Start of the Lewis and Clark expedition: August 31st, 1803. (Months Past).

CAPTAIN MERIWETHER Lewis, aged twenty-nine, set off from Pittsburgh by boat at the end of August with a party of men and his Newfoundland dog, Seaman, to begin the first American expedition to the Pacific overland (Andrew Mackenzie had crossed Canada to the Pacific in the 1790s). At Louisville he picked up his chosen co-leader, Lieutenant William Clark, who was four years older.

The two men, both from uppercrust Virginia planter families, had become friends in the army. Lewis had been personal assistant to President Thomas Jefferson, who authorised the expedition to find a water ...

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