William Clark - Encyclopedia

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES

CLARK, WILLIAM (1770-1838), the well-known explorer, was the youngest brother of the foregoing. He was born in Caroline county, Virginia, on the 1st of August 1770. At the age of fourteen he removed with his parents to Kentucky, settling at the falls of the Ohio (Louisville). He entered the United States army as a lieutenant of infantry in March 1792, and served under General Anthony Wayne against the Indians in 1 794. In July 1796 he resigned his commission on account of ill-health. In 1803-1806, with Meriwether Lewis, he commanded the famous exploring expedition across the continent. to the mouth of the Columbia river, and was commissioned second lieutenant in March 1804 and first lieutenant in January 1806. In February he again resigned from the army. He then served for a few years as brigadier-general of the Louisiana territorial militia, as Indian agent for "Upper Louisiana," as territorial governor of Missouri in 1813-1820, and as superintendent of Indian affairs at St Louis from 1822 until his death. there on the 1st of September 1838.