In Washington City, President Thomas Jefferson hears news of Meriwether Lewis and writes to him asking for a first-hand account of his progress. He warns that any further delays may lose a year in the end.
Thomas Jefferson
by James Sharples
Courtesy Independence National Historical Park.
Washington Apr. 23. 1803.
Dear Sir
Lieutt. Wilson told me you would leave Frederic [Frederick, Maryland] the 18th. inst. & that you had been detained till then at Harper’s ferry, where Capt Murray also told me he had seen you. I have no doubt you have used every possible exertion to get off, and therefore we have only to lament what cannot be helped, as the delay of a month now may lose a year in the end.—
. . . . .
let me hear from you on your reciept of this, and inform me of your prospect of getting off. I have letters here for you from your friends in Albemarle. Accept my affectionate salutations.
Th: Jefferson[1]Thomas Jefferson to Meriwether Lewis, 23 April 1803, Founders Online, National Archives, founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-40-02-0186. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, … Continue reading
Notes
| ↑1 | Thomas Jefferson to Meriwether Lewis, 23 April 1803, Founders Online, National Archives, founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-40-02-0186. [Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 40, 4 March–10 July 1803, ed. Barbara B. Oberg (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013), 263–264.] |
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- The Lewis and Clark Expedition: Day by Day by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2018). The story in prose, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
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