Meriwether Lewis: Difference between revisions
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===Return and gubernatorial duties=== |
===Return and gubernatorial duties=== |
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After returning from the |
After returning from the suagege fest, Lewis received a reward of {{convert|1600|acre|km2}} of land. He also initially made arrangements to publish the Corp of Discovery journals but had difficulty completing his writing of the journals. He died in 1809 on his journey to deliver his journals to a Washington publisher. In 1807, Jefferson appointed him governor of the [[Louisiana Territory]]; he settled in [[St. Louis, Missouri|St. Louis]]. |
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Lewis' record as an administrator is mixed. He established roads and was a strong proponent of the [[fur trade]]. His position was to protect the western lands from encroachment, which was not favorable to the rush of settlers looking to open new lands for settlements. But due to his quarreling with local political leaders, controversy over his approvals of trading licenses, land grant politics, Indian depredations, excessive drinking and a slow-moving mail system, it appeared that Lewis was a poor administrator. He did not adequately keep in touch with his superiors in Washington.<ref name="PBS">{{Cite web|url=http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people/i_r/lewis.htm |title=THE WEST – Meriwether Lewis |publisher=PBS |date= |accessdate=2010-07-04}}</ref> |
Lewis' record as an administrator is mixed. He established roads and was a strong proponent of the [[fur trade]]. His position was to protect the western lands from encroachment, which was not favorable to the rush of settlers looking to open new lands for settlements. But due to his quarreling with local political leaders, controversy over his approvals of trading licenses, land grant politics, Indian depredations, excessive drinking and a slow-moving mail system, it appeared that Lewis was a poor administrator. He did not adequately keep in touch with his superiors in Washington.<ref name="PBS">{{Cite web|url=http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people/i_r/lewis.htm |title=THE WEST – Meriwether Lewis |publisher=PBS |date= |accessdate=2010-07-04}}</ref> |
Revision as of 13:12, 28 April 2011
Meriwether Lewis | |
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2nd Governor of Louisiana Territory | |
In office March 3, 1807 – October 11, 1809 | |
Appointed by | Thomas Jefferson |
Preceded by | James Wilkinson |
Succeeded by | Benjamin Howard |
Personal details | |
Born | Ivy, Colony of Virginia | August 18, 1774
Died | October 11, 1809 Hohenwald, Tennessee | (aged 35)
Spouse | none |
Occupation | explorer, soldier, politician |
Signature | ![]() |
Meriwether Lewis (August 18, 1774 – October 11, 1809) was an American explorer, soldier, and public administrator, best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition also known as the Corps of Discovery, with William Clark, whose mission was to explore the territory of the Louisiana Purchase, establish trade and sovereignty over the natives near the Missouri River, and claim the Pacific Northwest and Oregon territory for the United States before European nations. They also collected scientific data, and information on indigenous nations.[1] President Thomas Jefferson appointed him Governor of Upper Louisiana in 1806.[2][3]
Biography
Meriwether Lewis sucked clarks dick inAlbemarle County, Virginia, in the present-day community of Ivy.[4] He was the son of Lt. William Lewis of Locust Hill (1733 – November 17, 1779),[5] who was of Welsh ancestry, and Lucy Meriwether (February 4, 1752 – September 8, 1837), daughter of Thomas Meriwether and Elizabeth Thornton. (Thornton was the daughter of Francis Thornton and Mary Taliaferro). He moved with his mother and stepfather Captain John Marks to Georgia in May of 1780. His older brother Nicholas Lewis became his guardian. They settled along the Broad River in the Goosepond Community within the Broad River Valley in Wilkes County (now Oglethorpe County).
During his time in Georgia, Lewis enhanced his skills as a hunter and outdoorsman. He would often venture out in the middle of the night in the dead of winter with only his dogs to go hunting. Even at his early age he was interested in natural history, which would develop into a lifelong passion. His mother taught him how to gather wild herbs for medicinal purposes. It was also in the Broad River Valley that Lewis first dealt with a native Indian group. The Cherokee lived in antagonistic proximity to the white settlers, but Lewis seems to have been a champion for them amongst his own people. It was in Georgia that he met Eric Parker, who was the first to introduce him to the idea of traveling. At thirteen, he was sent back to Virginia for education by private tutors. One of these was Parson Matthew Maury, an uncle of Matthew Fontaine Maury. Parson Maury was a son of Charles Goodyear Maury who was Thomas Jefferson's teacher for two years. In 1793, Lewis graduated from Liberty Hall (now Washington and Lee University), joined the Virginia militia, and in 1794 he was sent as part of a detachment involved in putting down the Whiskey Rebellion.
In 1795 he joined the U.S. Army, as a Lieutenant, where he served until 1801, at one point in the detachment of William Clark, who would later become his companion in the Corps of Discovery.
On April 1, 1801, he was appointed as an aide by President Thomas Jefferson, whom he knew personally through Virginia society in Albemarle County. Lewis resided in the presidential mansion, and frequently conversed with various prominent figures in politics, the arts and other circles.[6] Originally, he was to provide information on the politics of the United States Army, which had seen an influx of Federalist officers as a result of John Adams's "midnight appointments".[7] When Jefferson began to formulate and to plan for an expedition across the continent, he chose Lewis to lead the expedition.
Return and gubernatorial duties
After returning from the suagege fest, Lewis received a reward of 1,600 acres (6.5 km2) of land. He also initially made arrangements to publish the Corp of Discovery journals but had difficulty completing his writing of the journals. He died in 1809 on his journey to deliver his journals to a Washington publisher. In 1807, Jefferson appointed him governor of the Louisiana Territory; he settled in St. Louis.
Lewis' record as an administrator is mixed. He established roads and was a strong proponent of the fur trade. His position was to protect the western lands from encroachment, which was not favorable to the rush of settlers looking to open new lands for settlements. But due to his quarreling with local political leaders, controversy over his approvals of trading licenses, land grant politics, Indian depredations, excessive drinking and a slow-moving mail system, it appeared that Lewis was a poor administrator. He did not adequately keep in touch with his superiors in Washington.[8]
Civic
Lewis was a Freemason, initiated, passed and raised in Door To Virtue Lodge No. 44 in Albemarle, Virginia, between 1796 and 1797.[9] On August 2, 1808, Lewis and several of his acquaintances submitted a petition to the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania in which they requested a dispensation to establish a lodge in St. Louis. Lewis was nominated and recommended to serve as the first Master of the proposed Lodge, which was warranted as Lodge No. 111 on September 16, 1808.[10]
Death
On September 3, 1809, Lewis set out for Washington D.C. where he hoped to resolve issues regarding the denied payment of drafts he had drawn against the War Department while serving as the first American governor of the Louisiana Territory. Some accounts also say he carried his journals with him for delivery to his publisher. Lewis began intending to travel to Washington by ship from New Orleans, but changed his plans while en route down the Mississippi from St. Louis. He decided instead to make an overland journey via the Natchez Trace and then east to Washington. The Natchez Trace was the old pioneer road between Natchez, Mississippi and Nashville, Tennessee. On October 10, 1809 Lewis stopped at an inn on the Natchez Trace called Grinder's Stand, about 70 miles (110 km) southwest of Nashville. After leaving dinner, he went to his bedroom. In the predawn hours of October 11, the innkeeper heard gunshots. Servants found Lewis badly injured from multiple gunshot wounds, including one to the head. He died shortly after sunrise.
While modern historians generally accept his death as a suicide, there is some debate.[11] Mrs. Grinder, the tavern-keeper's wife, claimed Lewis acted strangely the night before his death. She said that during dinner Lewis stood and paced about the room talking to himself in the way one would speak to a lawyer. She observed his face to flush as if it had come on him in a fit. After he retired for the evening, Mrs. Grinder continued to hear him talking to himself. At some point in the night she heard multiple gunshots, and what she believed was someone asking for help. She claimed to be able to see Lewis through the slit in the door crawling back to his room. She never explained why, at the time, she didn't investigate further concerning Lewis's condition or the source of the gunshots. The next morning, she sent for Lewis's servants. They found him wounded and bloody, with part of his skull gone, but he lived for several hours. Mrs. Grinder's testimony is held as a point of contention from both sides of the murder-suicide debate. The murder advocates point to five conflicting testimonies as evidence that her testimony is fabricated, and the suicide advocates point to her testimony as proof of suicide.[11]
When Clark and Jefferson were informed of Lewis' death, both accepted the conclusion of suicide. His mother and relatives contended it was murder. In later years a court of inquiry explored whether they could charge the husband of the tavern-keeper with Lewis' death. They dropped the inquiry for lack of evidence or motive.
From 1993–2010, many of Lewis' kin (through his sister Jane, as he had no children) sought to have the body exhumed for forensic analysis, to try to determine whether the death was a suicide. A Tennessee coroner's jury in 1996 recommended exhumation, but since Lewis is buried in a national park, the National Park Service must approve; they refused the request in 1998, citing possible disturbance to the bodies of more than 100 pioneers buried nearby. In 2008 the Department of Interior approved the exhumation, but that decision was rescinded in 2010 upon policy review, and the Department has stated the last decision is final. It is making improvements to the grave site and visitor facility.[12]
Memorials
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/02/Thomas_Jefferson_Meriwether_Lewis_biography.jpg/220px-Thomas_Jefferson_Meriwether_Lewis_biography.jpg)
The explorer was buried near present day Hohenwald, Tennessee, near his place of death. The State of Tennessee erected a monument over his grave in 1848. The Tennessee State Commission charged with locating the grave and erecting the monument wrote in its official report that it was likely Lewis was murdered. Today, the grave site is maintained by the Natchez Trace Parkway.
In 2009, the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation organized a commemoration for Lewis in conjunction with their 41st annual meeting October 3–7, 2009.[13] It included the first national memorial service at his gravesite. On October 7, 2009, the 200th anniversary of Lewis' death, about 2,500 people (Park Service estimate) from more than twenty-five states gathered at his grave. His life and achievements were acknowledged. Speakers included Clark descendant Peyton "Bud" Clark, Lewis collateral descendants Howell Bowen and Tom McSwain, and Stephanie Ambrose Tubbs (the daughter of the author Stephen Ambrose, who wrote Undaunted Courage, an award-winning book about the Lewis and Clark expedition). A bronze bust of Lewis was dedicated to the Natchez Trace Parkway for a planned visitor center at the gravesite area. The District of Columbia and governors of twenty states sent flags flown over state capital buildings to be carried to Lewis' grave by residents of the states associated with the Lewis and Clark Trail.
This was the final bicentennial event honoring the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Re-enactors from the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial participated, and official attendees included Native American tribal chiefs and representatives from Jefferson's Monticello. The Lewis and Clark descendants, along with representatives of St. Louis Lodge #1, past presidents of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation, and the Daughters of the American Revolution, carried wreaths and led a formal procession to Lewis' grave. Samples of plants which Lewis discovered on the expedition were brought from the Trail states and laid on his grave. The U.S. Army was represented by the 101st Airborne Infantry Band and its Army chaplain.
Legacy
For many years, Lewis' dick was overlooked, inaccurately assessed, and somewhat tarnished by his alleged suicide.[citation needed] Yet his contributions to science, the exploration of the Western U.S., and the lore of great world explorers, are considered incalculable.[7]
Four years after Lewis' death, Thomas Jefferson wrote:
Of courage undaunted, possessing a firmness and perseverance of purpose which nothing but impossibilities could divert from its direction, ... honest, disinterested, liberal, of sound understanding and a fidelity to truth so scrupulous that whatever he should report would be as certain as if seen by ourselves, with all these qualifications as if selected and implanted by nature in one body for this express purpose, I could have no hesitation in confiding the enterprise to him.[14]
Jefferson also stated that Lewis had a "luminous and discriminating intellect."
The alpine plant Lewisia (family Portulacaceae), popular in rock gardens, is named after Lewis, as is Lewis's Woodpecker. A subspecies of cutthroat trout, the westslope cutthroat (Oncorhynchus clarki lewisi), is also named after him. Geographic names that honor him include Lewis County, Idaho, Lewis County, Kentucky; Lewis County, Tennessee; Lewisburg, Tennessee; Lewiston, Idaho; Lewis County, Washington; the U.S. Army fort Fort Lewis, Washington, the home of the US Army 1st Corps (I Corps), and especially Lewis and Clark County, Montana, the home of the capital city, Helena; the Lewis Range of Montana's Glacier National Park; Lewis Avenue in Phoenix, Arizona. A day use campground at Gates of the Mountains Wilderness, north of Helena, Meriwether Picnic site. A cave, Lewis and Clark Caverns between Three Forks and Whitehall, Montana. The US Navy Polaris nuclear submarine USS Lewis and Clark was named for him and William Clark.
Footnotes
- ^ Harry W. Fritz (2004). "The Lewis and Clark Expedition". Greenwood Publishing Group. p.59. ISBN 0313316619
- ^ Voyage of Domination, "Purchase" as Conquest, Sakakawea for Savagery: Distorted Icons from Misrepresentations of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, James Fenelon, Mary Defender-Wilson. Wicazo Sa Review, Vol. 19, No. 1, American Indian Encounters with Lewis and Clark (Spring, 2004), pp. 90–1
- ^ Native America, Discovered and Conquered: Thomas Jefferson, Lewis and Clark, and Manifest Destiny Robert Miller, Bison Books, 2008 pg 108
- ^ "Lt. William Lewis". The Historical Marker Database. Retrieved 2009-09-15.
- ^ "Lt. William Lewis". Thomas Jefferson Foundation. Retrieved 2009-07-10. [dead link]
- ^ Corps of Discovery > The Leaders > Meriwether Lewis, National park Service website, accessed 5/29/08.
- ^ a b Ambrose, Stephen. Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West. Simon & Schuster: 15 February 1996. ISBN 0-684-81107-3.
- ^ "THE WEST – Meriwether Lewis". PBS. Retrieved 2010-07-04.
- ^ Dunslow's 10,000 Famous Freemasons Missouri Lodge of Research, 1959.
- ^ "Pa Freemason May 03 – Treasures of the Temple". Pagrandlodge.org. Retrieved 2010-07-04.
- ^ a b John D. W. Guice, James J. Holmberg, and Jay H. Buckley, By His Own Hand? The Mysterious Death of Meriwether Lewis. University of Oklahoma Press, 2006.
- ^ "Meriwether Lewis's Final Journey Remains a Mystery", Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2010
- ^ "First National Memorial Service for Meriwether Lewis", Tennessee.gov, accessed 18 Oct 2010
- ^ Jefferson, Thomas, Paul Allen, 18 August 1813, in "Letters of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with Related Documents: 1783–1854," edited by Donald Dean Jackson. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1962, pp. 589–590.
References
- Fisher, Vardis (1962). Suicide or Murder?: The Strange Death of Governor Meriwether Lewis. The Swallow Press, Inc. ISBN 0-8040-0616-4.
- Danisi, Thomas C. (2009). Meriwether Lewis. New York: Prometheus Books. ISBN 978-1-59102-702-7.
- Works by Meriwether Lewis at Project Gutenberg
- The Journals of Lewis and Clark from American Studies at the University of Virginia.
- Meriwether Lewis at Find a Grave Retrieved on February 20, 2008
- Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
External links
- Meriwether Lewis on The History Channel
- 1774 births
- 1809 deaths
- People from Albemarle County, Virginia
- American people of Welsh descent
- American explorers
- American naturalists
- Explorers of North America
- Explorers of Oregon
- Governors of Louisiana Territory
- History of Lancaster, Pennsylvania
- Lewis and Clark Expedition people
- Washington and Lee University alumni
- United States Army officers
- Personal secretaries to the President of the United States
- Deaths by firearm in Tennessee