Hickman County was established in 1807 and named in honor of Edwin Hickman, a long hunter and gallant explorer who was killed by Indians near the present site of Centerville in 1791. Lewis County was established in 1843 and named in honor of Meriwether Lewis, a captain in the Army of the United States and onetime secretary to President Jefferson, later co-commander of the Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Pacific Northwest. En route to Washington in 1809, he died violently at the spot on the Natchez Trace now marked by the national monument bearing his name.