William Clark

William Clark married Julia Hancock, a girl several years his junior, in 1808. They had five children. He named his eldest son Meriwether Lewis Clark, Sr. in the honor of his friend.

Julia died in 1820. He then married her cousin, Harriet Kennerly Radford. This marriage produced three more children. Harriet died in 1831, leaving him a widower for the second time.

He spent the last months of his life with his eldest son and died on September 1, 1838 at age 68.

William Clark was born on August 1, 1770, in Virginia, to John and Ann Rogers Clark. He was the ninth of their ten children.

He was primarily tutored at home and did not receive any formal schooling. When he was a child his family regularly participated in activities such as fox hunts, cockfights, and shooting tournaments.

His five elder brothers fought in the American Revolutionary War where his oldest brother, Jonathan, served as a colonel, and another brother, George, rose to the rank of general. After the war the two brothers arranged for their parents and siblings to relocate to Kentucky in 1785.

As a 19 year old William Clark joined a volunteer militia force under Major John Hardin in 1789. The next year, General Arthur St. Clair, governor of the Northwest Territory, commissioned him as a captain in the Clarksville, Indiana militia.

He served as an ensign and acting lieutenant under generals Charles Scott and James Wilkinson in 1791. In 1792, he enlisted in the Legion of the United States and was commissioned by President George Washington as a lieutenant of infantry under General Anthony Wayne.

Clark commanded the Chosen Rifle Company, which participated in the Battle of Fallen Timbers (1794) and successfully drove back the enemy securing a resounding victory for the U.S.

He was sent on a mission to New Madrid, Missouri, in 1795. However, his health began to suffer and he resigned from his commission in July 1796 and returned home to manage his parents’ estates.

During his years in the army he had become friends with a fellow army man, Meriwether Lewis, with whom he regularly corresponded in the years following his retirement. In 1803 he received a letter from Lewis that would completely change the course of his life.

William Clark was one of the leaders of the Lewis and Clark Expedition commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson shortly after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. The expedition which took over two years to complete was a huge success and immortalized both Clark and Lewis as major figures in the history of American exploration.