Historical markers: Lewis County

County Named, 1806*

Marker Number: 803
County: Lewis
Location: Vanceburg, Courthouse lawn, KY 59, 3037

Description: For Meriwether Lewis of Lewis and Clark expedition, sent out by President Jefferson to explore the northwest, 1804-05 [1803-06]. Followed the Missouri River to source, crossed mountains, then Columbia River to Pacific. Lewis born Va., 1774. US army, 1795; captain, 1800. Private Secretary to Jefferson, 1801-03. Terr. Gov. of Louisiana, 1807-09. Died, 1809, buried in Tennessee.

(Reverse) Kentucky was the first state to name a county in honor of Meriwether Lewis and one of the members of the expedition. Kentuckian William Clark did not have a county named in his honor because Kentucky already had a Clark County – named in honor of his brother George Rogers Clark in 1793.