The Nine Young Men From Kentucky
Prologue:
While still in Washington City, Meriwether Lewis drafts the plan and invitation addressed to the one man he hopes will accept his offer, William Clark. Lewis has confided in him through this written communication that Clark will hold to the secrecy of this Enterprise. In this letter Lewis outlines the Mission, the Plan, the Purchase of Louisiana, and requests that Clark recruit the best frontiersman in his local neighboring country. With this entry, Lewis asks Clark to “engage some good hunters, stout , healthy unmarried men, accustomed to the woods, and capable of bearing bodily fatigue in a pretty considerable degree.”
Lewis lays out the objectives of this enterprise with the hope it will capture the interest and imagination of his old friend and past brother in arms. If he truly knows his friend, Clark could never pass up this opportunity to be a part of an enterprise that could change the fortunes of a young nation busting at the seams to reach its destiny. The only question was whether Clark was able to release himself from the obligations in which he was currently engaged.
Lewis closed his secret communique with one of the greatest invitations ever offered to any one individual. He wrote; “if therefore there is anything under those circumstances, in this enterprise, which would induce you to participate with me in its fatigues, its dangers and its honors, believe me there is no man on earth with whom I should feel equal pleasure in sharing them as with yourself.”
Now, Lewis had to wait in hopes that his good friend was up to the task to accept his given mission. How many times must William Clark read and reread this communication he was requested not to divulge.
On Aug 3 Lewis received Clark’s reply written July 18th, one day after receiving his invitation. He replied; “I will cheerfully join you ….and partake of the dangers, difficulties, and fatigues, …..This is an undertaking fraited with many difficulties, but my friend I do assure you that no man lives with whom I would prefer to undertake such a trip as yourself.” Thus the names of Lewis & Clark were forever joined in the annals of American History and the men Clark recruited for the expedition became identified as the Nine Young Men from Kentucky.