Since the time of Columbus, explorers dreamed of a water passage across the North American continent. President Thomas Jefferson shared this dream. He conceived the Corps of Discovery to travel up the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains and westward along possible river routes to the Pacific Ocean. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark led this expedition of 1804 6. Along the way they filled hundreds of notebook pages with observations of the geography, Indian tribes, and natural history of the trans-Mississippi West.

This volume includes Lewis's and Clark's journals beginning in August...

The dependable and matter-of-fact John Ordway was one of the mainstays of the Corps of Discovery, promoted early on to sergeant and serving as an able leader during the captains' absence. Fascinated by the peoples and places he encountered, Ordway became the most faithful journalist on the expedition recording information not found elsewhere and making an entry for every day during the expedition. Ordway later married and became a prosperous owner of two plantations in Missouri. His honest and informative account, which remained undiscovered for a century, offers an unforgettable glimpse of...

An accomplished carpenter and boat builder, Patrick Gass proved to be an invaluable and well-liked member of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Promoted to sergeant after the death of Charles Floyd, Gass was almost certainly responsible for supervising the building of Forts Mandan and Clatsop. His records of those forts and of the earth lodges of the Mandans and Hidatsas are particularly detailed and useful. Gass was the last survivor of the Corps of Discovery, living until 1870 long enough to see trains cross a continent that he had helped open. His engaging and detailed journal became the...

Lively and curious, possessing a keen eye for detail and a knack for skin-dressing, Private Joseph Whitehouse produced an account that stands as the only surviving record by any army private in the Corps of Discovery expedition. In simple and well-paced sentences he painted full portraits of the unusual group of men he accompanied on one of the greatest adventures in American history. Whitehouse's journal is published here in full for the first time including entries from a second copy of his journal that extend the narrative for five months beyond previous editions. Although Whitehouse's...