maury, the director of the Naval Observatory and author of A New Theoretical and Practical Treatise on Navigation (1836).

With Maury’s support, Secretary Mason approved Lynch’s proposal with the stipulation that Lynch would effectively proceed to the Dead Sea, to explore and survey the Dead Sea and the surrounding area.

More than a year later the party returned; the mission and Lynch had been successful. The group had accumulated vast amounts of scientific information on the trek that were of value to the United States Navy. Lynch and his party had returned to the United States with a variety of mineral and biological samples from the Dead Sea, the River Jordan and the surrounding area. Along with his samples were various sketches of the surrounding areas and maps of the River Jordan and the Dead Sea. Perhaps most important, Lynch had developed the first accurate calculations of the various depths of the Dead Sea concluding that the body of water was 1312 feet deep and proving that the level of the Dead Sea was below that of the Mediterranean sea.

However, to all of the accumulated scientific information, Lynch ascribed Christian significance. The biological samples correlated with plants and animals in various Bible stories. Many of the sketches were in fact illustrations of various religiously significant areas of the Holy Land. And the depth and calculations of the Dead Sea somehow served as evidence to Lynch that the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah had taken place in the area that he surveyed.

Lynch returned home to a society that had widely accepted the belief that the United States was the New Israel or God’s new “chosen people”. This antebellum culture, hungry for information pertaining to the original Holy Land assured the popularity of Lynch’s narrative.

Exegesis of a section of the diary

An interesting topic that derived from Lynch’s extensive research on the Dead Sea area was his infatuation with the legendary “pillar of salt.” Of course to truly understand the significance of this “pillar of salt,” it is crucial to understand the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorra. The story is told in the middle chapters of the first book of the Bible, Genesis. In chapter 13, the Bible introduced two Israelite men, Lot and his uncle Abram, who had decided to separate their agricultural conglomeration, which had grown too vast for one area. Abram announced to Lot that he could have first pick of the promised land to the East or to the West. The Old Testament says that Lot raised up his eyes to the east and the beautiful valley of the Jordan and decided to take his stock there. However after Lot moved to the area, the people of the two biggest cities in the Jordan Valley, Sodom and Gomorrah became exceedingly wicked and evil. In fact, in chapter 18 the Lord speaks with Abraham (Abram) and tells him that he is going to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. After a discussion between the two, the Lord God Almighty promised Abraham that he would not destroy the cities if he could find a mere ten righteous people between the two urban areas. However, ten righteous people were not found and the Angels of the Lord ascended upon the two cities. The night before the two cities were destroyed, the Angels stayed with Lot in the city of Sodom and warned him of the devastating plans of the Lord. They told him to grab his wife and family and leave the area, but Lot hesitated. Finally, the angels grabbed Lot, his wife and his two daughters and took them outside of the city and told them to run, warning them not to look back. “Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But Lot’s wife from behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”(Chapter 19,vs.27) The pillar of salt that Lynch described in his Narrative was found while the party was sounding the South Eastern side of the Dead Sea on Wednesday, April 26. “Soon after, to our astonishment, we saw on the eastern side of Usdom, one third the distance from its north extreme, a lofty, round pillar, standing apparently detached from the general mass, at the head of a deep, narrow, and abrupt chasm.”[22]

Lynch’s apparent astonishment at finding the biblically significant Pillar of Salt is somewhat questionable. In E.P. Montague’s, Narrative of the Late Expedition to the Dead sea, from a Diary by One of the Party, it is clear that Lynch had carefully planned to find the pillar. Montague described Lynch and the crew doggedly searching for the famous ‘Pillar of Salt’, days before they actually found it. “This morning we are examining the hills of Usdom, and seeking with a good deal of curiosity the ever-famous ‘Pillar of Salt’, which marks the judgment of God upon Lot’s wife.[23] This passage by a member of one of the party suggested that Lynch had made it the party’s objective to find the Pillar of Salt described in the Bible. But it would be foolish to look only at the depiction by one of the crew.

The only way to substantiate the member’s claim is to examine the Lynch’s Narrative. In fact, Lynch’s own notes effectively corroborate the story and show that Lynch was looking for evidence of the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorra before they actually found the monument. Moments before the party identified the interesting pillar Lynch wrote, “Seetzen saw this salt mountain in 1806, and says that he never before beheld one so torn and riven; but neither Costigan nor Molyneaux, who were in boats, came farther south on the sea than the peninsula. With regard to this part therefore, which most probably covers the guilty cities.” (Lynch’s Narrative, pg.307) The guilty cities that Lynch is referring to are Sodom and Gomorra

Lynch was extremely familiar with other explorers who had investigated the area and had noted a unique salt pillar and the fallen cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Notably Lynch mentions some of these other explorers like Josephus’ Antiquity who states, “But Lot’s wife continually turning back to view the city as she went from it, and being too nicely inquisitive what would become of it although God had forbidden her so to do, was changed into a pillar of salt, for I have seen it, and it remains at this day.”[24] He goes on to state that, “Clement of Rome, a contemporary of Josephus, also mentions this pillar, and likewise Irenaeus, a writer of the second century, who, yet more superstitious than the other two, adds the hypothesis, how it came to last so long with all its members entire “that as fast as any part of any part of this pillar was washed away, it was supernaturally renewed.” [25] Lynch’s complete understanding of those that had assessed the Dead Sea and acknowledged existence of the Pillar of Salt lead me to believe that he was primarily in search of such evidence. But was it possible that Lynch’s entire expedition was to prove the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah?

In 1898, Andrew Dickson White, Late President of History at Cornell University proposed just that, in his book, A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom. He felt that Lynch’s expedition, including the biological specimens accumulated and the measurement of the Dead Sea (1312 ft.) were a direct effort by Lynch to prove the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. “Lynch was no scholar in any sense; he never gave any real thought on the real questions underlying the whole investigation; as to the difference in depth of the two parts of the lake, he jumped-with a sailor’s disregard of logic-to the conclusion that it somehow proved the mythical account of the overwhelming of the cities…”[26] From White’s point of view and from Lynch’s own Narrative, it becomes clear that the Expedition had come to the Dead Sea to find more than just evidence of the depth and size of the great salt sea. White felt that Lynch had undertaken the mission to find Biblical evidence that he could bring home to his fellow Christians. The sketch provided by Lynch, is interesting to say the least. In 1898, White described the sketch and the affect that it had on ninettenth century America. “ One little circumstance added enormously to the influence of Lynch’s book, for as a frontispiece, he inserted a picture of the salt column. It was delineated in rather a poetic manner: light streamed upon it, heavy clouds hung above it, and, as a background, were ranged buttresses of salt rock furrowed and channeled out by the winter rains: this salt statue picture was spread far and wide, and in thousands of country pulpits and Sunday-schools it was shown as a tribute of science to Scripture.” Lynch had returned to the United States with evidence of the famous Pillar of Salt. Many would use the sketch as direct proof of the biblical story and of the Bible itself. For example Dr. Lorenz Gratz, in his book entitled, Theatre of the Holy Scriptures, published ten years after Lynch’s return, hails Lynch’s discovery and accepts the sketch as evidence of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah.

Conclusion

When William Francis Lynch set out to explore the Dead Sea it is evident that he was influenced by the religious significance of the area. While he came home with a significant amount of biological and scientific data on the Dead Sea, he also gathered a vast amount of information pertaining to the Christian religion. By looking at the amount of time Lynch spent on observing and evaluating scientific data on the Dead Sea and the Surrounding area and the time spent on gathering religiously significant materials one can easily assess that Lynch had religious motives.

[1] William F. Lynch. Naval Life, Observations Afloat and on Shore the Midshipman, (New York: Charles Scribner,1851), 1.

[6] Dictionary of American Biography, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1933) vol. XI, pg. 525.

[7] William F. Lynch. Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Jordan, (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1849) xiii.

[8] W. Francis Lynch, Report In Relation To His Mission To The Coast Of Africa, (Navy, 1853), 14.

[9] J. Thomas Scharf, History of the Confederate States Navy,(New York: Gramercy Books, 1996), 95.

[10] W. H. Parker, Recollections of a Naval Officer, 1841-1865, (New York, 1883), 228.

[12] W. Francis Lynch, Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Jordan (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1849), VI

[22] William F. Lynch. Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Jordan, (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1849) 307.

[23] E. P. Montague, Narrative of the Late Expedition to the Dead Sea. From the Diary of One of the Men. 201

[25] William F. Lynch. Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Jordan, (Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, 1849)

308.

[26] A. D. White, A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom,(New York, D. Appleton and Company,1898), 9.