It would be their responsibility to not only explore this strange new land, but to map it out as accurately as they could. He tasked Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to chart a suitable route that crossed through the lands west of the Mississippi River and ended in the Pacific Ocean, to open the area for future expansion and settlement. One of his goals was to plot the most direct and practicable water communication route across the continent, for the purposes of commerce. In 1785, the Clark family relocated to a plantation in Kentucky. Unlike Lewis, Clark never received a formal education, but loved to read and was, for the most part, self-educated. He was raised by a rural and agricultural slave-holding family that profited from maintaining several estates. William Clark was four years older than Lewis, having been born in Virginia in 1770. The two men got to know each other very well and when President Jefferson needed someone he could trust to lead an important expedition, he asked Meriwether Lewis to take command. He gained rank over the next couple of years and served, at one point, under the command of a man named William Clark.Īs fate would have it, just after leaving the army in 1801, he was asked to become the secretary of a former Virginia associate - the newly elected president, Thomas Jefferson. Shortly thereafter, he enrolled in the local militia and two years later joined the official United States Army, receiving a commission as an officer. He apparently applied himself as much to his formal education as he had to his natural upbringing, as he graduated at the age of nineteen. Much of this came to an end at the age of thirteen, when he was sent back to Virginia to get a proper education. He spent the next several years absorbing all that he could about nature and the great outdoors, becoming a skilled hunter and extremely knowledgeable. Meriwether Lewis was born in Virginia in 1774, but at the age of five his father passed away and he moved with his family to Georgia. Their responsibilities included not only charting out a new trade route, but also to gather as much information as they possibly could about the land, plants, animals, and indigenous peoples present.Ī tall task, to say the least. They were tasked to lead a small band of men into the unknown and return to enlighten people in the already settled eastern states and territories to what possibilities lay in the West. Talk about uncharted territory.Įven so, two men - Meriwether Lewis and William Clark - were chosen based on their experience and, in the case of Lewis, their personal connection to President Thomas Jefferson. Imagine that - these men set out across the country before people knew that the Rockies existed. There was sparse and undetailed information available regarding the enormous plains that lie ahead and no knowledge or expectation of the vast range of the Rocky Mountains even farther west. Louis in 1804 and returned in 1806, after having made contact with countless Native American tribes, documenting hundreds of plant and animal species, and mapping the way to the Pacific - although they found no water route that took them all the way there, as was their original intention.Īlthough the mission sounds straightforward, there were no detailed maps that could possibly help them in understanding the challenges they might face during such a task. It was commissioned by then-president, Thomas Jefferson, and was technically a military mission. What Lewis and Clark set out to do was find and chart out a water route that could connect the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. The Lewis and Clark Expedition in Context.Westward Expansion and Manifest Destiny.
The Lewis and Clark Expedition in Detail.What Was the Lewis and Clark Expedition?.
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