Day-by-Day / October 10, 1803

October 10, 1803

The Kentucky River

Carrollton, KY[1]No known record exists of Lewis’s travel between Big Bone Lick and Louisville. We do know that he had left Big Bone Lick before Thomas Rodney arrived there on 10 October and that he arrived at … Continue reading Meriwether Lewis takes his flotilla of boats closer to his rendezvous with William Clark. On or near this date, they pass or stop at the mouth of the Kentucky River.

The Kentucky River

On 11 October 1803, just a few days behind Lewis, Thomas Rodney describes the mouth of the Kentucky River and Port William, now known as Carrollton:

We passed the mouth of Kentucky River. This is a large river about the size of the Great Kanawa at [blank] but not so deep as there appears drift wood in it.

There is a pretty little town on the uper side with 6 or 7 brick houses in it and 15 to 20 wooden ones. The situation is pleasant.
Thomas Rodney[2]11 October 1803. Dwight L. Smith and Ray Swick, ed., A Journey Through the West: Thomas Rodney’s 1803 Journal from Delaware to the Mississippi Territory (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1997), … Continue reading

 

Notes

Notes
1 No known record exists of Lewis’s travel between Big Bone Lick and Louisville. We do know that he had left Big Bone Lick before Thomas Rodney arrived there on 10 October and that he arrived at the Falls of the Ohio on 14 October. Using Thomas Rodney’s journal and Cramer’s 1802 river guide, The Navigator, one conjecture is that Lewis stopped for the night at Carrollton near this date.
2 11 October 1803. Dwight L. Smith and Ray Swick, ed., A Journey Through the West: Thomas Rodney’s 1803 Journal from Delaware to the Mississippi Territory (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1997), 115.

Discover More

  • 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.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals: An American Epic of Discovery (abridged) by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2003). Selected journal excerpts, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals. by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 1983–2001). The complete story in 13 volumes.