The Expedition Campsites Historic Trail

The Expedition Campsites Historic Trail begins at the White House in Washington DC, where Army Captain Meriwether Lewis lived and worked as President Thomas Jefferson’s private secretary in 1801-03. Lewis left the White House on July 5, 1803 to begin his journey to the Pacific Coast; he returned to report back to President Jefferson on December 28, 1806. By all logic, the expedition began when Lewis left the White House to explore the routes across the continent to the mouth of the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest. The exact composition of the elite military unit known as the “Corps of Volunteers for Northwestern Discovery,” which he and William Clark co-led, wasn’t settled until the expedition left Fort Mandan in North Dakota on April 7, 1805.

The campsites table lists the White House as number 1. There are 82 campsite entries east of the expedition’s winter camp at Wood River, Illinois, near the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers (out of a total of 573 campsites). In addition, the book features 182 tourist destinations east of their Wood River Camp (out of a total of 805 destinations).

The Historic Campsites Table is as close to the true historic trail of the Lewis and Clark Expedition as we can determine in the 21st century. Many aspects of the landscape have changed over the last 200 years. The Key Guide on this website is contained in a 23 page spreadsheet in the Lewis and Clark Road Trips book. There are also nine topological maps with the 573 campsite locations in the book, but the map references are found only in the book. You may view the book maps on Google, where the entire book is available as a Search Inside the Book. The topo maps are double page spreads, 18 x 12 inches, at the start of Regions 1-9 chapters.

The primary location data is based on decades of research by Bob Bergantino. Cross referencings to the journals and collating the dated entries by geographical location was done by Henry Gale.

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