Where and When Did Meriwether Lewis
begin Preparations for the Journey?

Before his inauguration on March 4, 1801, Jefferson asked Meriwether Lewis, a 29 year old career officer in the U.S. Army, to join him in the White House as his personal secretary. [See Donald Jackson, Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, with Related Documents, 1783-1854 Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1962, pp. 1-3]. Jefferson knew Lewis and Lewis' family, as they were neighbors to his Monticello, Virginia estate. Lewis was serving on the frontier at the time of his appointment as a lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Infantry at Pittsburgh. Since Jefferson wrote out all of his own correspondence, his new personal secretary was utilized in other ways. Lewis, a staunch Jeffersonian Democrat, tested the loyalty of top Army officers to the President and reported back to Jefferson. Lewis was sent with sensitive messages to the ministers of foreign powers, and generally assisted the President. But most of all Lewis listened. Lewis absorbed Jefferson's ideas on geography, science, politics, American Indians, and diplomacy. It seems that Lewis was being groomed to lead Jefferson's expedition into the West.

On January 18, 1803, President Jefferson sent a special message to Congress about the proposed expedition. He noted with concern the fact that the British were carrying on a lucrative fur trade with Indians all long the northern border of the United States and into the West. He approached Congress with the idea that "an intelligent officer with ten or twelve chosen men, fit for the enterprize and willing to undertake it, taken from our posts, where they may be spared without inconvenience, might explore the whole line, even to the Western ocean . . ." [Jackson, Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, pp. 10-13]. In this message, Jefferson portrayed the major goal of the projected expedition as a diplomatic one, in which the explorers "could have conferences with the natives" about commerce, and gain admission for American traders among the various Indian tribes. The other major goal of the expedition, barely stated by Jefferson on January 18, was a scientific one - to not only explore but map and chronicle everything of interest, as he put it, along "the only line of easy communication across the continent." Jefferson took great care to describe the project as a cheap one which would not cost the taxpayers much money. "Their arms & accoutrements, some instruments of observation, & light & cheap presents for the Indians would be all the apparatus they could carry, and with an expectation of a soldier's portion of land on their return would constitute the whole expense." Jefferson knew that diplomacy, especially with the goal of increased commerce, could be sold to Congress; scientific discovery and description could not. One seemed practical, the other less so. Thus Jefferson asked for $2,500 to fund the expedition (based on Lewis' initial estimates). [Jackson pp. 8-9 and 13]

President Jefferson procured passports for Lewis from the British and French legations on February 28 and March 1, 1803 [Jackson, pp. 16-17]. At this time the Louisiana Purchase had not been made nor was it contemplated. There was no Spanish passport, however. In fact, the Spanish were adamantly opposed to Jefferson's scheme. Near the end of November 1802, Jefferson asked the minister from Spain, Carlos Martinez de Yrujo, if the Spanish court would "take it badly, that the Congress decree the formation of a group of travelers, who would form a small caravan and go and explore the course of the Missouri River in which they would nominally have the objective of investigating everything which might contribute to the progress of commerce; but that in reality it would have no other view than the advancement of the geography." Yrujo replied that "an expedition of this nature could not fail to give umbrage to our Government." Jefferson dropped the topic, but Yrujo later warned his superior that the President "might attempt to perpetuate the fame of his administration . . . by discovering or attempting at least to discover the way by which the Americans may some day extend their population and their influence up to the coast of the South Sea [the Pacific]." [Jackson, pp. 4-5].

On about March 15, 1803, Meriwether Lewis arrived in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (today's West Virginia), to obtain rifles and equipment for the expedition. He had looked at available military stores in Philadelphia at an earlier date, but did not like what he saw. Secretary of War Henry Dearborn ordered the officials at all federal armories to cooperate with Lewis. The Harpers Ferry arsenal was a new facility at that time, and had just begun turning out weapons in 1800. It was one of two government arsenals, the other being in Springfield, Massachusetts (it began production in 1795). At Harpers Ferry, Lewis ordered rifles from the military stores. He also obtained other necessities for the expedition, including scalping knives, pipe tomahawks, and an iron boat frame. The iron boat frame detained him longer than he had expected, and he stayed in Harpers Ferry for about a month. It seems that the boat frame was Lewis' idea, and only he could direct the artificers in its fabrication. It was made in two sections, each weighing 22 pounds, which could be fitted together to form the skeleton of a boat of 40 feet in length. This boat would be covered with animal hides and sealed together with pitch. This special boat could be used high in the mountains if they were unable to make dugout canoes.

Besides procuring equipment, Lewis was also expected to take crash courses in several disciplines to round out his training as leader of the expedition. It is important to remember that the Lewis and Clark Expedition was not mounted as a stunt, merely proving that one could reach the Pacific Coast and return. The expedition was a scientific endeavor as well as a political and diplomatic one. With only the precedent of the voyages of James Cook, Lewis was instructed to compile scientific data on every aspect of the terrain through which he would pass. He was prepared for this by Jefferson during the period he served as the President's personal secretary, and during the Spring of 1803 by astronomer Andrew Ellicott, physician Dr. Benjamin Rush, botanist Dr. Benjamin Smith Barton, surveyor and mathematician Robert Patterson, and anatomist Dr. Caspar Wistar.

Lewis also spent his time in Philadelphia procuring supplies with the aid of Israel Whelan, the Purveyor of Public Supplies. Lewis had a $1,000 draft from the War Department, and he spent it with Whelan's help. Whelan dashed about the city procuring such items as "portable soup," medicine, special uniforms made of drab cloth, tents, tools, kettles, tobacco, corn mills, wine, gunpowder in lead canisters, medical and surgical supplies, and Indian presents.

In addition to all of these activities, Lewis most certainly visited the famous museum of Charles Willson Peale, then located on the second floor of Independence Hall. The museum included paintings of Revolutionary heroes by Peale, as well as paintings of the bird and animal species of North America. Many fine specimens of everything from toads to a full fossil skeleton of a mammoth were on display, not to mention a unique collection of Indian artifacts from far and wide. Lewis absorbed much useful information in this museum.

Lewis left Philadelphia on June 1 and traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Jefferson and make final arrangements for his journey to the Pacific. These included writing a long letter on June 19 to an old friend, William Clark, asking him to be a co-leader of the expedition and to recruit men in his area. Lewis told Clark the real destination of their mission (the Pacific Coast), but told him to use a cover story that the mission was to go up the Mississippi River to its source for his recruitment. Lewis concluded by saying "Thus my friend you have so far as leisure will at this time permit me to give it you, a summary view of the plan, the means and the objects of this expedition. If therefore there is anything under those circumstances, in this enterprise, which would induce you to participate with me in it's fatiegues, it's dangers and it's honors, believe me there is no man on earth with whom I should feel equal pleasure in sharing them as with yourself." Lewis also hinted at secret news just received by President Jefferson: the French had offered the entire territory of Louisiana to the United States for $15 million.

Jefferson's final instructions to Lewis were dated June 20, 1803. [Jackson pp. 61-66]. Jefferson also procured orders authorizing the enlistment of privates and non-coms from Secretary of War Henry Dearborn, as well as blank commission forms. The President gave Lewis a "letter of general credit" dated July 4, 1803. On July 3, 1803, official news arrived in the nation's capital - Robert Livingston and James Monroe had purchased the Louisiana Territory from Napoleon's France. The news was published in the Washington papers on July 4, adding to the festivities. Lewis may have joined in the celebrations - certainly U.S. ownership of Louisiana changed several aspects of the mission he was about to undertake.

Lewis left Washington on July 5, 1803, for Harpers Ferry, where he picked up the over 3,500 pounds of supplies and equipment he had amassed to take overland to the Pittsburgh area. Lewis wrote that on July 7 he shot his "guns and examined the several articles which had been manufactured for me at this place; they appear to be well executed." The Harpers Ferry-made items probably included the 15 rifles, 24 pipe tomahawks, 36 tomahawks for Indian presents, 24 large knives, 15 powder horns and pouches, 15 pairs of bullet molds, 15 wipers or gun worms, 15 ball screws, 15 gun slings, extra parts of locks and tools for replacing arms, 40 fish giggs such as the Indians use with a single barb point, 1 small grindstone and the collapsible iron frame for a canoe. Lewis left Harpers Ferry for the West on July 8. He hired a man named William Linnard with a Conestoga Wagon to haul the supplies to Pittsburgh. The items were so heavy that Linnard had to obtain another wagon.

At Elizabeth, Pennsylvania, (south of Pittsburgh on the Monongehela River), Lewis was held up for over a month waiting for his 55-foot keelboat to be built. William Clark answered Lewis' letter asking him to join the expedition on July 18, and followed up with another letter on July 24. But Lewis did not receive these letters with any speed, and as late as July 26 was worried that Clark had not received his message or did not care to join the expedition. Lewis was going to ask Lt. Moses Hooke, stationed at Pittsburgh, to accompany him if he did not hear from Clark. On August 3 Secretary of War Henry Dearborn approved Hooke's participation in the expedition, but by the same date Lewis had received both of Clark's letters.

On August 31, 1803, the keelboat was completed and Meriwether Lewis began his journey down the Ohio. It is believed that Lewis also purchased what later became known as the "Red Pirogue" at this time, a single-masted boat rowed with seven oars. On September 3, Lewis had to discharge one of the hands he hired to take the boat down the Ohio. It seems that none of the hands or the soldiers recruited for this leg of the trip became part of the expedition, with the exception of George Shannon and John Colter. On September 8 at Wheeling, Virginia, a Doctor Patterson volunteered to go with Lewis; Patterson never went, because he was an alcoholic. Lewis investigated ancient Indian mounds on his way down the river at what is now Creek Mounds State Historic Site near Kent, West Virginia. The next day Lewis first mentioned his Newfoundland dog Seaman in the journals. The water in the Ohio was low, causing long portages at various points.

Lewis reached Cincinnati, Ohio on September 28, 1803, where he talked with Dr. William Goforth about fossil finds in the area. Dr. Goforth was a local physician who was excavating the fossil remains of a mastodon at the Big Bone Lick in Kentucky. Lewis traveled to Big Bone Lick himself by October 4, and sent a box of specimens back to President Jefferson, along with an extremely detailed letter describing the finds of Goforth. The letter weighed the pros and cons of whether the tusks found by Goforth belonged to a mammoth or to another animal. The letter demonstrated how well Lewis had learned the scant knowledge of the period regarding fossil remains, and seems to reveal a personal interest in the subject. It is by far the lengthiest surviving letter written by Meriwether Lewis. Lewis spent five days at Big Bone Lick.

On October 14, 1803, the keelboat arrived in Clarksville, Indiana, where Lewis joined William Clark, his slave York, and the "young men from Kentucky" including Joseph and Reubin Field, recruited by Clark on August 1, and Charles Floyd and George Gibson. John Colter officially enlisted on October 15, George Shannon and John Shields on the 19th, Nathaniel Hale Pryor and William Bratton on the 20th. These so-called "nine young men from Kentucky" formed the backbone of the expedition's crew. Whatever inexperience they may have suffered from in October 1803 was rectified quickly at Camp Wood and along the trail in 1804-06. We don't know if these men met Lewis' initial criteria, but they certainly grew into the role as time went on, and hindsight shows that Clark could not have chosen better.

The expedition got under way once more on October 27, moving down the Ohio to Fort Massac, Illinois, by November 11. Today a replica of the American fort as it looked when Lewis and Clark visited in 1803 stands on the site. Lewis hired interpreter George Drouillard and gained volunteers from the U.S. military at Fort Massac: John Newman and Joseph Whitehouse of Daniel Bissell's 1st Infantry Regiment. These were the first active-duty military personnel added to the Corps of Discovery. The most important addition at Massac was Drouillard, or "Drewyer" as his name is most often spelled in the journals. Born north of present-day Detroit, Michigan, Drouillard was half French and half Shawnee Indian. Drouillard had "the right stuff" the expedition lacked to this point - he was a real frontiersman in the mold of Daniel Boone or Simon Kenton, by far the best hunter and woodsman of the entire expedition. Drouillard was hired as an interpreter for $25 per month, and was not an enlisted man or in the chain of military command (sergeants made $8 per month, corporals $7, and privates $5).

On November 13 the Corps left Fort Massac, arriving in the vicinity of modern Cairo, Illinois on the 14th. Here Lewis and Clark worked jointly on their first scientific research and description; to study the geography at the junction of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. Lewis and Clark were learning to use surveying instruments and astronomy by working together. They also measured and compared the speed of the currents and the volume of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. On November 16, 1803, they began the diplomatic phase of their journey when they visited the Wilson City area of Mississippi County, Missouri and met with Delaware and Shawnee Indian chiefs. They probably took the occasion to inform the Indian chiefs of the impending change in government in Louisiana from Spain to the United States. They ended their surveys at Cairo on November 19, and proceeded up the Mississippi River, now working against the current. At Cape Girardeau Lewis attended a horse race, and met the attractive daughter of Louis Lorimier.

Lewis and Clark stopped to describe and climb Tower Rock on November 25, and arrived at Fort Kaskaskia, Illinois on the 29th. Today Fort Kaskaskia State Historic Site, high on a bluff above the river, shows the outlines of the earthen portion of its fortifications in a park-like setting. In 1803, Kaskaskia was the U.S. Army post furthest north and furthest west. Kaskaskia was a town of 467 people when Lewis and Clark visited in 1803. Six soldiers enlisted at Kaskaskia from Russell Bissell's Company, 1st U.S. Infantry Regiment: Sgt. John Ordway and privates Peter M. Weiser, Richard Windsor, Patrick Gass, John Boley, and John Collins. In addition, John Dame, John Robertson, Ebeneezer Tuttle, Issac White, and Alexander Hamilton Willard of Capt. Amos Stoddard's company, U.S. Corps of Artillery, also enlisted for the journey. This was a very important crop of men who added immeasurably to the success of the expedition. Francois Labiche, another half-Indian half-Frenchman, enlisted with the expedition on November 30. Another boat, the "White Pirogue," may have been acquired at Kaskaskia; orders stated that Lewis and Clark were to have the use "of the best boat at the Post." Clark and the men of the Corps departed Kaskaskia on December 3, and camped just below Ste. Genevieve. Lewis remained at Kaskaskia, probably meeting with locals and taking care of the military and paperwork sides of the expedition. On December 4 Clark and the men moved further up the river, passing Ste. Genevieve on the left side, a very prosperous town of about 1,000 residents - equal in size to St. Louis in 1803. Clark and the men next viewed the remains of Fort De Chartres, abandoned for over 30 years, on the right side.

On December 6, Lewis left Kaskaskia and traveled to Cahokia along the Illinois roads. Both Lewis and Clark arrived in Cahokia on December 7.