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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] William Clark Biography CLARK, William (1770–1838). An American soldier and explorer, brother of George Rogers Clark (q.v.), and the associate of Meriwether Lewis on the famous Lewis and Clark expedition (q.v.). He was born near Charlottesville, Va.; removed with his family to the site of Louisville, Ky., in 1784; entered the army in 1791; and served as a lieutenant of infantry, under General Wayne, against the Indians, in 1794. He resigned, owing to ill health, in 1796; but in 1803 was recommissioned as a second lieutenant, and from 1804 to 1806 shared with his friend Meriwether Lewis the command of an exploring party which, leaving St. Louis in May, 1804, crossed the continent, reaching the mouth of the Columbia River in November, 1805, and arrived at St. Louis on its return in September, 1806. He was commissioned brigadier general of militia in 1807, served as Indian agent for the Territory of Upper Louisiana, was Governor of Missouri Territory from 1813 to 1821, and acted as Superintendent of Indian Affairs at St. Louis from 1822 until his death. In 1828 he laid out Paducah, Ky., and in 1830 negotiated the Treaty of Prairie du Chien. Consult the biographical sketch by Coues in vol. i of his History of the Expedition Under the Command of Lewis and Clark (New York, 1893), and the other authorities referred to under Lewis and Clark Expedition, The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. V (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 403. |