William Clark`s Map of the Lewis and Clark Trail
The Lower Missouri River
Westbound: St. Louis to Fort Mandan, 05/14/1804 through 10/24/1804.
Eastbound: Fort Mandan to St. Louis, 8/17/1806 through 9/23/1806.
On Google Maps.
On Captain William Clark's Map, overlays added by myself.
The main goals of the expedition were to find a route joining the Missouri River with the Columbia River, and to explore the territory along the way. This made St. Louis the obvious starting point, as that's where the Missouri River empties into the Mississippi River.
While still in St. Louis, Meriwether Lewis obtained maps of the Missouri River as far north as the Mandan Villages; the Missouri River had not been explored beyond that point by Americans or Europeans. Lewis also learned that the Mandan Villages were the trade center of the Northern Plains, bringing traders from the North West Company, the Hudson's Bay Company and St. Louis together with Crows, Assiniboines, Cheyennes, Kiowas and Arapahoes. That is where the Captains planned to spend the winter of 1804-1805 from the start. Upon reaching that location in October 1804 they constructed winter quarters which they called Fort Mandan, and remained there throughout the winter as planned.
At the top of the article, did you notice how quickly they made it from Fort Mandan to St. Louis, in comparison to the time it took to get from St. Louis to Fort Mandan? They set out in two small paddle boats and a large keelboat. The keelboat carried the majority of the party and was laden with dried edibles, ammunition, scientific instruments and twenty-one bales of presents for the Indians. While this vessel had sails, navigating upstream was often a task requiring intensive labor. On the return trip they floated downstream in light paddle craft, free of much of the load they were burdened with at the start of the journey.
