You’ve seen the paintings. Two men in buckskins standing on a rocky precipice, pointing heroically toward the Pacific while a stoic Sacagawea looks on. They’re everywhere—in school textbooks, on National Park brochures, and plastered across the internet.
But here is the thing.
Almost none of those famous lewis and clark images are real. At least, they aren't "real" in the sense that they were captured during the expedition. There were no cameras in 1804. More surprisingly, there wasn't even a professional artist on the payroll.
When Meriwether Lewis and William Clark set off into the Louisiana Purchase, they carried rifles, journals, and a crapload of whiskey. They didn't bring a painter. This left a massive visual hole in American history that was later filled by artists who never actually saw the "Corps of Discovery" in action.
If you're looking for the truth behind the visuals, you have to dig past the romanticized oil paintings of the 1920s.
The Scarcity of Genuine Lewis and Clark Images
Most people assume the journals are packed with sketches. Honestly, they aren't. While the journals contain roughly 3,000 pages of text, the actual drawings are few and far between.
Captain Meriwether Lewis was the primary "illustrator," if you can call him that. He wasn't a pro. He was a soldier with a decent eye for detail. His sketches were purely functional. You'll find a drawing of a leaf, the head of a "Brant" (a type of goose), or the specific shape of a trout's fin.
These weren't meant to be art. They were data.
William Clark was the map guy. His visual contribution to the lewis and clark images archive is mostly cartographic. He drew remarkably accurate maps of river bends and mountain ranges. Sometimes he’d sketch a Flathead Indian burial scaffold or a Chinook canoe, but it was always about recording facts, not capturing a mood.
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The Problem with Patrick Gass
One of the earliest "visual" records we have comes from Sergeant Patrick Gass. He published his journal in 1807, years before the official Lewis and Clark journals hit the shelves.
The book had illustrations.
The problem? They were woodcuts made by people who had never been west of the Mississippi. They depict the explorers in odd, stylized clothing that looks more like European military garb than the rugged, rotting elk-skin suits they were actually wearing by the time they hit the coast.
The Portraits: What Did They Really Look Like?
If you search for lewis and clark images today, the first thing that pops up is usually the pair of oil portraits by Charles Willson Peale.
These are actually legit. Mostly.
Peale painted them in 1807, shortly after the men returned to Philadelphia. If you want to know what Lewis and Clark looked like when they weren't covered in mud and mosquito bites, these are your best bet.
- Meriwether Lewis: Peale captures him looking somewhat intense, which fits the historical record of his moody, introspective personality.
- William Clark: He looks a bit more approachable, reflecting his role as the "man-manager" of the group.
Interestingly, Lewis actually posed for a separate portrait wearing a fur tippet (a shoulder cape) given to him by the Shoshone chief Cameahwait. It’s one of the few instances where we see an actual piece of expedition "costume" in a contemporary image.
The "After-the-Fact" Masters: Catlin and Bodmer
Since there were no artists on the actual trip, historians often look to George Catlin and Karl Bodmer for context.
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Catlin traveled the Missouri River in the 1830s. He met William Clark in St. Louis and used the aging explorer as a mentor. His paintings of the Mandan and Sioux tribes are often used to illustrate Lewis and Clark stories because he saw the cultures before they were completely decimated by smallpox and forced removal.
Then there’s Karl Bodmer.
He was a Swiss artist who came through in 1833. His work is arguably more important than anything Lewis or Clark drew themselves. Why? Because he was a master of detail. When you see a high-quality image of a Mandan earth lodge or a specific tribal headdress in a documentary about the expedition, it’s almost always a Bodmer.
He captured the look of the world Lewis and Clark moved through, even if he arrived 25 years late to the party.
Why the Misconceptions Persist
We love a good myth.
The vast majority of the "iconic" lewis and clark images were created during the 1904 Centennial. This was the era of the "Great American Mythos." Artists like Charles Russell and N.C. Wyeth created sweeping, dramatic scenes of the expedition.
They are beautiful. They are also total fiction.
In these paintings, Sacagawea is often shown as a "guide" leading the men through the wilderness. In reality, her most important role was as a translator and a "white flag." A woman and a baby traveling with a group of armed men signaled to Native tribes that the party wasn't a war party.
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The images of her pointing the way over the Rockies? Those were largely made up to fit a 20th-century narrative of manifest destiny.
Actionable Ways to Use and Identify Real Images
If you're a teacher, a history buff, or just someone who hates being lied to by AI-generated "historical" art, here is how you sort through the noise.
Look for the Notebook Texture
The real sketches from the journals are on yellowish, foxed paper. They are small. If the image looks like a sprawling landscape with perfect perspective, it isn't from the journals. Check the American Philosophical Society archives—they hold the original notebooks.
Check the "First Contact" Dates
If an image claims to show a specific encounter with the Nez Perce or the Clatsop, check the artist's name. If it’s anyone other than Lewis or Clark, it’s a recreation.
Verify the Gear
The Corps of Discovery used very specific equipment. They had a massive iron-framed boat (which failed), Girardoni air rifles, and specific uniforms that didn't last long. If an image shows them in pristine colonial-era tricorn hats in the middle of the Rocky Mountains, you're looking at a romanticized fake.
Use Primary Source Repositories
Don't just use Google Images. Go to the source:
- The Library of Congress: They have the digital scans of the original maps.
- The Beinecke Library at Yale: This is where many of the "Voorhis" collection maps ended up.
- The Missouri Historical Society: They hold many of the actual artifacts, which are better visual records than many of the paintings.
The truth is that the visual history of the Lewis and Clark expedition is a puzzle. We have bits of hair, a few compasses, some rough sketches of fish, and a lot of maps.
The "epic" scenes only exist in our imagination.
And maybe that's okay. The lack of photos or professional paintings forces us to actually read the journals to understand what they saw. It makes the history more of a scavenger hunt than a movie.
To get started on your own visual research, head over to the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail website. They’ve done the hard work of tagging which images are "contemporary" (from the era) and which are "modern interpretations." It's the best way to make sure the lewis and clark images you're looking at are the real deal.