A Brief History of the Journals
of Meriwether Lewis, William Clark,
and the Corps of Discovery
President Jefferson gave Captain Lewis explicit instructions about keeping field
notes and diaries. The Corps was to to record details of geography, geology, and climate;
flora and fauna; and local inhabitants. As a safe
guard against loss, they were also instructed to periodically make copies of
their records. Once en route, Lewis ordered that all the Sergeants were to keep
diaries as well.
Click here to read a transcript of Jefferson’s instructions to Lewis.
Today, the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia holds the journals kept by Captains Lewis and Clark. Sgt. Gass’s journal is known only from its publication; his manuscript has long since disappeared or been destroyed. Sgt. Charles Floyd’s diary is at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. The Newberry Library owns two manuscript versions of Private Joseph Whitehouse’s diary.
In addition to the Whitehouse diary, the Newberry holds an extensive
collection of the various editions of the official histories of the expedition
and publications of the journals. Below is an annotated list of those editions
that were included in Lewis and Clark and the Indian Country.
Click here for more information regarding the provenance and publication of
the journals.
Joseph Whitehouse
Journal Commencing at the River Dubois [Wood River, IL]
May 14, 1804 – November 6, 1805
Joseph Whitehouse (1775?– ?) was the only private known to keep a journal. After deserting the army in 1817, Whitehouse and his unpublished diary disappeared from history. In 1860, Canon di Vivaldi, an Italian priest, loaned the diary, which he claimed was a gift from Whitehouse, to the New York Historical Society. In 1893, a Mrs. Haley retrieved the document to settle a debt owed by Vivaldi. She later sold it to historian Reuben Gold Thwaites who used the journal when preparing his version of the expedition’s history in 1904. Thwaites later sold the journal to Chicago book collector and Newberry trustee Edward Ayer, who gave it to the Library. In 1966, George W. White, a professor of geology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, discovered a paraphrased transcription of a previously unknown second volume of the journal in a Philadelphia bookstore. Urged on by White and his Illinois colleague, historian Donald Jackson, the Newberry added this unique item to its collection.
Patrick Gass
Journal of the Voyages and Travels of the Corps of Discovery, Under the
Command of Capt. Lewis and Capt. Clarke
Philadelphia: Matthew Carey, 1811
Sgt. Patrick Gass was the first member of the Corps of Discovery to publish an account of the expedition. Appearing in 1807, Gass’s journal became quite popular, with a London edition appearing in 1808 and a French translation two years later. Meriwether Lewis was angered by Gass’s publication, expecting that as the commander of the expedition, his report would be the first to appear.
Paul Allen
History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark,
to the Sources of the Missouri
Philadelphia: Bradford and Inskeep, 1814
At Jefferson’s suggestion, Clark commissioned Philadelphian Nicholas Biddle to edit the journals and write the history of the expedition. However, before his text went to press, Biddle turned its production over Paul Allen, a Philadelphia journalist, who saw it through to its completion. Biddle went on to become the president of the Bank of the United States.
Commonly referred to as the "Biddle Edition," only 1,417 copies of the narrative were printed. No other description of the expedition would appear for eighty years. It is important to note that this is a history of the expedition, not an edition of the journals. The Newberry’s copy is one of two given to Thomas Jefferson, who later presented it to Clark.
Elliott Coues
History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark
London: Henry Stevens & Son; New York: Francis P. Harper, 1893
Elliot Coues was an American naturalist, whose career included service in the United States Northern Boundary Commission and the United States Geological Survey. Also an historian of the American West, Coues published a heavily annotated edition of Biddle’s History of the Expedition in 1893. His four-volume work was instrumental in reviving interest in the expedition.
Reuben Gold Thwaites, ed.
Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 1804–1806
New York: Dodd Mead & Company, 1904-1905
In 1893, Reuben Gold Thwaites, second director of the Wisconsin State Historical Society, came across the manuscript of Sgt. Charles Floyd’s journal in the Society’s collection. Inspired by what he read there, Thwaites began to study the various accounts of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition--which incorporates the journals of Lewis, Clark, Floyd, and Whitehouse--is the first true publication of the journals, as distinguished from histories of the expedition. Upon publication of his eight volume work, Thwaites announced “We shall henceforth know Lewis and Clark as we never knew them before.”
Meriwether Lewis and John Ordway
The Journals of Captain Meriwether Lewis and Sergeant John Ordway, Kept
on the Expedition of Western Exploration, 1803–1806
Madison, WI: Publications of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1916
Purchased by the government for $300, Sergeant Ordway’s journal was used by Nicholas Biddle while he prepared the first official history of the expedition. Ordway’s journal was considered lost until 1913, when it was found by Biddle’s grandson among Biddle’s papers.
Gary Moulton, ed.
Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 13 volumes
Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, c1983–c2001
In 2001, Gary E. Moulton, Thomas C. Sorensen Professor of American History at the
University of Nebraska, completed the definitive edition of the journals. He is the recipient of the J. Franklin Jameson Award
of the American Historical Association for the editing of the Lewis and Clark
journals, and he won the Outstanding Research and Creative Activity Award from
the University of Nebraska.